"Stop looking at them." Greg snapped as they stood on the bleachers of the stadium, watching as their lacrosse team paraded around down on the field under the large lights. It was a very poor excuse for entertainment, considering that lacrosse was a sport just recently introduced to the school and so the team was...well, decent. However since football was in the fall, along with all the rest of the sports that people actually go to, lacrosse would just have to substitute as a sport to bring all the students together. It was a rather poor student section tonight, for there was some sort of test tomorrow for the kids who were taking some sort of rigorous math class that John hadn't bothered to sign up for. Calculus was enough for him. However it would seem that the impending test didn't keep Sherlock from coming out, and he and Victor sat together near the edge of the bleachers, wrapped together in a black blanket with travel thermoses filled with who knows what. They looked cozy together, and John had to admit that he would much rather be sitting there in a blanket than standing on top of the bleachers with the other idiot jocks who didn't make the lacrosse team, bare-chested with a letter painted on his chest in cold green paint, spelling out 'Gators' their team's mascot. It was a freezing night once the sun had sunken, and despite spring being on the way according to the calendar, it was ever so obvious that they were in for a couple more chilly weeks before the summer weather started moving in. Of course despite the entertainment playing out on the field, John was continuously distracted with his neighbor, and he kept glancing over just to make sure he wasn't doing anything any more interesting than just sitting and sipping from his thermos.
"I'm not looking at anyone." John lied, shivering horrifically before trying to find where the ball might be, and in whose stick. Honestly lacrosse was almost impossible to follow, for you could never see the ball when it was in a net, you only saw big guys clad in what looked like armor chasing each other around and hitting each other with their sticks.
"Yes you are. It's annoying." Greg insisted, frowning and shivering along with the rest of the lineup. He was the G, since his name started with a G and he insisted that it was appropriate, and John was the A, which had no connection except that he wanted to stand next to Greg.
"John!" screamed a voice from below, and John looked down to see Mary and her band of giggling sidekicks all standing down on the track below, wearing large coats and green puffball hats.
"Hey Mary!" John called back, wondering why she had decided to communicate with him from so far away.
"We're going to the concession stand, want some hot chocolate? You look freezing." Mary yelled up, holding up a five dollar bill just in case he didn't know what she was saying.
"Yes! Yes that would be wonderful! I'll pay you back!" John agreed eagerly, shivering in response to the opportunity to actually feel some degree of heat. It felt like he was somewhere in the arctic tundra, and some hot chocolate seemed almost like a necessity at this point.
"Make that two!" Greg called hopefully, however the girls had already begun to move away and they didn't seem to hear him. Greg sighed heavily, watching as Molly's ponytail wagged to and fro on the back of her head as she walked in Mary's wake.
"Why can't Molly like me?" Greg whined.
"Because you're obnoxious." John answered easily, rubbing his hands together and trying to bend his fingers.
"Ya but my abs are better than yours." Greg pointed out glumly, as if that was supposed to make Molly instantly fall in love with him.
"They're hidden behind a giant G, how is Molly supposed to notice?" John defended with a shrug. Of course he shouldn't be teasing Greg now, since his entire body had gone numb, and he was worried that should he grab any hot chocolate from Mary that his fingers wouldn't be able to grasp it and he would spill his precious heat source. That would be inconvenient as well as embarrassing. Oh if only he could kick Victor Trevor out of the blanket and take his spot and his thermos, snuggling up close to Sherlock so that their body heat mingled and got trapped under the blanket, warming them as they smelled the warm aroma from their coffee...or tea. Or hot chocolate. Honestly, since it was Victor, John wouldn't even be surprised if their thermoses contained some sort of hard liquor that warmed you from the inside out. Well in that case maybe he would let Victor take his thermos along. Needless to say, the two of them looked much cozier down there.
"Oh quit it John! You're such a creep!" Greg insisted, slapping John's arm quickly to which some of their companions looked around, trying to figure out why John Watson was such a creep.
"Keep your voice down." John snapped miserably. Greg just rolled his eyes, shivering and trying to watch the game for a little bit. There had been a couple of goals, or at least John assumed there had been because a couple of times the student section had gotten up and cheered and rung their festive little bells, trying to congratulate who even knows on their accomplishments on the fields. The other team was wining by a point or something, because John heard some mutters behind him about 'making a comeback'. He was quite sure that wasn't happening, but all the same he pretended to care. Mary returned with his hot chocolate, and to Greg's delight she had bought one for him as well. John handed her a couple of crumbled up dollars in exchange, and they traded off. John thanked her repeatedly; however he was too busy trying to gulp down the scalding liquid to have much of a conversation. Mary and her friends stood against the railing of the bleachers for a little while, since John was standing on the first row of seats, and they chatted for just a little while. Mary didn't have much to say, she talked about her friends, her night, and the test she had tomorrow and was neglecting to study for. John just nodded along blankly, this time the game was preferable to the people, and so for once all night he actually was able to follow along with the players. Mary disappeared eventually, and John looked over once more towards the lovers on the other side of the bleachers, who were now talking in hushed voices and giggling to one another. They made a good pair, they really did, evidently they were compatible and Victor was a sort of good looking boy, he gelled his hair and he had a defined jawline, however he looked like a haphazardly molded thing of clay next to his boyfriend, next to his angel. Despite their giggling John felt as though there was something he should be worried about, a sort of deep-seated hate for Victor Trevor that didn't make its motives clear. Maybe it was just his presence with Sherlock, or his control over him, or the way Sherlock had trembled the other day when he had pulled up in that beat up old car. John felt like no matter how happy the two of them were now, there just might be some underlying troubles they had, the troubles that only emerged when they were alone together. John suspected that Sherlock deserved better, however for the life of him he couldn't think of a better suitor than Victor. None of the other boys in this school would even look at Sherlock twice, for fear that he may approach them when the hallway emptied, so who would take Sherlock to be their boyfriend if not Victor Trevor? Who would dare even speak to him? The game ended rather abruptly, for John hadn't been watching the clock at all and so when the players started forming a line and clapping each other's hands he thought that it may just be a sudden urge of good sportsmanship that brought them together. The student section began to disappear, and suddenly only GA was left of the once school spirted arrangement.
"Let's go find our cars, I'm freezing." Greg insisted, shuddering and looking behind them to the empty sets of bleachers. There was trash strewn all about, plastic strings from pompoms, cans from sodas, and popcorn speckling the seats and the floors. Humans were disgusting.
"Ya sounds good." John agreed, still clutching onto his empty and cold Styrofoam cup, almost as if he expected it to magically refill with hot chocolate. As they started to walk out, however, John decided that it wasn't worth the effort and he just dropped it on the bleachers as he walked out. What's one more cup to clean up? Greg had gotten a very good parking spot next to the stadium, since he had arrived very early with all the paint supplies for decorating the fans. John hadn't been so lucky, since he had been late while arguing with his mother about whether or not he should bring a jacket or not. In the end he had just left without one, and now he was regretting his past stubbornness. A jacket sounded really good right now. And so Greg and John parted ways, giving each other quick farewells before Greg climbed into his nice warm car and John continued on through the dark, cold parking lot. Most all the cars were gone, and John was just fishing out his keys when he heard the clicking of dress shoes against the pavement behind him, walking rather quickly. John paused for a moment, turning to see Sherlock out of the corner of his eye before another figure emerged from the darkness, a tall, leather clad figure that grabbed him by his throat, slamming into a chain link fence and holding him there with ravenous blue eyes. John gave a scream of surprise, grabbing at the rough hand of his attacker to see Victor glaring at him, looking angry, looking defensive. Sherlock cowered off to the side, looking as though he wanted to hide into the shadows instead of watching this makeshift punishment. A wave of fear washed over him, he knew to what lengths Victor was willing to go, and he also knew what things that boy could probably get away with.

"Victor, Victor what on earth are..." John squeaked, his voice leaving him as Victor's grasp tightened. John couldn't breathe; all he could manage were short little sniffs of air that would certainly not be enough to sustain him. And yet he knew that the boy didn't care, he knew that he would keep squeezing until he got his point across.
"You think I'm stupid, you think I'm blind?" Victor growled, thrusting John against the fence so that the stray pinches of plastic and metal scraped along his bare back. John winced, however the fear was overpowering the pain at the moment, a couple of scratches were irrelevant when he thought his whole life was at stake.
"I don't...I can't..." John managed, clawing at Victor's strong fingers, trying to loosen them even the slightest bit so that he might be able to catch a breath. Victor growled, however his grip slackened ever so slightly. He knew that he shouldn't be committing any kind of murder here, however he seemed like he was willing to at the moment.
"Stop looking at Sherlock. Stop talking to Sherlock. He's not available, he's mine." Victor growled.
"I haven't been trying to take him from you!" John whispered in whatever voice he could manage, to which Victor's gaze just intensified, and his grip tightened. He was an unstoppable force, John was hopeless to do anything but struggle against him, and Sherlock did nothing but cower behind, too fearful to protest. This was all on his behalf, was it not, but was he the one making Victor go after John or was he just as helpless as John was?
"You've been staring at him all night, parading around without a shirt as if you might attract..."
"I'm not your enemy!" John defended. "I'll have a girlfriend soon, I'm straight!"
"Then act like it!" Victor growled, shoving John into the fence before drawing away, letting the poor boy fall to the pavement at his shoes, gasping for breath and attempting to message his red, swollen neck.
"If you talk to him again, I'll know. Don't let me find out, John, don't even tempt me. I know where you live, and I'll make it look like an accident." Victor threatened, holding his arm out for Sherlock, who cowered into his grip like an obedient dog, falling against his chest as Victor held him closer, protectively. He held him as if he was merely a treasure to be jealous of, as though his very proximity was a reward in itself.
"What, you're going to kill me if I try to be neighborly?" John growled.
"I'm going to kill you if you even look in his direction! I'm warning you Watson, stay away, for your own good." Victor growled, staring down at the broken boy at his feet before planting a quick kick to his ribs, sending John sprawling back into the fence once more, his back cut and bleeding, his throat tight and hoarse. And yet he was able to bring his gaze up to Sherlock's, able to catch those green eyes looking down at him fearfully, pitifully. He thought that he even saw a tear forming. Obviously this wasn't what Sherlock wanted, obviously he didn't want anyone to get hurt over him, and yet Victor began to march him off, pulling him away as if he was obligated to follow, pulling him away almost as if Sherlock wanted nothing more than to stay. John waited for the pair to leave, and when he finally heard the telltale groan of one of the only cars still left in the parking lot he willed him to get to his feet, the paint on his chest smeared, the blood on his back drying, and the shivers relatively forgotten in this new spawn of terror. It wasn't necessarily Victor's threats that scared him, for everyone knows that he wouldn't actually murder someone just for looking at Sherlock, it was simply the fact that he had made those threats in the first place that concerned John. Was he really that overprotective? And if that was how he treated Sherlock in public, what kind of over powering dominance did he display in private? Was he trying to drain Sherlock of all individual choice, parade him around on a tight leash just so that he did not linger off to somewhere Victor did not permit? Why did Victor feel the need to be so overprotective, if not to cut Sherlock off from any world that was not his own? It was concerning, to say the least, and John was beginning to feel more and more uneasy about their relationship, which bordered into toxic territory. Was Sherlock even happy with him now that he saw the full extent of his evilness? Was Sherlock willing to go on or was he being forced along by an ever present hand on his shoulder, a hand with a dangerously tight grip? It was difficult for John to drive, for coupled with the darkness his windshield had decided to fog up to the point where he couldn't even see, and now he was driving on mostly instinct as he tried to smack the heater a couple of times, for it was sputtering and spewing cold air instead. Miraculously John made it home safely, and he managed to park his car outside the house and stumble inside without any sort of interrogation from his family. When John got to his room he locked the door, wincing as he lifted his arms to go through his closet, looking for something to wear. The cuts on his back weren't deep, nor were they numerous; however they hurt enough to make what should've been an innocent wardrobe search something equivalent to a torture method. Not only were they painful but they were also a reminder that he was now cut off from Sherlock, despite their reuniting only a couple of days before he felt like they were on the brink of something more, maybe a rebirth of that friendship they had had so long before. And yet Victor had to come and spoil that too, he had to come and loom over Sherlock's entire life in an attempt to isolate him from people that would actually be good for him. John slammed his closet door with some ferocity, shaking his head miserably before retreating into his bathroom to take a quick shower, letting the hot water scald across his skin and hair, rubbing at his chest until his washcloth turned green and his skin turned an irritated shade of red. When John was done showering he changed into comfortable clothes, and being that it was a school night he knew that he had mounds of homework to do. And so John toweled off his hair and made his way over to his desk, sitting stagnant for a while and checking over his texts, snapchats, and the occasional email from a rather premature college, encouraging him to apply despite his being in eleventh grade. When John was done checking his phone he set it aside, deciding that none of his notifications were important enough to respond to, and gazed out the window for a moment. There appeared to be no cars in the Holmes' driveway, and Sherlock's bedroom light was off, making it look unusually eerie in the still, quiet night. John sighed heavily, turning on his homework with some stubbornness and doing a couple of problems before checking his phone once more, scrolling through his Instagram and looking at all the pathetic pictures of the game, a couple that he was tagged in, and none that he liked. John never liked anything because he knew it encouraged people to post more, which in turn just clogged up his Instagram and in turn made scrolling through a lot less pleasurable. Sherlock didn't have an Instagram; John had checked the night before, just to make sure. In fact John wasn't even sure that Sherlock had a phone, for he never seemed to use it. John did a couple of more homework problems. Ah, there was Greg, texting him and asking him if he had caught up with Mary after the game. John just laughed, shaking his head and thinking about the people he did meet up with afterwards. Certainly they were a lot less friendly than Mary. John sighed, leaning back in his chair, dropping his pencil, and picking up his phone once more. History could wait. After a good ten minutes of arguing back and forth with Greg about whether or not he should ask Mary out for real John was back to homework, and finally a good hour and a half later he set aside his work and went to sit on his bed, turning on the TV and turning off his lamp, he was done for the night.