He’d needed more. Needed night vigils surrounded by lilies and silence.
I was going for the funereal with the lilies and that’s why the hallway was scented with them, too. Of course, practically speaking, there was a big vase of lilies in the little lobby where they got off the elevator. Attempted foreshadowing of death ahead which would have affected at least John’s subconscious because he had recently been thinking of funerals when he’d finally allowed himself to test the small sample of Sherlock’s blood that he had. He’d been feeling that he’d needed the extended rituals of loss and hadn’t had them to help him adjust. It was one more way in which Sherlock’s fall had traumatised him, no time with the body to satisfy himself that life had really gone. (Of course, lilies are associated with rebirth, too.) May not have gotten all that in there!
The air in the lab was sweet.
That was because the blood was Sherlock’s and John always perceives a sweet smell around him. He smells it in the Rare Books Room and the archivist’s office, too, which is one of the reasons John is drawn to spending time there. It reminds him of what he thinks is Sherlock’s fragrance, perhaps mixed with his cologne. These could be hints for John that Sherlock is actually still around or just that Sherlock had spent so much time there that his scent permeated the place.
Harking back to Sometimes there is the sweetness of those who were receptive, that was such a lure.
So, I’ve attempted to contrast two sweet scents. The lilies being flowers associated with death, but also rebirth and the sweet smell that is a characteristic of those who are connected with the “original experiment”.
So the freezer not only stopped the burning from progressing, it slowed down Sherlock's heart? It sounds like he was stuck to the freezer?
It also brought down the high fever resulting from the intense immune reaction. It was a drastic measure, but one that he thought he could manage before he passed out from the pain and the fever. Where his face was furtherest inside the freezer, his skin was stuck to the metal wires of the shelving. (That's always such a nasty winter or freezer thing to happen!)
I think this might be too long! Rest in next comment.
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He’d needed more. Needed night vigils surrounded by lilies and silence.
I was going for the funereal with the lilies and that’s why the hallway was scented with them, too. Of course, practically speaking, there was a big vase of lilies in the little lobby where they got off the elevator. Attempted foreshadowing of death ahead which would have affected at least John’s subconscious because he had recently been thinking of funerals when he’d finally allowed himself to test the small sample of Sherlock’s blood that he had. He’d been feeling that he’d needed the extended rituals of loss and hadn’t had them to help him adjust. It was one more way in which Sherlock’s fall had traumatised him, no time with the body to satisfy himself that life had really gone. (Of course, lilies are associated with rebirth, too.) May not have gotten all that in there!
The air in the lab was sweet.
That was because the blood was Sherlock’s and John always perceives a sweet smell around him. He smells it in the Rare Books Room and the archivist’s office, too, which is one of the reasons John is drawn to spending time there. It reminds him of what he thinks is Sherlock’s fragrance, perhaps mixed with his cologne. These could be hints for John that Sherlock is actually still around or just that Sherlock had spent so much time there that his scent permeated the place.
Harking back to Sometimes there is the sweetness of those who were receptive, that was such a lure.
So, I’ve attempted to contrast two sweet scents. The lilies being flowers associated with death, but also rebirth and the sweet smell that is a characteristic of those who are connected with the “original experiment”.
So the freezer not only stopped the burning from progressing, it slowed down Sherlock's heart? It sounds like he was stuck to the freezer?
It also brought down the high fever resulting from the intense immune reaction. It was a drastic measure, but one that he thought he could manage before he passed out from the pain and the fever. Where his face was furtherest inside the freezer, his skin was stuck to the metal wires of the shelving. (That's always such a nasty winter or freezer thing to happen!)
I think this might be too long! Rest in next comment.