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Sherlock is back.

Not dead.

No matter how roughly John had shoved him down and grabbed his shoulders. No matter how many times John had slammed that slender -- too slender -- torso against the floor, growling with anger and hurt and relief. He’d been careful of Sherlock’s head, though, aware of the need to protect that great sodding brain that Sherlock needed so sorely to compensate for his utter lack of sense.

Sherlock hadn’t apologised.

John hadn’t expected it of him.

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John is getting divorced.

It’s not Sherlock’s fault. No.

With the cases back in his life (the danger, the chase, the exhilaration), John’s found that he’s as shoddy a husband to Mary as he was a boyfriend to the women before her. He loves her, but she doesn’t fit. And she shouldn’t have to fit; she should have the man she married. Or, rather, she should have a man for whom being like the man she married makes him whole.

John wants to tell her that, explain, but she’s never liked poetry and prose won’t suit.

John wrote Sherlock a poem once. It went like this:

There once was a man from London
Who SHOULD GET THE HELL OFF MY LAPTOP THIS MEANS YOU SHERLOCK

The missing punctuation was very ee cummings, John thought at the time and still thinks today.

John’s room at 221B is exactly as it was, not even a layer of dust. The refrigerator holds a serving platter of toenails, a jar of ginger preserve, and three carrots. The microscope on the kitchen table looks to be even larger than the one that sat there before.

Sherlock nods when John sets a cuppa next to him.

(Don’t have to justify this being in third person point of view. This is my private journal, written for me and me only. If Sherlock Holmes wants to UTTERLY DISAPPOINT ME by reading these entries, it’s his lookout.)

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They have had A Conversation.

Capital A, Capital C.

It was awkward and awful and stretched across three days and might as well have been in an outer-space alien language for all it resembled how two British men typically talk with each other. (Yes, they are neither of them typical, but they are both British men.) But at least it produced a conclusion.

(Capital A, Capital C, but John isn’t Milne enough to do that twice in a row.)

The conclusion was this: What they have is what they want. Each is the other’s Most Important Person. (Perhaps John is more Milne than he thought.) So as not to incite competition for the Most Important Person position, John will stop dating and Sherlock won’t start.

Sherlock had assayed that John was welcome to any one-night stands he could pull; John had assayed that Sherlock could shut his fat mouth, that John would take care of it.

Nothing was said on the subject of Sherlock having sex, John having decided he didn’t want to know, and Sherlock… well, John doesn’t know what Sherlock was thinking on that topic, because, as mentioned, it wasn’t mentioned.

They finished the conversation with Jaffa Cakes and an argument over whose turn it was to clean the bathroom.

It’s two days later, and the bathroom still isn’t clean.

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Sherlock Holmes drools in his sleep.

I know.

He seems above all that. Rarefied. But nope, just like you and me (well, not me, I’m perfect whilst sleeping ha ha).

This is how the discovery came about:

It was a rollicking case, far outside London, and involved startlingly brilliant brainwork from you-know-who and a few medical insights from yours truly and multiple chases and a dead satisfying tackle of the culprit, who did not anticipate John coming in high and Sherlock low.

By the time the statements had been taken, the t’s crossed and the i’s dotted, the last train home had long since departed, and John and Sherlock took the very last room at the local inn. That the room had only one bed was immaterial, as Sherlock insisted he’d be up the entire night filing the details of the crime away in his cranium and John was knackered enough to sleep through the end of the world. Barely got his boots off and bam, head to pillow, sawing logs as the Americans say.

The wake-up the next morning was much slower than the go-to-sleep, as John felt truly rested for the first time in a longer time than he wants to think about. Uni? No, now that he considers, definitely not uni, nor secondary, nor Afghanistan, nor the army bits that weren’t in Afghanistan, and absolutely not when he first came back from Afghanistan.

Anyway. Suffice it to say, the rested feeling was novel and John enjoyed wallowing in it, eyes closed, on his back, blissful, with tiny little stretches of this muscle or that from time to time, just because it felt good to wiggle a bit. It was during one of these stretches that John made two realisations at exactly the same time: there now was a rod of some kind pressed against the side of his thigh, and there had always been a much larger rod lying across his chest. Well, probably not a rod, the second one, as it seemed to break apart at the end, given the pressure points. A limb, with branches? No, and John’s brain didn’t seem to function well when rested, which was something he’d have to think about when he finished thinking about the arm across his chest. Plus the knees he could now feel his legs bumping gently against and the probably-an-erect-dick pressed to his thigh.

He thought, and considered, and speculated. Unless Sherlock had let someone else into the room and then buggered off to who-knows-where (I mean, it’s Sherlock; that’s not out of the realm of possibility), then it was most likely Sherlock’s arm and knees and probably-an-erect-dick and general wafting warmth surrounding John. Which was… not bad.

That was a bit of a surprise to John, not minding a bloke being cuddled up to him as he slept. It was impossible to know if it was not minding “a bloke” or not minding Sherlock, and really that question was pretty much moot, given the small likelihood of any other man crawling into bed with John.

Small likelihood not being no likelihood, John decided at that point to check that it was indeed Sherlock curled next to him. Visual reconnaissance. Which meant opening one’s eyes.

Hmph.

Some minutes (seconds? aeons?) later, John summoned the fortitude to open his eyes and thus abandon the prospect of any more sleep. Which he didn’t need -- truly rested, remember? -- but still was reluctant to forego. Onward.

John opened his eyes and turned his head, and there was Sherlock. Looking so much younger in sleep (YES THAT’S A CLICHE but he did. He did.), hair tousled, and face relaxed.

Well relaxed.

Utterly relaxed.

So relaxed that his lips were sagging down towards the pillow his head rested on, and a rivulet of saliva linked the corner of his mouth to that pillow.

John went from content to gleeful in a blink of the eye (which had been done to ensure he was actually seeing Sherlock Holmes drool), and something about that transformation woke Sherlock.

There followed a lot of grumbling and only a tiny, tiny bit of sniggering and eventually an agreement on both sides to never discuss again that SHERLOCK HOLMES DROOLS IN HIS SLEEP, and also that kipping in the same bed was not all that bad and might even be better on Sherlock’s sybaritically comfortable mattress and bedclothes.

I’m keeping my own room, though.

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Brits eat, on average, more than 25 pounds of bananas per year.

Given the quantity of fruit in the kitchen of 221B, Sherlock is apparently planning to eat his share all in one week.

Even more surprising than the bounty of banana bunches is that Sherlock actually did the shopping. That calls for a celebratory cuppa.

...

Nevermind, there’s no milk, because he didn’t do the shopping, he just bought bananas.

“And boric acid,” His Nibs is insisting, as if that’s SOMETHING I COULD PUT IN MY TEA.

A certain someone may find himself with far fewer blankets than he is accustomed to when he traipses in to bed tonight.

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Those bananas from the other day? Sherlock didn’t get them, as you might logically assume, to take care of a severe potassium deficiency. No. He got them because he thought John wanted chocolate cake. Metaphorically.

I mean, metaphorical chocolate cake.

That might make a good band name if you divorce it from the meaning Sherlock gave it.

Or, no, that’s not fair, it’s still a good band name if it has the meaning Sherlock gave it. Just not a band John would be in. He would watch this theoretical band, sure, just wouldn’t be in it. Not actually watch the metaphor because that would be awkward but metaphorically watch the theoretical band. It’s a perfectly fine band! Just not for John.

Yes, I’m freaking out a little SHUT UP it’s my diary I do what I want.

OK, stop. Let’s tell this as a proper story.

Dr. John H. Watson climbed the stairs to his flat after a very long, very boring day, looking forward to sitting in his armchair and cracking open the spy novel he’d recently purchased. Upon opening the door to his flat, he realised he would not be doing any such thing any time soon, as his lounge was inhabited by approximately one hundred and twenty-seven youths of indeterminate gender peeling bananas.

He thought for a moment about turning around, walking back down the stairs, and heading to his local for a whiskey or two (or one hundred and twenty-seven), but then Sherlock came into the lounge and rousted the youths out. Each left with a quiet thank-you sent Sherlock’s way and a clear bag with several naked bananas in it.

The peels had all been tossed into a sparkling clean rubbish bin, which Sherlock immediately whisked away, leaving John to appreciate the sudden clearing of his flat and to sink into his armchair.

He was to find out later in the evening that the young people were from Sherlock’s homeless network, brought in to peel the bananas in exchange for, well, the peeled bananas. Sherlock had purchased the fruit not for consumption by himself or his flatmate, but for some kind of experiment with dozens of banana peels and, you guessed it, boric acid. Where the banana peels and boric acid have now got to is a question that remains unanswered. John’s primary concern was that they not be in the bathtub, and they weren’t, so he didn’t bother pursuing that line any further. This may come back to bite him at some point.

Sherlock had not sent all the bananas out with the homeless teens, however; he saved exactly four peeled bananas in the fridge. “Two for you and two for me,” Sherlock said.

Is John telling this tale in a roundabout way, using rather long sentences, as a way to avoid getting to the heart of the matter where he will have to admit awkwardly things he’d rather not and submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known?

Obviously, as Sherlock would say while pulling a face.

Right.

It’s this.

After dinner that evening, Dr. John H. Watson, took a peeled banana out of the refrigerator and ate it, as a nutritious and tasty treat.

W. Sherlock S. Holmes took a peeled banana out of the refrigerator and fellated it.

No, I’m not kidding. He fellated that thing, and I know for a certain fact that’s what he was doing because he told me that’s what he was doing.

Why would he do such a thing?

I’m going to quote him here: “Because you’re getting shirty, John.”

Shirty. Me. Hmph.

Apparently, when John hasn’t had “partnered sex” in a while, John gets shirty, tetchy, fractious. Like a bear with a sore head.

As if Sherlock can’t strop for days when he’s in the mood!

Not the point.

So. It turns out sex, for Sherlock, is like chocolate cake. Not something he typically spends any time thinking about, not something he ever feels compelled to go out and get for himself, but something he quite enjoys if he happens to be offered some at a time when he’s not busy with something else.

Now, Sherlock said, he’d noticed that John was quite “hungry” so he’d decided to practice making chocolate cake for them to enjoy together. Not every day, Sherlock’s far too busy for that, and anyway, he’d likely get bored with chocolate cake on too frequent a basis, but enough that John could feel sated.

That man.

He decides to stop being an annoying dick for half a second and I --

John then stumbled ham-fistedly through a horrid explanation that while he was quite keen on cake and did feel its absence acutely, he only wanted cheesecake, not chocolate cake, and yes, he was absolutely sure even though he’d never actually eaten chocolate cake because the thought of it did absolutely nothing for his, ehem, taste buds.

Leaving Sherlock sat at the kitchen table, John retreated to his room for a lie-down, stared at the wall, and eventually fell asleep.

He woke to an arm wrapped round his midsection and a voice bitching about the inferiority of the sheets relative to those in Sherlock’s bedroom.

He’d never wished harder that he did like chocolate cake.

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Sherlock Holmes is dazzlingly brilliant.

You think it’d be old hat after a while, but no, his brain always amazes.

This case… I’d love to write this case up proper on the regular blog, but the Queen has asked that I not. The actual Queen of England (although Mycroft did try to order me not to, the pompous twit), Her Royal Majesty. Who can say no to that?

Sherlock probably would, but anyway, the case. Remember how Sherlock’s written up the hundreds of types of ash? He used that analysis on this case.

Yes. Seriously.

On the crime scene, he found Ash #157 (or whatever), and these bits of white that looked like thistledown, and boom, we were off to Peterborough to the office of BOU, tracking down the head bird person, who of course doesn’t work out of the office because she’s also CEO of the BTO NGO, ho ho ho. Then we’re on the train to Cambridge and Sherlock’s got her on Facetime, and the signal’s going in and out, and her words hardly sound like English at all, but still the two of them seem to be understanding each other.

Remember the Monty Python bit where they’re clacking coconuts and pretending they’re riding horses, and then the two guards are arguing what kind of bird would and could bring a coconut to Mediaeval Europe? That’s what Sherlock and the ornithologist sounded like, back and forth until the train pulled into the station, and then we were off, running toward one of the colleges, into a lab and through it, back to a huge dusty storage room, sheets tossed over everything like they were about to start painting twenty years ago and then forgot it entirely.

When a winged creature swooped down on me (well, fell off a rickety shelf, same thing), I was actually glad I didn’t have my gun at that moment, because the retort and bullet holes would’ve been rather tricky to explain. Nonetheless, Sherlock found the something he was looking for even before the ornithologist got there, and we were off again. When Sherlock’s mobile rang, he shoved it in my direction, and I had to listen to the bird woman -- she did sound rather hooty like an owl -- complain about the specimen Sherlock had stolen (“Borrowed! It’s going back!”). I did my best to convey soothing, charming words in her direction, but Sherlock had started up a row with a cab driver who did not want to take us wherever it was Sherlock had us going, so my assistance was needed there.

Anyway, long story short, the solution to whodunnit all revolved around racing pigeons, an Irish falconer, and a rare Dominican cigar owned by an American from Idaho, which Sherlock assures me is one of the US states, and not, as I’d previously thought, a city. “It has fewer people than Euston, which is a city,” Sherlock noted, and I was thoroughly confused, Euston being a busy railway station or at a push referring to a village in Sussex which is not in any way, shape, or form a city. Odd.

Turns out he’d said, “Houston,” the city astronauts report their problems to, and was being… reassuring (?) about my lapse in knowledge. Reassuring, is that what that was? Even odder than I’d thought!

Back to the case: Sherlock was and is outstandingly perspicacious, so it’s all solved. All that’s left is tracking down the current location of the person what done it, and we’ll be leaving that to the Met.

I’ve finished my lager, and the shower’s just shut off, so off to bed we go, for a well-earned night’s rest.

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Sherlock Holmes is a fucking idiot.

When John Watson woke in the morning, refreshed and thinking of a fry-up to celebrate the successful solving of the cigar-falcolner-pigeons case of the day before (possible titles: “When Irish Idahos Are Smiling” or “Euston, We No Longer Have a Problem”), Sherlock Holmes had already vacated the flat.

Not a surprise. John knew full well that Sherlock would generally be in one of two moods after a case: torpor or frenzy. Torpor John could stand to have in the flat for a bit (he’d just walk around the lump), but frenzy he would often push right out the door, with a suggestion to go visit Bart’s or NSY or the guy with the dog John could never remember the name of. The guy, he could never remember the name of. The dog, over whom Sherlock has waxed rhapsodic many, many times, is Toby.

Anyway, the fry-up was lovely, albeit with a twinge of regret that Sherlock wasn’t there to share the table, if not the food. The rest of the morning was peaceful, and even as the radio silence from Sherlock continued through the afternoon, John wasn’t worried. Sherlock’s texting holds in common with his post-case routine a tendency toward the poles of torpor or frenzy, rather than a more moderate, consistent pace.

Not a problem. John might even have been whistling as he picked up a call from Greg, expecting some question related to the paperwork for the case.

That was not what the call was about.

It seemed that Mr. Holmes had not followed through with their agreement to let NSY find the wrongdoer, and as a consequence was, although ambulatory, in need of medical assistance.

John fumed throughout scrounging up enough cash for the cab, all during the cab ride, and as he made his way past coppers and forensics and who the hell knows what toward where Sherlock was sitting in the back of an ambulance. He calmed enough to listen to a report from the nearest paramedic, which told him Sherlock would have pretty spectacular bruising but was otherwise ok. He confirmed there’d been no head injury, and then turned to Sherlock.

“John, I -”

John interrupted quietly but firmly. “Have you ever heard the phrase, ‘It’s all over but the shouting’? Well, here comes the shouting bit.”

Sherlock’s lips zipped shut, his eyes grew a fraction larger, and his chin dipped. Oh, he clearly knew he deserved this!

“What the fuck were you thinking, going by yourself, not including me?” John shouted. “We’re partners, Sherlock. Do you even know what the word ‘partner’ means? It doesn’t mean haring off on your own, running heedlessly into something that could get you killed!”

With his lips turned down into a sulk, Sherlock murmured, “You went to Afghanistan.”

Fucking idiot! “That was before we even knew each other. Name me one time I’ve put myself in danger since then that wasn’t stepping in between you and whatever Hand of Fate decided they wanted to strangle you that day. Hm? Can you? No. You can’t.

"I’ve lived with you dead, and I wouldn’t wish that situation on, on Moriarty himself, least of all the dearest person to me in the world.

“And so help me God, if you make me go through it again, I will dedicate my life to the art of necromancy so I can bring you back and chain you to the radiator. There won’t be cases then, oh no, just you, me, takeaway, and horrid telly that I will make you watch constantly as punishment for dying on me twice!”

His piece said, John glared at his fucking idiot.

After a long moment, Sherlock ventured, “So I suppose I shouldn’t anticipate at death do us part?”

“Fuck no,” John spat. “You think I’m letting you go then? No.”

Sherlock’s smile lifted his cheeks, shifting the bruise forming under his left eye. “Possessive of you.”

It was, and now that he thought more, it was not quite what he meant. He wasn’t a stalker, or a jailer, and he wanted to make that clear. “You can leave the relationship whenever you want, Sherlock. If I’m not all right, or even if I’m all right but you find something better, you should take it.” At Sherlock’s blink of surprise, John smiled. “But leave because you want to, not because you’re being stupid.”

Sherlock dropped the shock blanket and climbed down from the ambulance. “I never do anything stupid.”

“You --” John could only shake his head, and wrap his arms gently around his idiot. “You’ll be insisting that until you’re old and grey, won’t you?”

“Until we’re old and grey,” Sherlock replied with a kiss to John's forehead.

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Well.

John might have been a little bit cross about an unrelated matter, and therefore his voice might have been a little bit louder than typical when he reminded Sherlock that Sherlock has never, not even once, in all of their acquaintance, given John his half of the rent without prompting and really it’s a wonder Mrs. H hasn’t dumped them out on their arses with how often she’s paid late, but that doesn’t seem to be enough of a reason for Sherlock to have put his nose in the fucking air and stalked out the door without even so much as a by your leave and been absent from the flat now for five fucking hours.

Not that John’s worried.

It’s just, you see, that the rent is due today and once again Sherlock has managed to piss off without giving John his half, and John can’t cover it by himself -- Mrs. H is giving them a marvellous discount, but it is central London after all.

Does it count as paying your rent on time if you give them the cheque when due but ask them not to cash it for three to five business days?

Edited: 8:54 pm (UTC)

He

I

The thing is

Fuck it, I’ll finish this tomorrow. Sherlock actually wants to watch something on telly (it’s about poisonous snakes), and he’s actually asked me to join him, and I feel a bit of a cuddle on the couch is in order.

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Before anything else, Sherlock insists the record be set straight. (“Do you really think I have to read your personal journal to know what you write in there? Really?”) The documentary last night was about venomous snakes. There are very, very few species of poisonous snake. The difference? If it bites you and you die, it’s venomous; if you bite it and you die, it’s poisonous.

With that handled…

Sherlock Holmes came home after his unexplained multi-hour absence and immediately thrust a parcel into John’s hands.

“There,” he said, nodding as if a matter was settled, and moved toward the kitchen.

John, not finding the matter settled, not least because he had no idea what the matter was, called him back to the lounge.

It transpired that Sherlock had decided to address the problem of his procrastination and general apathy toward household and personal finance by giving it to John.

Actually, them, not it. “It” would imply he only gave the problem to John, instead of the problem and the solution.

Actually, solutionS.

Meaning, accounts.

Meaning…

Sherlock had gone out and had John named a joint owner of all his financial accounts.

Except the trust. “I wanted that done today, but according to Mycroft, ‘Something something paperwork something meeting-scheduling something Her Majesty’s approval something.’ I wasn’t entirely listening. Eventually, you’ll be installed instead of Baron Chakrabarti on the board. Mycroft tried to claim it was a conflict of interest, but honestly who better than the secondary beneficiary to be a trustee?”

“Erk,” John stated eloquently, staring down at his lap, at the debit card, credit card, checkbook, and sheaf of papers that he’d taken from the parcel.

Sherlock did have one requirement: John was forbidden from trying to convince Sherlock to care about their (their! !!!! !!!!) money. “If we need to, what’s that phrase, tighten the belt?, then let me know and I’ll cut back. But otherwise, our finances are now all you.”

When John asked if he should add his own (meagre) funds to the joint (joint! !!!! !!!!) accounts, Sherlock waved a hand insouciantly and wandered off.

John sat, and stared, and failed to organise his thoughts in any comprehensible order until finally a question occurred and he shouted across the flat to Sherlock: “Wait, Baron Chakrabarti? The Chancellor of the Exchequer is one of your trustees?”

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Since I have more formally taken over the administration of cases (record-keeping, accounting, billing, not pissing off clients who are willing to pay us), I asked Sherlock if he could provide me with a write-up of his “rating scale” for potential cases to make the intake process easier for me. He surprised me by emailing it within seconds; it had apparently been at the ready for some time.

Yeah, the blighter gets to keep doing his own bloody intake.

1 - So easy a monkey with brain injury could solve it. The prospective client gets a form email lambasting them for being an idiot and billing them 1,000 pounds for the minutes I wasted reading their email.

2 - So easy a monkey who has not been subject to brain trauma could solve it. I generally save these in case John ever expresses an interest in solving a case on his own.

3 - Requiring some level of human intelligence but exceedingly boring. When John insists I take one of these cases, the client is charged double.

4 - Only marginally less boring than a three. When John insists I take one of these cases, the client is charged one-and-a-half.

5 - Overall exceptionally boring but with one feature of interest that could keep me from wanting to stab my eye out with a rusty fork. I take these if there is nothing else I could occupy my time with other than bad telly or Mrs. Hudson talking about herself.

6 - More than one potential feature of interest within an overall milieu of tedium. Mycroft’s “crucial for the continued survival of the nation” cases tend to fall in this category.

7 - The bare minimum of acceptable case.

8 through 10 - These levels are so rarely seen in private cases as to make distinction among them meaningless. A tragic, mournful, and calamitous state of affairs. I believe John would put a colon and a left parenthesis after the end of this sentence.

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That wanker.

John Watson has made a bloody fool of himself, again, and the blame can be laid at the door of Sherlock Holmes, again.

It was like that scene in Arthur, where drunk Dudley Moore shouts, “You’re a prostitute? I just thought I was doing great with you.” It was in fact exactly that, except for the inebriation. (I’ve just now remembered there’s a series for kids called Arthur, and the image of that animal kid with glasses drunkenly hitting on a sex worker is one I do not want in my brain, ta very much.)

How it happened is this:

John walked into the flat, after having been to the shops, to find a stunningly fit young woman in her mid- to late-twenties sitting on his sofa. She greeted him with a beautiful smile and said that Sherlock had had to go out but asked her to wait here for John.

“Ah,” John thought, “a new client.”

He greeted her, dropped his bag onto the table to be put away later, and settled himself in his chair, pulling his notebook out to take her details.

She invited him to sit next to her on the sofa instead, and ok, not typical, but, well, important to make the client feel comfortable, so he went and sat.

Her name was Nixi, and that’s all he’d got written down before she gently pulled the notebook and pen from his hands and placed them on the coffee table.

“Let’s,” she said, as John was still marvelling over how soft the skin on her fingers had been, “just talk.”

And talk they did, and laughed, and the skin of her cheek was just as soft as her fingers, and her lips even softer, and John asked if she’d like to go to dinner with him, and she whispered that she’d rather he take her to bed.

Then they were standing in John’s bedroom, her hands on his shoulders, his hands toying with the lovely soft straps of her plum-colored lingerie, and he murmured, “This is the first time I’ve done this with a client,” and leaned in for another kiss… which he did not get, as she had firmly pulled away.

“First time?” she asked.

He couldn’t help noticing that her voice quality was now rougher, a bit of the silkiness gone, but he put that thought away in favour of assuring her that he had plenty of experience -- expertise, even -- just not with a client specifically.

“Oh,” Nixi interjected, as she sat down on his bed. Dropped might actually be the best word, practicality rather than grace. “Sherlock didn’t say this was a training session. I would’ve given you a completely different approach.”

John opened his mouth to reply, and then realised he had no idea what to say. “What?” he settled on.

“No problem,” she said. “Just give me a mo’ to reorient my head, and then we’ll start over.” With a slight squint, she gave him a once-over that was much more inspection-for-appraisal than passion. “A little old to be going into this line of work, but your kissing’s not half-bad and if that package is the size I think,” -- she nodded, and he resisted the impulse to put his hands over his bits -- “yeah, that’s quite the asset.”

It was then that Sherlock stuck his head into John’s bedroom and said, “Is the intercourse over? Lestrade just texted with a halfway decent case.”

Do you know what happens when you throw a flash-bang of ire into a vat of mortification?

John doesn’t, because he’s erased this part of the story from his mind. Sherlock deletes off his hard-drive; John grabs a rubber larger than his hand and scrubs at the paper until the graphite’s gone or blurred beyond comprehension.

Edited: 9:13 pm (UTC)

Sherlock’s not a wanker. (Well, literally maybe he is; I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. Anyway.) He just keeps trying to put his hand in where he doesn’t need to. However, now, finally, it’s been sorted. With any hope.

In the end, Nixi got her remuneration and headed off home; Sherlock got loudly reminded that he’s to leave John to take care of his own sex life, thanks; and John got a blood-pressure induced headache that was relieved somewhat by the long hot bath he took and finally wiped away by the apology massage Sherlock provided after Lestrade’s case was solved. “An hour, John,” Sherlock sighed. “It had seemed promising but was solved in an hour.”

“It’s like criminals aren’t even trying to be clever,” John murmured, and pulled Sherlock in for an extended cuddle.

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They have had, once more, A Conversation.

After the evidence was turned in and statements made to Lestrade and his team, after the adrenaline subsided, after that single hair-on-end breath-held heart-stopped moment when they were destined to fall off the side of a building but didn’t -- they talked.

Why it was easier lying down in the dark in their bed under a canopy of blankets pulled up over their heads, John has no idea, but it was, and they got quite quickly to the point, which was:

Sherlock contended that he had everything; John felt instinctively that that couldn’t possibly be true but countered instead that he had everything so perhaps they should start searching for a previously undiscovered something that could add to Sherlock’s fervour, joy, well-earned pride--

“But you don’t,” Sherlock insisted with a tone just up to the line between determination and anger. “You don’t have sex and it’s important to you and--”

“Hold on,” John interrupted, and didn’t let himself be distracted by the very literal response of Sherlock’s hands tightening. He explained very carefully, very firmly, very clearly that everything was exactly what he had with Sherlock. Yes, if Sherlock was a woman and the two of them had sex on the regular that’d be brilliant -- a brilliant extra to the whole that their relationship was.

“Our relationship is a whole?” Sherlock asked, voice faltering, and John wished a little more light was leaking into their cocoon so he could see Sherlock’s face better.

“Yes,” John replied, “whole.”

“Whole?”

They repeated the sound /həʊl/ back and forth several times in varying pitches and intonations until John realised that while he was saying the word “whole,” Sherlock was hearing it without the “w.”

“Whole,” he said one more time, while lightly pinching Sherlock’s lips shut. “Entire, complete, everything.” The lips between his fingers twitched; John’s lips twitched; and he and Sherlock giggled themselves exhausted.

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Has it really been more than six months since I’ve last written in here? I knew life’d been a bit of a madhouse lately but fuck. Anyway, I mean “madhouse” with the utmost of delirious affection. I am exhausted and perpetually behind and having the time of my fucking life.

After having had locum jobs at surgeries in seemingly every bloody borough of London, each more tiresome than the last, I’d finally had enough. I quit. Not, as His Nibs first assumed, for the pleasure of being at his beck and call every second of the day, but to re-train in Emergency Medicine. There was a bit of pouting to be worked through, but after I explained that:

(a) I needed to work in medicine every bit as much as he needed to conduct experiments, and

(b) interesting mysteries were far more likely to show up in A&E than in a typical surgery,

Sherlock conceded that perhaps I had better utility as a contributing member of society than as an action figure stuffed back in a toybox between adventures.

(When I subtly (not actually subtly) tried to determine whether the fees for the re-training would be too much to ask, given how little I’d put into our accounts, Sherlock literally stamped his foot and reminded me vociferously that I was forbidden from ever making him think about finances.)

Now, several months later, I’m halfway through the three-year programme, having been exempted from a year’s worth of the re-qualification due to my exemplary trauma surgery performance in the RAMC (and, I was later to find out, Sherlock nagging his brother into pulling a string of one sort or another). It is a huge amount of work, my brain is mush compared to my uni years, I barely have time for cases, I got more sleep during combat in Afghanistan, and every day I catch myself grinning that this is my life.

Sherlock grumbles sometimes, but notice that word “barely” in that sentence above. I do have time for cases, for chasing Sherlock around and serving as his batman and telling him that he’s brilliant. And every night possible, I drag him into bed next to me and tell him that my life is brilliant because of him.

Because it is.

He tells me I’m ridiculous, and that he finds it absolutely astonishing that he ever could have come to love someone as absurd as I am.

I smile and stroke his hair -- he’s growing it out and it’s even more lustrous than it used to be -- and then we sleep until it’s time to jump into another hectic day.

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Drugs.

DRUGS

Drugs.

The mothe

He

HE

Sherlock Fucking Holmes is taking fucking drugs and I

God, how did I not know? How did

Why

Oh

God, that bloke (“The Wig,” ridiculous, he’s a Taddy or Wilf or Davie if ever I’ve seen one) and his assertions it’s been months. “Same supplier as las’ month this time, though, and tell ’im I’m getting close to formulating ’em myself.”

He’s been sent off with a flea in his ear, no doubt about it, and a sprained arm. IT WAS A SPRAIN, not a break, John knows how to sprain people, how to keep from breaking something even when he wants to, when he wants to shatter syringes and shove them up a bloke’s ass and ROAR that Sherlock is HIS, his to protect and care for, and no one and nothing will be taking Sherlock away this time, TA VERY MUCH.

Now John’s just got to calm down enough to remind Sherlock of this without shouting.

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John was wrong, thank God.

It’s not drugs.

Well, it is, but not illegal drugs.

Well, technically the drugs are illegal, but not in and of themselves, only in the way Sherlock’s gone about procuring them.

Actually, I’m not 100% sure it is illegal, how Sherlock was obtaining them, given NHS wait times, and, anyway, it’s John’s fault.

Well, not fault exactly, more like “cause.” Because there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it, if you’re doing it for the reason pretty much every person other than Sherlock Holmes does it.

Not that Sherlock’s reason is wrong, per se. It’s just, what’s the word? Stupid. Foolish. Ludicrous. Reckless. Wholly unnecessary, to go back to the issue of this being John being at fault the catalyst.

Are we circling the point so John can avoid dealing with something so monumental that he might be swamped and drown, putting aside the fact that monuments aren’t made of water?

Yes.

Yes, we are.

Because William Sherlock Scott Holmes has taken a throwaway line by John Watson and run with it. Run fast and far over months, not to go away from John but to be nearer to him. To give him not everything but beyond everything.

It’s more than John can accept. More than he deserves, certainly, but even if there was any way in the world this could be deserved (there isn’t), John still could not let it happen.

Because Sherlock is his to protect and care for, and that includes keeping Sherlock from running heedlessly, needlessly into danger.

Sherlock, of course, didn’t quite see it that way.

“How attached are you to your eye colour?” he asked John.

John, perplexed, stared at Sherlock and replied something along the lines of “What the hell are you talking about?”

“It’s a metaphor; keep up; you’ll get it in a moment. How much does your eye colour mean to you? Would you be willing to change it?”

John admitted his eye colour wasn’t something he ever thought much about; it was what it was.

What if, Sherlock asked, you were faced with a choice: change your eye colour to emerald green or Sherlock will never be allowed to solve cases again?

John insisted that was not the same thing at all, that coloured contacts were a far cry from regular injections and the surgeries Sherlock was contemplating.

“What if changing your eye colour so I could have cases did involve injections and surgeries? You’d still do it; I know with absolute certainty you would.”

John said that Sherlock was right, that he would.

You must then admit, Sherlock said, it’s the same thing.

“It is not,” John replied, doing his very best to convey that his vehemence was directed at the world rather than Sherlock, “Because people with green eyes don’t face the same murder rate as transgender women!”

He stepped closer and took Sherlock’s hands gently in his. “If this is something you want, you feel, tell me and I’ll be behind you every step, except when I’m in front protecting you from anyone who even so much as breathes disapprovingly. But if it’s just something you think I want, then no. You will not put yourself in that danger for me.” Sherlock looked away, and all was silent for a moment.

“Please,” John begged. “Promise me.”

Sherlock looked John in the eye again and nodded. He pulled a hand away to push back his curls. “I didn’t really like my hair this long, anyway. Nail polish, though, I might still be interested in trying out.”

“Whatever you want,” John replied joyfully, and then they were hugging tightly.

So.

There it is.

Sherlock was changing his entire gender because he thought it would lead to sex that would make John happy.

Jesus.

I apologised to him, that I’d been so unobservant, not seeing how deeply he was worried about me having sex. I’d thought he was just being a prat, mucking around. But he was having the same anxieties I have when he doesn’t eat right or get enough sleep.

I was so busy thinking about how he was mine to take care of, I forgot that I’m his to take care of.

Fortunately, the drought in John’s sex life will soon be coming to an end, which will be a great comfort to Sherlock and with any luck a great pleasure to John and to Felicia, a woman in John’s study group.

She’d told John a few weeks ago her tale of woe: how her boyfriend, the love of her life, was stuck in America for two years, and how they’d agreed that they could each have a sex-only relationship with someone local but it’d been impossible for Felicia to find the time to find an appropriate man, what with her studies and all the hookups on dating apps being “skeeze balls” unwilling to be introduced to her boyfriend.

Earlier this evening, John texted her; she, John, and Sherlock Facetimed; the boyfriend and Sherlock chatted; and each week when the study group is held at Felicia’s, John will be staying for an hour or so after the group’s gone.

I am the luckiest fucking person on the planet.

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Has it really been months since, etc., etc. Life is still hectic and wonderful. Sherlock’s interest in nail polish was short-lived, as he doesn’t care for the scent of remover, but he has become a deft hand with those eyeliner pencil things. Yes, he’s tried it on me as well, and no, I won’t be posting the pictures. Even though this is my private journal and I really did look dead gorgeous in some of them.

Retraining is going fine. I’m not as quick at Name That Diagnosis as some of the younger folks, but I was recently commended for my “calm leadership presence in a crisis.” It was an emergency simulation that wasn’t even a quarter as intense as Afghanistan, or Moriarty, come to think of it. Not even one sniper aiming at us. Barely a six on a ten-point excitement scale.

Now I’m starting to sound like Sherlock. If I was Molly, I might call it cute. Heh.

Talking of Molly, I suppose I didn’t mention her fiance, Tom, here. Nice bloke. Looks strangely similar to Sherlock on first meeting, though the resemblance doesn’t hold up after you’ve talked to him a bit. They seem happy, no matter what Sherlock mutters under his breath when Molly’s not close enough to hear.

What else? Cases are going well. The Elephant in the Room was one of my recent favourites, but that’s even more hush-hush than the cigar-falcolner-pigeons case. I don’t expect I’ll ever get over the sight. Inside a typical suburban house in a typical suburban street there were two bodies… and an elephant. A real, live, adult elephant. It was just standing there in the middle of the room looking a bit bored.

Sherlock wasn’t bored, though. His solution to the case was ingenious, as always. Sorry I can’t share it here.

Gotta wrap this up; study group at Felicia’s is about to start. I won’t be staying an extra hour, unfortunately. The boyfriend has joined her early in London as of last week, and since I wasn’t interested in a threesome with the couple, Felicia and I are back to platonic study-groupmates.

If ever I’d had doubts about Sherlock being asexual, his response to Felicia and I concluding our non-platonic activities put an end to that. He said something to the effect of “At least you should be satisfied for several months now.” Very, very tempted to explain to him that’s not how sexual attraction works, but I won’t. Let him think I’ve “stored up” enough sex to get me through, if it’ll keep him from worrying. My love.

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If John had ever thought of Sherlock – and Mycroft, shit – as having parents instead of springing from the earth fully formed like whatsername, he probably would have pictured them as the parents from The Secret Garden and other stories of its type: busy, important people with busy, important things to do and only vaguely aware that any children exist, nevermind their own.

Instead, come to find, Sherlock’s mother and father are perfectly ordinary. Mummy seems to be a natter-er; Daddy nods, smiles, and puts in a word here and there. They obviously adore Sherlock, no matter how he downplays it.

John was tickled pink to meet them, for the few minutes Sherlock allowed before shoving Mummy and Daddy out the door.

John’s going to insist they spend Christmas with the ‘rents next month during the break from his retraining. Insist quite firmly.

Assuming, of course, he’s not kidnapped and stuck underneath a bonfire again, and none of the other “markers” Sherlock’s tracking manage to blow up Parliament. Ah, all in a day’s work for the great Sherlock Holmes and his partner Dr. Watson.

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John doesn’t have an eidetic memory like Sherlock does, but by this point he does have a good ear for interesting or out-of-the-blue dialogue. And nothing is quite as out-of-the-blue as Sherlock shouting from the sitting room as John descends the stairs:

“John! John! Oh, there you are. I’ve found you a promising sexual partner!”

John groans. Not this again. “Sherlock, I told you --”

Sherlock cuts him off with a non-sequitur: “John, are you in the habit of shopping for first editions of 19th century American poets?”

“What? No.”

“And yet, when you ran across that Whitman, you texted me immediately. This is the same thing. A rare find fell at my feet, so do me the courtesy of not dismissing this out of hand. Wait. Does that count as mixing metaphors?”

John doesn’t know and doesn’t care. He’s too busy trying not to smile at the adorable expression on Sherlock’s face. Several of Sherlock’s expressions are adorable, though John strongly suspects that Sherlock wouldn’t appreciate him using that word.

“You’re right,” John admits. “I should listen to you.”

“Always.”

Even his snooty toff expression is adorable. Under certain circumstances. John replies, “That’s a tall order, although I do try. So what about this woman?

“She’s a [REDACTED], on [REDACTED] arrived [REDACTED]. She’s an expert in [REDACTED] success rate. She has [REDACTED] so she’d likely be amenable to hearing about your work as a doctor. She’s also [REDACTED], a cat lover, size [REDACTED], an only child, bakes her own bread, and has a [REDACTED]. Oh, and is sexually attracted to men but is aromantic, thus an excellent candidate for an ‘acquaintances with benefits’ affair.”

Wow. ‘Rare find’ was correct. “Is she good looking?”

“Oh. Let me think.” Sherlock pauses for a good thirty seconds before coming out with “Less than Lupita Nyong’o, more than Aileen Wuornos.”

John is perplexed. “Who is… Wait, that serial killer in the 90s from Florida?”

“Murders in 1989 and 1990, executed 2002. Yes.”

Ugh. “Aileen to Lupita, that’s a wide range of attractiveness there.”

Sherlock sighs. “I’m a grey-asexual who’s aesthetically attracted to men. That’s as precise as I can get about this woman’s physical appeal.”

Fair enough. John thinks about what else he needs and wants in a sexual partner. “Is she nice? Does she have a sense of humour?”

“She laughed and didn’t strike me when I deduced her. Does that answer the question?”

It does, actually. A reasonably positive response to Sherlock deductions is a good indicator for compatibility. “Alright, I guess I could at least meet her.”

“Good.” Sherlock pushes John toward the sitting room door. “If you put your coat on now, we’ll make it to the pub just on time.”

“You already told her I’d meet her?”

“I already told her you’ll have sex with her.”

“Sherlock!” John protests, but follows him out the front door anyway.

And, we’re back from the pub, and a funny, [REDACTED], much-closer-to-Lupita-than-Aileen-in-attractiveness woman is taking a shower before joining me in my bedroom. Keeping a bed up here even though I hardly ever sleep in it was clearly a genius move.

Now she’s smiling at me from the doorway. Oh, poor thing, the dressing gown I lent her doesn’t seem to want to stay closed.

Or on.

Time to put the laptop away.

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Fucking Mycroft! You can stick your “redacted” up your [REDACTED], you [REDACTED]. If your [REDACTED] wasn’t my [REDACTED], I’d [REDACTED], [REDACTED]; [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED].

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Looking back at the last entry in his PRIVATE PERSONAL JOURNAL to see where he’d left off, John is cross all over again.

Anonymous Redacting Person, listen carefully. You’re only doing your job, obviously. But that boss of yours is – fuck it. If John ever does have sex with Sherlock, he’s going to write down every single detail in this journal (which is, it must be stated once again, PRIVATE and PERSONAL) and he is counting on you to read every. single. word. to your boss out loud. Preferably in person and preferably more than once. But, you know, needs must, and if it’s over the phone just the once, then as long as it is out loud (your choice as to how much thespian flair you want to put into the reading) John will be content.

Right. Onward.

Still having quite nice sex with the quite nice woman from the prior entry. Claire is her name.

Actually, I’m pretty sure Claire is not and never has been her name, but it’s what she likes to be called.

Still putting up with the swells of vainglory that flow from Sherlock every time Claire comes by. He’s so high on himself about this, god. I happened to mention Claire once when we were consulting with Lestrade in his office, and I thought Sherlock’s chest was going to pop, it inflated so fully and abruptly. “You should know it was I who procured her,” he steamrolled over Lestrade’s polite follow-up question as to who Claire was.

I pointed out that “procure” was entirely the wrong word as she was neither an object nor a sex worker; Sherlock ignored me, busy as he was declaring to Lestrade, “I am a superlative partner, providing this much outstanding sex to John. You should hear how deeply satisfied he is.”

At exactly the same time my mouth opened to tell Sherlock off both for listening to me and Claire and for parading my sex life in front of all and sundry – order yet to be determined – my eyes reached his face and I was bowled over by the love saturating his expression. He was showing off again, but this time it was me, how good he is at making me happy, meeting my most fundamental needs. What’s more human than that?

I explained to Lestrade about Claire later. He gets it. Well, probably not entirely, he's from the same kind of "one man & one woman" stock I'm from, but he does get what Sherlock can do to your head, point your eyes toward some things you’d overlooked, get you seeing the entire tableau in a completely different way. Yeah. Lestrade gets that.

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Why are there so many irritating twats in the world?

John was having his lunch, minding his own business (working through the logistics of something Claire said she’d try with him, if you must know), when Randall sat down next to him.

“Blah, blah, blah,” said Randall.

“I am politely listening but not actually interested,” said John’s face, or at least that’s what he hoped it was saying.

The gist turned out to be that Randall had a cousin who was thinking about going into medicine, and Randall wanted John to give the cousin advice on what it’s like to go through medical training as a person who’s LGBT.

“Sorry,” John replied, and explained that while he was willing to give advice to a youngster, he didn’t have any LGBT advice on account of being straight and cis.

“What?” Randall squawked. “I thought that tall bloke with the coat was your boyfriend.”

“He is,” John confirmed, and then Randall went off on a rant about closets and false pretences and disrespect and “exploiting LGBT+ resources,” whatever that means, and by about a minute in, John had had enough.

Gathering the remains of his lunch, he stood and addressed Randall as calmly as he could. “Just because I’m straight, doesn’t mean I can’t have a boyfriend. It is none of your fucking business how I identify. I’m going to walk away now, but if you ever, ever bring that shit up around my boyfriend, I will knock your fucking head off.”

And that was that.

Until John got home (late, exhausted) and Sherlock was ignoring him (interesting but non-urgent case), and John got to thinking as he brushed his teeth that maybe it was disrespectful to your gay – or, at least, closer to the neighbourhood of gay than to straight – same-sex partner to call yourself straight, an orientation that implies if not outright designates an exclusion of same-sex partnership. He was still thinking and still brushing, although slowly, when Sherlock surprised him with a kiss to the back of the head.

Sherlock ordered him to stop thinking, as it was distracting Sherlock from the thinking he needed to do, and reached around John for his own toothbrush.

“Does it bother you?” John asked.

“Did I not just say it was bothering me? I am 99 and nine tenths sure that I said that out loud.”

John spit into the sink, and then grabbed the toothpaste away from Sherlock. This was important. “Not that. That I say I’m straight and not LGBT. I could–”

“You aren’t LGBT,” Sherlock interrupted. “You’re also not of Nigerian descent nor taller than I nor… What’s that group of people that piss you off so thoroughly?”

“Anarchists?” John guessed.

Sherlock waved him off.

“Murderers?” was his second guess.

“Really, you think I’d have deleted the term ‘murderers’ from my hard drive? No, the ones that shout on news programmes and, we can infer, think all poor people should die.”

Ah. “Tories.”

“Right, deleting that again now that my point is made. There are a lot of things you’re not and none of them bother me.” Sherlock tugged the toothpaste tube from John’s hand and began a careful application to his brush.

John sighed and started to protest, but was stopped by a toothbrush pointed directly at his nose.

“John, are you my boyfriend and partner?”

“Of course.”

“Do you intend to stay my boyfriend and partner?”

“As long as you’ll have me.”

Sherlock nodded. “That is what I care about. What some random idiot idiotically said is not.”

John put his arms around Sherlock’s waist and his face between Sherlock’s shoulder blades, and held on until Sherlock’s oral hygiene routine was complete and they could go to bed.

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John spent last night at Claire’s. That’s not happening again.

No offence to Claire, or her flat (though it is as blandly impersonal as a hotel room). It’s just that somewhere along the line, for him and Sherlock “kipping together’s not half-bad” has turned into “it’s hard to get restful sleep if you’re not around,” and John doesn’t intend to ever allow Sherlock to have a night like last night again.

Whir up a nun

Shh its fine. Sleep

loll that was Sherlock and me caught by voice recorder

Don’t think I’ll edit that bit. Leave it there for posterity. Because, see, the drafting of this post is happening almost all through the voice feature on my mobile, on account of typing with one thumb being ridiculously slow. I can hear Sherlock’s voice in my head, commenting that it’s difficult to perceive any increase in speed when both my hands are on a full-sized keyboard. That’s alright, as long as he keeps sleeping, he can talk inside my head all he likes.

Why one thumb? Because I’m stretched out on the couch and Sherlock’s stretched out on me and one arm’s busy keeping him from falling off – keeping me from not being able to hold him – and the other arm’s trapped between me and the couch, a bit, with only the hand free to hold the mobile.

And this story should be told. So that when Sherlock’s had an even whirlier whirlwind of a week than normal, with cat naps his only concession to his need for rest, and stubbornly snaps at me at the end of it, “I’m not an infant; there is no reason for you to stay, and in fact your hovering is becoming intolerable” I’ll have a reminder that the other room is as far as I should go.

The story is this:

John Watson made his way up the stairs to 221B in quite the good mood, having spent the evening before and some of the morning as well having amorous adventures with his acquaintance (Friend? Maybe? Getting there?) with benefits, Claire. He was planning on a long hot shower and then taking Sherlock out for lunch at that one cafe with the great homemade soups.

The flat was silent and the lounge was empty when he walked in. Heading into the kitchen to go through into their bedroom, John was surprised to see a massive bunch of balloons in the corner, bobbing in front of the window. They were a variety of shapes, all shiny pastel colours, some with sparkles, and one, if John was not mistaken, inscribed with “Happy Birthday Princess.”

Odd but not hazardous, so John continued onward and very quietly opened the bedroom door so as not to disturb Sherlock’s slumber.

Which turned out to be completely unnecessary, as Sherlock wasn’t in the bedroom. The sheets were tangled, so he had been at some point. Good.

John dropped a quick text to Sherlock (lunch at soup place?) and was headed to the bath when a loud thump boomed down from the ceiling. He took the stairs two at a time and found Sherlock on the floor of John’s old bedroom, caught up in a quilt and with his mobile pressed to his forehead for some reason.

Sherlock looked up at John, eyes heavy and puffed, and said three words that scared the shit out of John.

"Are you real?"

Because, you see, John has been treated more than once to Sherlock's rant about the uselessness of questioning people about their existence (John never realised before meeting Sherlock how many pieces of fictional media use this particular device) because an hallucination or manifestation ("Not the same at all, really, what is the state of medical education if they can't be bothered to teach you about the way the brain perceives and conceives reality") will not provide you with useful data, and actual people are idiots.

John jolted toward Sherlock and gathered him up, pulled the lanky scarecrow and his quilt onto John’s lap right there on the floor, bundled and tucked and silently cursed the arms that weren’t quite long enough to cocoon Sherlock properly.

“I'm real,” John said. “I'm here. See? I mean feel? I'm here.”

“Tactile hallucinations are –”

“Statistically unlikely and see? Here.” John stretched to rub the underside of his chin against Sherlock’s skin. “Scruff. You've never felt it on the back of your wrist before. No memory to conjure up. I'm real.”

Sherlock let out at a rough sigh, and his shoulders seemed to melt. “Plus you reek of Claire's secretions.”

There he was, John’s love, back again. “Hm, yeah, haven't had my shower yet.”

They sat on the floor for a while until John was able to coax Sherlock down the stairs and into the kitchen for some tea. He would've preferred to get Sherlock nestled onto the couch immediately, but it seemed neither of them were able to quite let go of being in physical contact.

As the water heated, Sherlock related his tale – how he’d lain down on their bed last night and moments later was sitting in the lounge, John in his own chair, Mycroft in the client chair, talking about a secret fortress and a super-genius little girl.

(“Smarter than you?” John asked with a smile.

“Smarter than Mycroft,” Sherlock replied, and John knew it wasn’t time for lightheartedness yet.)

Just then, a crash of breaking glass pulled the attention of all three of them to the kitchen. The top part of the window had been smashed out by a flying drone. Odd creepy music came out of the thing as it flew into the lounge and landed in the middle of the rug. Mycroft declared it a patience grenade, said it would destroy the flat when any of them moved. They waited, tense and quiet, for Mrs. Hudson to stop hoovering and then ran – Mycroft to the stairs and John and Sherlock to the windows.

They each jumped through a window at the same time, the glass splintering around them and smelling of spun sugar, as flames balled and billowed behind them. They bounced off the canopy over Speedy’s and then Sherlock landed back on their bed, alone, nothing damaged except his sense of what was actual and what was not.

He crept out of the bedroom, expecting the rest of the flat to be destroyed; it wasn’t, but crossing the threshold into the kitchen made dread crawl under his skin like ants. He backed out, dressed, grabbed his wallet, and fled.

Not many stores were open in the early almost-dawn hour but he’d somehow found what he needed. Back in the flat, shiny balloons in place to block the drone from coming in, Sherlock had stumbled up the stairs, desperate to be away but home, and he’d wanted to be on the mattress but didn’t want his eyes to close but they did and his phone had sounded and John hadn’t been there and maybe John died in the blast and maybe –

John hugged him, hard, tight, deep pressure to stabilise them both.

“I’m here. I’m real. You’re safe. Sod the tea; let’s go lie down. I need to hold you.”

Sherlock asked for the couch, not their bed, so he could remind himself the lounge was still standing. John had no objections, and they settled themselves comfortably, John propped against the sofa arm and Sherlock tucked against John’s chest.

“Did we frighten Mycroft with a clown?” Sherlock asked sleepily.

John chuckled. “No, love, that was just a dream. Sleep.” And Sherlock did.

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Bill Murray is getting married! So chuffed for him. Great bloke, just great. Made Afghanistan a bit more bearable, having a mate like Bill around.

And Deborah sounds lovely, from everything Bill said at the pub.

Bill had hand-delivered the wedding invitation as they met up. John had opened the envelope to find a second envelope – why do wedding invitations do that? He’d asked Bill, who had no idea, and they had a bit of a laugh about it.

The inside envelope was addressed to Dr John H. Watson (the cheek of Bill, using his middle initial) and Guest. Bill had asked who John might bring, and John said, Sherlock of course, and then there was a bit of a longer conversation, to help Bill get his mind fully around the idea that a straight bloke would want to commit his life to another man.

They’d talked about Sherlock before, of course they had, but it hadn’t really sunk in for Bill, what it meant. Just confusion, it turned out, not lack of support. ‘Course not, not a guy like Bill.

Wonder what Sherlock will want to wear to the wedding.

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Voicemail from Bill. Fucking Christ, I’ll box his ears next time I see him. Fucking cunt, fuck him and his bigoted fiancee!

John, it’s Bill. Super quick, I talked to Deborah, told her about you and Sherlock, and she was furious with me, that I hadn’t told her that you and him were, yeah, together. She said to tell you to throw the invitation right in the rubbish bin. Oh shit, gotta go, talk to you later.

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In the category of things not being what they seem:

John had been stomping through the flat for more than a day, ever since that voicemail from Bill Murray. He hadn’t played it for Sherlock, naturally – who needs that in their ears? – but had let Sherlock know that Bill was right off their Christmas list. If they’d had one, which they didn’t, and it had taken a while to convey to Sherlock why anyone would have a Christmas list, and then that got the two of them off onto the subject of the varying levels of “friends” and why people didn’t say “acquaintances” and then how “network” was an appropriate term for people you knew as a noun but appalling as a verb that meant accumulating more people to know, and then Mrs H popped in holding the post.

“Lovely thick ivory envelope for you; bet it’s a wedding invitation.”

Sherlock took the envelope and sliced it with the letter opener (actually a dagger, “but considerably dulled, John; repeated contact with bone does that”).

“It’s nice when couples take that step,” Mrs H continued as she headed into the kitchen. “It’s all right, you know, when you’re just living together. I don’t mind, as the two of you well know.”

She re-entered the lounge, cup of steeping tea in hand. “But there’s just something about that solemnisation. Who is it, dear?”

Sherlock recited, somehow managing to convey the formatting through verbal tone alone:

“Bill? What’s that ffff” – he held the letter, teeth against lower lip, as his brain scrambled to come up with a less sweary word to use around Mrs Hudson, ah, yes – “fellow doing sending me another invite?”

“It’s not just you,” Mrs Hudson pointed out, holding up the smaller envelope that’d been in the larger one. “Dr John Watson and Mr Sherlock Holmes.”

Sherlock turned the invitation over and read, “We’re looking forward to meeting Sherlock and having the both of you there as we celebrate. Hugs.” He over-articulated that word, his voice dripping with his customary disdain for sentiment, especially informal sentiment, but he was able to finish reading: “Deborah.”

“But.” John was thoroughly perplexed. “But Bill said Deborah said to bin the invite.”

“How odd,” Mrs Hudson commented, “to tell you to throw out something already in the post to you.”

“It wasn’t in the post,” replied Sherlock, ever the stickler for detail. “This is the second invitation John’s received for the same event; John was instructed to bin the first one.”

John told Mrs Hudson the rest of the story, how Bill had given him the invite in person and then left the voicemail. He could feel his head filling up with steam as he relayed Deborah’s anger at them being a couple.

“Well, no, dear,” Mrs H replied. “She wasn’t angry at you being a couple; she was angry at Bill not telling her you were a couple.” Seeing John’s scepticism, she shook her head. “Who was the first invitation addressed to?”

“Me.”

“And?”

“And, um, Guest.”

Mrs Hudson nodded again. “There you go, love.”

She seemed to think everything was now clear.

It wasn’t.

After a light sigh, Mrs H went on. “The etiquette for addressing invitations is that writing ‘and guest’ is only for single people; with a couple, both people should be named. She wasn’t upset about you being together; she was upset that she’d mistakenly implied that you weren’t together.”

A mystery solved by Mrs H! Score one for her, and one for me and Sherlock who’ll be going to Bill and Deborah’s wedding.

(And thank god I’d decided to give Bill the silent treatment after the voicemail instead of shouting at him. How awkward would that have been? Bill’s seen the ol’ Watson temper but that doesn’t mean he would’ve liked it aimed at him.)

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Rumour has it Sholto is coming to Bill’s wedding. It’d be great to see him but I’m not holding my breath. Major James Sholto is the most unsociable man alive. Sherlock was miffed when I said that to him, but seriously, it’s impossible to get Sholto to come to London or even just out of his house. I’ve barely had any contact with him, since he’s not much of a writer/emailer, either.

He’s probably not going to come but it’d be fantastic to see him and talk a bit. He’s the first person I admired who ever, well, it wasn’t mutual admiration exactly but more like, he saw me? Saw all of me and thought the good bits, the useful and estimable bits, outweighed the bad and nothing bits. Got me focused on the good bits, on building strengths; helped me get to the point where success felt familiar.

I’d achieved things before I met him, obviously. I wasn’t a complete loser. But it usually didn’t feel like enough or it felt shaky somehow or the next problem came along swiftly and knocked me on my arse.

Working with him, being on his team, we went from saving the day to saving the next day. We worked our arses off, and we made a difference, had an impact.

Then blam, a bullet to the shoulder, and it was all gone.

Until Sherlock.

The first might meet the current. It’d be great. Not saying they’d actually like each other, but yeah. Yeah. It’d be great.

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John wrote up The Hollow Client on the public blog and told how Sherlock Holmes fell for a prank, imagining a fantastical set of possible solutions to a mystery that really wasn’t one.

That evening Sherlock woke John from the doze he’d fallen into on the couch, crawled into his lap, and confessed that he’d known from the first two sentences of the email from the “client” that the whole thing was fake. He’d only agreed to “take the case” because it’d been strange enough to capture John’s attention.

Which had been sorely lacking lately.

John’s immediate reaction was to protest, to contradict, but with a few more seconds’ thought, he realised Sherlock was right.

Retraining has been exhausting lately, physically and mentally, and there’s barely been opportunity for the two of them to exist in the same room, never mind work together on a case.

John held Sherlock, leaned in against his neck just to breathe him in, and asked him to hold on just a while longer. When the programme’s done, John’s outside work will scale back considerably – maybe even just one day a week? Give them time to get in their groove again.

But I don’t know. Maybe I should quit, maybe it’s not worth it, if my absence is felt so keenly that Sherlock would actually tell me that it’s felt keenly.

I don’t know.

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John had trotted down the stairs and was about to go out to his shift at Bart’s when the doorbell rang. A bit of frustration at the delay was pushed aside entirely when he saw Claire standing there; she looked as fit as ever.

“Hi, great to see you,” he said. “Sorry, I’m just about to go out; why were you stopping by?”

“Sherlock didn't tell you?” Claire tilted her head to the side, and smiled up at him. “Well, this is awkward.”

Sherlock suddenly appeared in the foyer, pulling his gloves on, and slipped past John to join Claire on the sidewalk. “Let’s go,” he said to her.

“Hang on,” John said at a slightly louder decibel level than was, strictly speaking, required. “What are the two of you doing?”

“Working, obviously,” Sherlock replied. “She’s better at this than you, actually.”

Claire sent a pleased, impish grin John’s way, but it didn’t mollify him one bit. Not one bit.

Sherlock continued, “So I texted her.”

“Claire’s better than me?” John couldn’t keep the emotion out of his voice, even though he wasn’t quite sure what the emotion was. As far as he could tell it was an odd melange of resentment, hurt, resignation, shame, jealousy, and a tiny smidgen of happiness that his partner was getting along with his… different kind of partner.

“Well, she is an on-leave super-[REDACTED] with a terrifying skill set. Of course she’s better.”

“Yeah, okay,” John replied. That at least made logical sense; the melange began to dissipate.

And, if nothing else, Sherlock’s words had put a sparkle in Claire’s eyes that was definitely alluring. Maybe by the time he got back from his shift, they’d both be in the lounge, flush with victory and high on adrenaline, and Sherlock would turn to his violin and Claire would turn to him…

“Nothing personal.”

He was startled out of his reverie. Sherlock was so close to him, hand on his wrist, and looking up at him, their heights reversed, and the look on Sherlock’s face… John took the opportunity to plant a kiss right on Sherlock’s forehead. “Have fun.”

“I always do.”

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Last evening, which Sherlock and John both were at home for, and isn’t that a miracle these days, Sherlock informed John that he didn’t want to go to Bill’s wedding. Too many people, which John got, and too many preparations, which John didn’t. Suits, a wedding gift, hotel room to stay in after, hire car to get there and back (Sutton Mallet, why’d they pick Sutton Mallet? Bill’s not from there and he said Deborah’s family are all Londoners. ??) were all squared away. So what –

Sherlock interrupted at that point to hand John the most luxurious socks John had ever seen in his life. The explanation for such socks was that Sherlock had been told that the floors are often chilly at weddings, and Sherlock wanted John’s toes to stay warm.

Hmm.

“Told by whom?” was John’s question (and he deliberately used “whom” so as to not distract Sherlock from the question by incorrect grammar).

The story was this:

Molly’s young niece had wanted to meet the famous detective, so Sherlock agreed to lunch with her and Molly at a small cafe. They had an engaging conversation on forensic entomology (“You told a small child about insects eating dead people?” “She was the one who led the conversation. Quite insightful questions for one so young.”), and then Small Molly (Sherlock did not remember the girl’s name) mentioned she would in the near future be the flower girl at a wedding.

Regular Molly excused herself to the toilet, and Small Molly proceeded to impart to Sherlock all that she knew about weddings.

By the time Molly returned to the table, Sherlock had concluded he wanted nothing to do with weddings and the conversation had turned to other matters.

“Tell me what she told you,” John said.

Sherlock proceeded to do so, getting more agitated and speaking faster and faster as he went. The thing he was most anguished about was that guests had to give a speech about the best man, and not only would many of the guests be embarrassingly and tediously incorrect about who exactly the best man was, because obviously John was the best man still alive (apparently, the Garroter of Somewhere had been a very generous person but was now deceased), but it was becoming frustratingly clear that capturing one’s feelings on paper-slash-screen was exponentially more difficult than recording one’s thoughts.

A nice tight hug, deep pressure in the right places, helped calm Sherlock down. John explained that the under-ten set had a tendency to misinterpret, and then they had a conversation about what actually happens at weddings.

They had to consult Mrs Hudson on some of the finer details, but by the end of the evening Sherlock had once again agreed to come to Bill and Deborah’s wedding.

(And at the very end of the evening, when we were tucked into bed together, Sherlock told me some of the things he’d been trying to put in a speech about me. God. Tears in my eyes, on my face; me bawling like a baby, felt like. Sherlock got alarmed, but I just held him closer and tried my best to reciprocate, to tell him what he means to me. Not sure I did it justice; not sure I could ever do it, or him, justice, really. Not sure that’s possible. My love.)

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John has made A Choice.

Capital A, Capital C.

We’re back to being Milne, although perhaps John never stopped.

The choice is not to be a complete arsehole about what he’s just discovered, even though he’s fairly well burning with jealousy.

It’s always intimidated him, this thing, and so of course Sherlock would find someone else to do it with. It’s not cheating, not outside the bounds of their relationship.

It’s just –

Well, a lot of things. He never knew Sherlock was into it, for one, and why didn’t he? It shouldn’t be a secret, at least between partners the way he and Sherlock are. What is it about John that Sherlock never told him? Because clearly the man loves it.

And it’s a thing for couples, isn’t it? Obviously, not everyone’s a couple – not if it’s your hobby or profession, generally – but most are. And while obviously he and Sherlock don’t do everything, or maybe even most things, your standard couple do, they could do this. Couldn’t they?

John’s intimidated by it, as stated before, but he could learn! And he would learn, for Sherlock. Maybe he wouldn’t be as good as it as Claire

And here’s he’s going to remind himself that he made A Choice, The Choice not to be an arsehole about this! Even though Claire is so good at it, it makes John seethe. Even though Claire and Sherlock now are doing a second thing for hours every week, spending time together, having experiences together that John wants to be having with Sherlock.

Maybe John should use the spare time he doesn’t have to take up boxing or mixed martial arts.

Some way to release these feelings, because he likes Claire, he truly does. Sherlock is always going to be Number One for John, but it’s nice to have another number in there. Someone to be yourself with. He’s got that now with Claire, and it feels good, so why should he begrudge the same thing to Sherlock?

And it’s not like John has pined to learn how to waltz. He would have gone his whole life without giving any thought to doing it himself, if Sherlock and Claire hadn’t taken it up together.

He could ask them to teach him, but they can’t all three dance. There are limits!