AN: This story was written for the 221B Advent Calender 2012


Four Weeks until Christmas

It's still one month until Christmas, but John has already re-discovered a universal truth: It is impossible to find the right present for Sherlock Holmes, especially if you want it to be a surprise. He hadn't cared so much about the present on their first Christmas together, they had been just mates back then and it was a spontaneous decision, a book from a pathologist recounting some of his most interesting cases. The next Christmas Sherlock had been dead and there was no need for any presents. He hadn't even any clear memories from that time, not that he really wanted to remember spending the holidays with several bottles of whiskey in the loneliness of his flat. But now, now they were together in every sense of the word and somehow their first Christmas as couple felt like a huge occasion.

So ever since the first Christmas-themed items turned up in the shops he thought about the right present. He isn't close to panic – after all he has still a month – , but the fact that he is at the same stage of finding the perfect present for the madman he fell in love with since September starts bothering him. That's why he tries to keep his eyes and ears open, hoping for some kind of inspiration or maybe a hint from Sherlock. In the end, it is pure coincidence that he stumbles upon the advert for a sale of lab equipment and he couldn't really believe his luck when Sherlock chooses exactly that day to help his brother on a case.

This should have been probably his hint that not everything is going to be this easy. Surprisingly the store is packed with people and even without Sherlock's ability for deduction he'd say most of them are students or actually chemists with their own kind of lab. He feels a bit lost regarding the variety of instruments and also a bit jostled around by the other customers while he slowly walks down the shelves, but in the end he settles for a mini mass spectrometer which will fit nicely in Sherlock's makeshift lab in their kitchen.

Glad that his Christmas shopping for Sherlock is over, it takes him a moment to recognise the strangled noises beside him. But the immediate cry for help from several other customers draws his attention to an elderly woman who has collapsed near the shelf of beakers. His medical training kicks in and in an instant he is besides her, checking her vitals and after finding no heartbeat starting CPR. He vaguely registers someone calling an ambulance, but is nevertheless surprised when a paramedic kneels beside him. Together they manage to stabilise her, but since her pulse is still very weak and irregular, John decides to join the paramedics in the ambulance. (He doesn't meet much resistance from the paramedics, he knows one from some of his shifts at St. Mary's and the other one is the first week on the job.)

It is hours later when he returns to Baker Street, having waited all the time in the hospital for news on his impromptu patient. When he leaves her station, her daughter is already there, thanking him for rescuing her mother. With his thoughts still on the events of afternoon, it takes him a moment to remember why he had been there in the first place. Thankfully Sherlock is still out, so he doesn't catch John's frustrated groan. Although it is not as impressive as the one he can't suppress at the store the next day, when he learns that apart from some beakers everything is sold out.