Author's Note: My friend was feeling kind of low, so I wrote this up for her. I typed it up at one in the morning, and it's based off of some texts that me and another friend had been shooting back and forth in character as John and Sherlock. So bear that in mind as you read; it's just for fun and probably not as good as some of the other stuff I posted.
Disclaimer: I don't own anyone but Brealy.
John checked his watch as he boarded the tube at Charing Cross station settled in a corner of the car with his back to the wall, standing with his arms crossed. He'd just got off work, and he felt the adrenalin of the stressful day leave him, allowing the tiredness to take hold.
Need coffee, he thought, wearily. The day wasn't over yet, and he'd been up since three am. It had been awhile since Sherlock had asked him on a case, though the detective had kept busy, judging from the papers. John had grown adept at spotting which cases had really been solved by his friend, though his name was rarely mentioned and the Yard mostly took the credit.
But the blogger's days had been full, as well. Mary hadn't gone back to work yet after delivering the baby, and John took double shifts to supplement the little family income and cover the hospital bills from the birth.
It was good. But it was busy. John found himself wishing for a break. He chuckled at how ridiculous it was that solving a crime with Sherlock sounded like a stress-relieving jaunt to him, but it did.
John's phone blipped three times in rapid succession. He pulled it out of his pocket with perhaps a little more eagerness than he would admit even to himself. The text did actually turn up to be from Sherlock, and made John feel awake in an instant.
S- HELP
S- John.
S- You are a doctor.
John's response was immediate.
J- What?
S- Quick, what does one do when an infant is screaming for no discernible reason without
stopping?
S- Have tried giving it a bottle. Please advise. SH
John's eyebrows traveled a mile up his forehead and he blinked.
J- Sherlock, WHO in their right mind would give you their CHILD to babysit...?!
J- Try making funny faces.
S- Faces, John? This is your professional advice?
S- In answer to your previous question, think someone related to you by marriage. The
argument could be made either way as to her sanity, so we'll leave that an open-ended
question. Mary left your offspring with me while she ran to the market.
John shook his head to one side and shot off an irritated response.
J- What did she go to the market for? Wait, why was she at the flat?
Sherlock didn't respond, and as minutes passed, John slipped the phone back into his pocket. Sherlock must be trying the funny-face method.
It was only when John was getting off in Picadilly that his phone blipped again.
S- Situation normal. Infant is asleep.
J- Where is she sleeping? Please tell me she is in a crib and not on the kitchen table.
S- I'm not performing surgical experiments on her, if that's what you are implying. She is on my
bed with pillows around her so she doesn't roll off.
John was a little surprised. Of course, he probably shouldn't have been. He wasn't worried for Brealy, not really. Sherlock neither liked children, nor had dealings with them as much as he could manage, but he did have common sense. Well, a little. Sometimes. Under certain circumstances. In completely unpredictable patterns.
John hailed a taxi, stepped in, and directed it to Baker Street. Whatever his friend's merits, John was still not completely comfortable with the idea of Sherlock playing babysitter.
...
John still had a key to the flat, and let himself in downstairs. Mrs. Hudson was not in, apparently, which explained Sherlock's delimma with a screaming child. The motherly woman would have known what to do right away.
As he ascended the steps two by two, he heard the gentle, swelling melody of a bitter-sweet lullaby on Sherlock's German violin. The flat door was standing partly open, and he pushed it in. Sherlock sat in his chair by the cold fireplace, the gleaming shoulder of his instrument nestled lovingly under his chin, the bow moving languidly up and down and drawing eloquent but simple beauty into the air. His face was intent, but calm and somewhat distant. He was composing.
Across his knees lay Brealy's little form, fast asleep, two of her tiny baby fingers in her little baby mouth. She sucked on them once or twice every few seconds, the picture of utter trusting peacefulness. John leaned against the doorframe and watched, quietly, a little smile tugging at his lips at the sight of his daughter and his best friend.
Sherlock did not notice him for several long minutes. Not until the song had ended on a sighing, tremulous low note, had faded finally from the still air, and Sherlock twisted carefully in his chair so as not to disturb the baby when he put his violin down and instead scooped up transcription sheets and a pen from the side table.
"John," he said, "how was your splurged roast beef sandwich at lunch?"
John snickered. It felt good to hear the bizarre announcements again. And he still had no clues how Sherlock could have divined that he'd had a roast beef sandwich.
"Crummy, actually. A bit...dry." John settled contentedly in the chair opposit from Sherlock. His chair. There was comfortable silence for a moment as Sherlock scribbled notes onto the paper. Brealy drooled onto his trouser leg, and John hid a smile.
"So I see the flat is still standing," he said, finally. "A two-month-old and Sherlock Holmes, and they both come out alive."
Sherlock grunted.
"Her mother is an ex-assassin; it was an obvious priority to keep from angering her. Mrs. Hudson is out and Mary said something about it being her birthday and went to get some things before she comes back."
Brealy stirred, hiccuped, and spit up all down Sherlock's trouser leg. He stiffened. His lips pressed together and he blinked rapidly as his brain attempted to process the information that his seven-hundred-dollar suit pants had just been ruined in something unpleasantly warm and white from a baby's mouth.
"Now that you're back, John, you can take your offspring," he said, voice oddly strained. He looked at John pointedly, and then back down distastefully at the wet spot on his suit that was quickly growing cold in the air.
John grinned, and gently lifted his daughter without waking her. Sherlock might could make for a good nanny in a pinch. But he was still Sherlock.
...
Mrs. Hudson was surprised when she got back from her chiropractic and massage appointment across town. She hadn't seen the baby since her first days in the world at the hospital, and she took pride befitting a grandmother in the little bundle. Mary had cake and ice cream; nothing spectacular, but nice. Sherlock, (in a new, fresh pressed suit. He had changed his entire ensemble instead of only the trousers) inspected the ice cream, and finding it to be chocolate, deemed it worthy of his consumption.
There was small talk, about Mrs. Hudson's oldest son, about Mary and the baby and how well they slept at night, about John's job. And Sherlock recreated a crime scene in Mrs. Hudson's kitchen to demonstrate exacrly how he had solved the latest double murder.
It was a pleasant hour. But Brealy began to fuss and Mary and John quickly agreed it was time they got home.
Sherlock caught John halfway out the door and told him to watch his phone. A new case would come soon, and John would be the first to know. John promised he would, and hurried to jump into the cab, which was waiting.
"John," Mary said, rummaging in the diaper bag for Brealy's bottle, and pulling out instead an envelope. "What's this?" She held it up inquisitively. It had Brealy's name on the outside.
They opened it.
"It's a lullaby he wrote for her," John shook his head, wonderingly, and Mary giggled with delight. John knew his family was weird. Brealy had a soldier and a doctor for a father, an assassin and a spy for a mother, an ex-drug cartel partner-in-crime for a grandmother, and a sociopathic genius detective for a...well, for a Sherlock.
But John didn't mind one bit.
He wouldn't trade it for any "normal" one out there.
THE END
Author's Note: So yep! That's it! I hope you liked it. It felt wrong to have a finished oneshot sitting in my repertoire without being published. Anyway, lemme know what you think! Am I the only one that's CRAZY excited about the interactions between Sherlock and John & Mary's baby in possible upcoming episodes? I am hoping so strongly that nothing happens either to Mary or the baby, but you know, with Moffat...keeping fingers crossed. And in the meantime I shall think happy thoughts.