It started with the dropped 50p piece.

John had been working at his laptop and had reached in his pocket for a receipt to enter into his banking software when he accidently pulled out the 50p piece and dropped it. So he'd gotten down on his hands and knees to search. There were many things under the desk—pens, fringes of paper from pages torn from spiral notebooks, a crumpled Mars bar wrapper, what might have been a Jenga piece, something that was certainly a half melted chess pawn, a USB cable that he'd been looking for the day before, three rubber bands, several pieces of popcorn and a single jelly bean, two of those horrible subscription cards from magazines and some dead plant leaves. There were some stains that might have been coffee, and others that certainly weren't. At least there was nothing dead or disgusting. Or growing.

He heard Sherlock's footsteps taking the stairs his usual two at a time, but when John glanced out from under the table, he thought he'd been mistaken. Because the pair of legs that walked into the flat were wearing jeans. And that couldn't be Sherlock. Because Sherlock didn't wear jeans.

"John, what are you doing?"

No, that was certainly Sherlock's voice.

"Looking for a 50p piece that I dropped.

Sherlock bent down for a moment, back to John, "Is this it?"

"Um, I guess so. You know, under this table is filthy. Can you pass me the bin?" Yes, definitely dark denim blue jeans with yellow stitching, topped by a casual blue striped shirt that didn't fit like Sherlock had been hand sewn into it but rather like a normal shirt.

And the jeans looked good, really good. Showed off his figure well, even better than those painted on trousers. His figure? Since when did he think about another man's figure? And really, it wasn't the whole figure, it was the bum. Oh, God, that was worse!

John tried to stand up and banged his head on the underside of the table.

"Ow! Bloody hell!"

Sherlock whirled in one of those amazingly fluid moves of his, standing, spinning and catching a mug of pens and the router seemingly effortless in one smooth motion as they toppled.

"John?" Sherlock set the mug and router back on the table as he knelt to look beneath the table. "Are you alright?"

And that was when John saw the haircut. Sherlock had gotten a haircut.

Clutching the duck egg that was rapidly swelling on the back of his head he said, "You cut your hair?"

"Actually I had a gentleman cut all of my hairs, but very observant of you. Come out of there and let me look at your head."

John backed out from under the table. At least Sherlock was still wearing a pair of his narrow black shoes. If he'd been wearing trainers John thought his head might explode. He accepted Sherlock's outstretched hand which was warm and very slightly moist. It took John a moment to realize why that was strange. Sherlock wasn't wearing his gloves. Sherlock gripped John's hand tighter, fingers clasping to take some of John's weight and help him up. For a moment it looked curiously like the way a man might kiss a lady's hand.

Sherlock let go and blinked and even winked his right eye rapidly for a moment, rubbing and plucking at the lid which John could see was watering.

"We should look at your head," Sherlock said, "but I seem to have something in my eye."

"Come over to the window and let me take a look. You're going to have to sit down. You know I can't look down into your eye if you don't."

Sherlock pulled out a chair and swung himself into it backwards, arms resting on the back. The colour of the shirt made his skin warmer somehow and really showed off the green in his eyes.

But it was the haircut that especially caught John's attention. It fit closer to his head revealing the shape of his skull and his ears. The fringe was straighter and lighter, the heavy curled bit having been cut off. The part was casual and at the back there were soft childish curls along the hairline. It looked very soft and touchable. It made him look younger, vulnerable, open and more human—less like a mad capped whirlwind.

John looked down into Sherlock's face in the light of the window. Across Sherlock's wide cheekbones and sharp nose was a scattering of tiny hairs, bare millimeters long. It was one of these that was just tickling the bottom of the eye. This close John could smell a little mousse that the hairdresser must have used and the talcum powder that had been dusted across Sherlock's face to brush off the hairs. He could even see a little scatter of it Sherlock's unruly eyebrows. He could smell the rich sandalwood scent of Sherlock's aftershave.

"It's a hair," he said, and he was surprised at how hoarse his voice sounded, how dry his mouth had become. "Look up and I'll try and get it out with my finger.

"So, you're dressed awfully casually," he went on partially to distract Sherlock from a finger in his eye but also to distract himself from the feel of Sherlock's very soft hair in his hands as he tilted the head to get a better angle, and the smooth cool skin on Sherlock's cheek and Sherlock's warm breath touching his neck and chin.

"Am I?" Sherlock replied, his voice almost a whisper as he rolled his eyes up.

"It's just I've been here a month and I've never seen you in anything but a dress shirt and suit, even when it would make more sense to be in more informal clothes."

"I don't like to get haircuts in my good clothes."

"Ah…," said John as he slid the hair from Sherlock's eye, caught it on his finger and flicked it away. He brushed a few more stray hairs away from Sherlock's brows and cheeks. There was one on Sherlock's upper lip, caught in the sharp V. Those lips were naturally quite pink, weren't they? John's finger slid along Sherlock's open mouth. He noticed that Sherlock had shut his eyes. His moist tongue flicked out to just touch John's finger.

Oh, bugger.

John leant in to press his lips against Sherlock's open mouth, pulling Sherlock's head closer by sliding his fingers into that luxuriant softness. Sherlock's arms wrapped around John's neck and his hands wandered up to John's own short hair.

"Ow!"

Sherlock moved his hands quickly from the throbbing bump on John's head but stayed around John's shoulders.

"You know," he murmured as he moved his mouth to John's throat, "I was putting off getting my hair cut because I thought you wouldn't like it. But that seems to not be the case. I wish I'd realized that a month ago. I'd have taken you with me to the hairdressers."

"That," John managed to gasp, "would certainly have been interesting."