Buttonhole

"Sherlock? Can you give me a hand?" No response. I frowned, readjusting the shopping bags in my hands until the pinch of the handles eased. I knew he was in. I'd left him sat on the sofa, and I would literally eat that ridiculous deerstalker if he had moved from the flat. I checked my phone; he hadn't gone out for a case, or he would have demanded I meet him there. "Sherlock!" I shouted more insistently, rejigging the bags impatiently. I had already walked too damn far with my arms fully weighed down, in the rain, and with my old injury making my shoulder ache, since a taxi hadn't seemed worth it. With the roads the way they are in London, I'd probably made it home in half the time. Still, it hadn't exactly been a skip through the park. I'd be damned if I carried them up the stairs on my own.

Ensuring that my feet hit each step with maximum impact, hoping to warn Sherlock that I was home and not to be argued with, I stomped up to 221B. I heard fretting about loud noises and broken steps from Mrs Hudson's flat, but I was too focused on the arse sat on his arse upstairs. "Sherlock, I'm not in the mood. Come get some of the bags—" I froze at the door. It was closed and locked. I had definitely left it on the latch when I'd left. Mrs Hudson had mentioned something about coming up to do some cleaning, and I had had no desire to stop her. The whole flat looked a state, and I wasn't going to be the one to scrub it. I was, obviously, always that unlucky sod. I think we had both just been waiting each other out; seeing who was snap in the squalor first. It was always me. The army standards had been drilled into me after all.

There was a sound of definite movement, but I couldn't hear voices. Was he with a client? I leant in, pressed my ear to the door, but there was still nothing. Hopefully, I wasn't about to just burst in on something embarrassing. To be honest, I'd found him naked on the sofa more times than I'd care to think about. With a shrug, I pulled out my keys – lucky really that I had them,since we usually just left the flat unlocked, since the only other person who was ever in the house was Mrs Hudson – and let myself in. It was the second the key turned, with an audible click, that there was a frantic fumbling from inside. I threw open the door with just enough time to see Sherlock shove something behind the sofa cushion and reposition himself into the same lazy slump that I'd left him in. He clearly thought I hadn't noticed. Two can play at that game.

"Sherlock, I have been calling you from downstairs. Come and get some of the shopping, or I'll stop doing your shopping for you, throw away all your vile experiments, and keep the fridge all to myself and my food." His eye opened for a second, narrowing as if I had just interrupted an important train of thought - which I knew for damn sure I hadn't - and for a moment I could tell that he was looking me over for a hint that I was just pretending to have not seen. I forced my tongue to keep still; one night - after a tumbler too many of whiskey - Sherlock had let slip that one of my tells when I was lying was a tendency to lick my lips, or to twitch the fist with the now absent PTSD tremor. I held both still.

Reluctantly, he peeled himself away from his hiding place and slunk towards the front door with all the enthusiasm of a child instructed to aid their parent in unloading the shopping from the car boot. I stood watching him with my arms crossed, nodding him onwards. The moment he crossed the threshold, I ran for it. I could hear him chasing me, and for a moment I thought he would just beat me, but my hands closed around the fabric shoved down the crack just seconds before he could get to it.

I tugged… and the familiar dark fabric of the Belstaff came tumbling out. Except, I had held his coat before. It was supple with wear, soft at the shoulders and elbows, and spiced with a hint of his expensive aftershave. This was not that jacket. I looked up to find Sherlock staring at me with eyes widened, one hand outstretched for the coat, but I ignored him. I held it up to my nose and breathed in, no scent of starch or detergent, so it wasn't fresh from the dry cleaners

"You have a new coat," I concluded. He nodded quickly, hands fidgeting as he reached for it. I held it away.

"I do-"

"They've been out of shops for years," I remarked. He raised a surprisingly fair eyebrow, apparently slightly impressed that I had done my research.

"One of my homeless network tracked it down for me, it was sat in a warehouse doing very little, and I negotiated an excellent price—"

"Why do you have a new coat?" I pressed, still holding it out of arm's reached. He could easily have grabbed it if he tried, with his spidery limbs surpassing my own by what often seemed to be at least a foot, but he didn't dare attempt it. Possibly from the knowledge that he could very well lose the fight, a friend, both, or the secret of the new coat.

"Do keep up, John. You remember our last case—"

"You fell in the lake," I said slowly. "Why could you not just dry clean it? These coats don't exactly come cheap you know." He looked at me with a derisive look, and I had to admit that I certainly sounded the hen-pecking wife tonight. Nagging him about finances and how he didn't help around the house. "I'm sorry, but some months we can't even afford the rent, but you're off spending hundreds on coats?" He muttered something that sounded suspiciously like thousands but I kept my mouth shut. I was not going to be sidetracked. I knew his tactics.

"They couldn't get the smell out," he said, miserably. I stopped short of saying another word. I knew he didn't like change, so no doubt he was struggling slightly with giving up the old coat. Still, why was he trying so intently to hide it?

"So why were you so content on keeping it away from me?" I asked, laughing slightly at the absurdity. "It can't just be that you thought I would nag you about money." He looked at the coat shiftily, and I frowned and glanced down at the coat again. That is when the giggles began.

A small needle was poking out of the button hole with a loop of red thread hanging off it. Half of the button hole was neatly stitched in that familiar red accent, and the other half was still awaiting its decoration.

"John—" He began in exasperation, rolling his eyes at my amusement,

"You were sewing? That's why you were being so secretive? I just assumed these coats came with the decoration, but you did this? Did you sew the other one as well?"

"No, I did not," he snapped.

"Oh, was that a special edition one then? Did you not have to sit up by candlelight, secretly darning so that I won't catch you—"

"I wasn't being that secretive—"

"No, because I caught you pretty easily. It's almost as if you wanted to get found out. Did you want a compliment on your creativity and eye for fashion?" I teased, dangling the coat in front of him by its collar. He snatched it away, pretending that he hadn't pricked himself on the needle in his haste,

"You normally take an hour to get the shopping, but on days like this – when traffic if bad – you take at least another hour—"

"I decided to walk instead of get a taxi," I said, crossing my arms. "So?"

"So, what?" He snapped, defensively, as he smoothed the creases out with his hand.

"Who did the other one, then?" I asked. That got him. Pale skin turned pallid, and then positively ghostly. He did everything to avoid my eye, and I abruptly began to laugh. "Oh, this is too good. Tell me it was who I think it was. Please, tell me it's who I think it was. Did she sew a label with your name in it as well?" I teased. "Does the collar have a little label, so your coat doesn't get mixed up with the other little boys'?" His hands clutched defensively at the collar, and he lookedd close to snapping. "It was her! I knew it!"

"Yes, fine, alright. Mummy did it for me."

AN. I was inspired by the Setlock pictures I saw recently, with Sherlock's new outfit being the primary inspiration