Dead silence.
Twenty minutes ago, John had been thumbing the latest pages of the Evening Standard in his armchair. Sherlock had disappeared for most of the day to test "clay particles, John! If we can compare the soil samples from both victim's shoes-" at St. Barts. Valentine's day ads popped around every article with bright reds and pinks, but he didn't pay them much attention.
Sherlock was the kind of person that would give oddly sweet, spontaneous gifts whenever he felt like it- an ashtray from the Buckingham Palace, a collection of his hairs presented to him in a custom velvet box (gross, but sweet and definitely Sherlockian), storing a random plethora of facts about John that was blurted at the most inopportune times.
"I really, really didn't need to know that." Lestrade had said with a carefully blank expression after Sherlock had told him the exact measurements of John's cock in the middle of a crime scene. This was of course, in retaliation to Anderson's implication that he wasn't "getting any"
Sherlock easily, blatantly blew past every dating convention in the history of mankind. Hence, in the course of their relationship, John had long forgone any concept of normal. Christmas was a locked room murder, sex was a weekly activity and often done on the nearest available flat surface and the British Government became something more of a nuisance than actually threatening.
So to say John wasn't expecting anything for Valentine's was an understatement.
But that was twenty minutes ago, and since then the universe had decided to bend the space-time continuum and transport John into a slightly altered reality where he apparently lived approximately the exact same life, with one difference.
Because Sherlock, wrapped up in his Belstaff, cheeks a little flushed from the wind outside and that painfully blank look on his face that usually meant he was doing his best imitation of an unfeeling sociopath during a ridiculously sentimental situation, had a litre of milk in wrapped in his ridiculously elegant hand like a bottle of cognac.
John stared.
Sherlock stared right back.
"I bought the milk." he finally said, fingers tapping rhythmically on his side. Ah. Nervous. If John wasn't completely flummoxed himself, he would have wanted to make a dry comment about stating the obvious. "Because you always seemed to have a penchant for nattering on about our lack of it. And it's ah, Thursday."
That seemed to break the spell. John rose from the chair and strode towards Sherlock in fast, determined strides as wide as his legs would allow him. Gripping Sherlock's collar and tugging his face down till they were eye to eye, forcing those ever-flickering eyes to focus on him. Pushing him up against the door.
There was a tight feeling in his chest that felt suspiciously like he wanted to cry. But John was a nothing if not an uptight British male with an staggering incapacity to express his feelings only second to Sherlock Holmes. So he settled for the next best thing.
"I fucking love you," John stated matter-of-factly. "And I'm going to let you shag me through the mattress tonight."
A flush crept up on the detective's neck that was definitely not from the cold. John decided to tease him a bit after he took the milk from Sherlock's cold fingers and deposited it in the fridge with a satisfying thunk.
"So, Thursday huh?"
"Yes."
"Right, not because today is Valentine's day or any of that silly rubbish."
"Of course not John, Valentine's is a positively hateful celebration misappropriated and marketed by commercial bodies to cretins. Hanging would be preferable."
John smiled at that and leaned up to press a kiss at the corner of those lips. Teasing. He watched the flush travel up a little higher.
"Mmhm, You planning on making this a habit then? Buying the milk every Thursday?"
In response, Sherlock flipped them and pressed him against the door in one smooth move, all liquid heat. His hands bracketed John's head as Sherlock lowered his mouth down to his neck, lips barely grazing the skin. The moan that it dragged out of him was absolutely humiliating. He heard Sherlock's faint chuckle, a deeper register than usual. It looked like sex against the door of the 221B was where they were headed tonight.
"If it elicits this reaction from you, it's worth consideration."
"God, shut up and kiss me now."
