"So tell me again how we're entitled to this car?" John looks at the shiny black town car sitting in the road in front of their flat with a sense of bewilderment at how they came to be here in the first place.
"In the absence of its proper owner, the charge of the car falls to us. It's simple, John. We have a car, and we are going out." Sherlock has walked all around the car, inspecting it for damage and other incriminating marks, and is now crouching down and rubbing a finger over a scratch in the paintwork on the front right-hand side of the bumper. He shakes his head and looks at John.
John sighs and rubs a hand over his forehead, eyes scrunched shut. He can feel the impending headache already. Sherlock stands up, flips his scarf over his shoulder and opens the door to the driver's seat with a flourish. John, still standing on the front step of 221B, looks up with an expression of alarm on his face.
"You're actually serious? You're taking this car? You're driving this car? This car. That belongs to your brother. Who is essentially the entire British government."
Sherlock doesn't look at John and throws over his shoulder a simple, "Yes."
It's the kind of weather today that means rain might be on the way, and there's a chill in the air. They don't have a case on, and Sherlock is already displaying the worrying signs of boredom John knows so well. He tries not to count all the various ways this could go wrong and steps down off the doorstep, pulling his coat around him warmly. Sometimes it's good to live on the edge. He rethinks that statement, however, remembering that he lives with Sherlock Holmes. Every day is spent on the edge. With a sense of determination in his step, John rounds the car and gets in the passenger seat. What can go wrong?
They drive around town for a bit, John surprised that Sherlock doesn't seem to have an actual destination. It seems that, now he has the car, he is a little unsure of what to do with it. The reason the car came to be outisde 221B that morning is a simple one. Mycroft had sent a man round with the car that morning, intending to call Sherlock and John in for one of their monthly chats/brotherly bonding/'contest-to-see-who-can-get-in-the-most-jibes-and-witty-slash-sarcastic-responses-in-five-minutes' sessions. John doesn't particularly like these chats, but even missing out on this month's session can't make up for his unease at the situation at hand, because a) Sherlock is driving and b) the proper driver of the car is (probably still) lying on the floor of 221B, unconscious, due to an untimely encounter involving the driver's head and a saucepan. Sherlock claims it was an accident, ("I thought it was an intruder! And it was, John, technically he was an intruder!") but John wonders…
Eventually , after they've driven round the block twice and Sherlock has deduced that the usual driver of this car has a bad back (incline of the seat) poor long distance eyesight (angle of the rear-view mirror) and smokes at least 12 cigarettes a day (contents of the ashtray), John is wracking his brains for a way to escape the car without Sherlock noticing or John ending up in A&E. Sherlock himself if pouting ever so slightly, because John is less impressed than he usually is with Sherlock's deductions. This may be due to the ever-present feeling of impending doom hanging over John that this experience cannot end well.
"We need milk." John breaks the silence as they round a corner, swerving alarmingly to avoid a parked car. It's not that Sherlock is a bad driver as such, John thinks, it's just that, like everything he does, it happens at a mile a minute without giving anyone a chance to catch up.
"We always need milk," Sherlock counters, but signals a left anyway, in the direction of the supermarket. They drive the few minutes up the road in silence and pull into the supermarket car-park where Sherlock finds the only empty parking space in the whole car thing almost at once, and pulls into it. Sherlock turns off the ignition and leaps out, pocketing the keys. John climbs out a little less gracefully and follows Sherlock towards the store.
What was going to be a simple quest for milk turns into an all-out, no-holds-barred shopping fandango, in which Sherlock basically grabs anything with bright coloured packaging and puts it in the trolley, and John takes out the really bizarre stuff and puts it, discretely, back on the shelf. Sherlock hasn't noticed yet.
Eventually they make it to the check out and John pays while Sherlock stands around looking bored. Really, his impression of an impatient 6 year old is very accurate, John thinks. Grabbing more than half the bags of shopping off the counter, he waits for Sherlock to pick up the rest and then leads the way back to the car park. By this stage, the weather has turned for the worse and it's drizzling and cold.
On their arrival, a strange scene meets them. Their car and the one beside it, a silver hatchback thing that looks expensive, are surrounded by half a dozen people all bent down or heads tilted, looking at the sides of the cars. John can really feel that headache coming on.
Sherlock strides up to the group of people and politely raises his eyebrows. "Can I help you?"
A balding man with a handlebar moustache and very shiny shoes blusters up to Sherlock and says, "There is a scratch on the side of my car."
Sherlock merely looks at the man and replies, "How unfortunate. However I fail to see what this has to do with us."
The blustery-handlebar-moustache man draws himself up to his full height (John gives him credit for trying but really, the man still only comes up to Sherlock's shoulder) and huffs, "Well, it was your car that did it."
Sherlock raises one eyebrow. "Well since both myself and my friend have been in the shop and not in the car, and I am not aware of any self-activating device on this car, it seems unlikely that it was."
"Well there is a scratch on your car, and a scratch on mine, so it seems logical that it was!"
Sherlock's face remains impassive, but John groans internally. He knew this wasn't a good idea. Fate was really out to get him today. Sherlock replies swiftly, "Can you prove the scratch on my car wasn't here before now? Or yours, for that matter."
Blustery man is now getting even more blustery, and John puts the bags of shopping down at his feet, next to the ones Sherlock plonked down on seeing the crowd, and runs a hand over his eyes. A large-ish lady with curly blonde hair and a pink cardigan, who has been standing back watching the proceedings, steps over to him and smiles.
"I'm Donna."
John offers her a smile and his hand, and relplies, "John."
Donna shakes his hand, and then, after a pause says, "That's my husband, Berny. I'm sorry for all the fuss but when Berny gets an idea in his head there's really no telling him otherwise."
John thought wryly that Berny might have met his match in Sherlock.
Donna continues. "Your friend seems sure it wasn't you that scratched the car?"
John shakes his head adimantly. "Definitely wasn't us. Believe me, that scratch was there to start with. It's not even technically our car, we're… borrowing it."
Donna nods. "Well you look to be honest people, so if you say you didn't do it, then you didn't do it."
John smiles gratefully at her. "Your husband doesn't seem to agree."
Donna sighs. "Well, that's Berny for you."
The small crowd around the car had slowly disappated on Sherlock's arrival, mostly due to the threatening glare that Sherlock is busy projecting at anyone within a five metre radius. The only people left around the car now are Sherlock and Berny, a shop assistant who had apparently been called over for a second opinion, and a nosy business-man with a cell phone in one hand and a paper in the other, who is now busy giving Berny advice on which insurance policy to claim on.
Sherlock is looking increasingly annoyed, which John knows is not a good sign. After insisting for the fifth time that it was not their car that caused the scratch, it seems Sherlock has changed tactics and is now busy insulting the intelligence of anyone who says it was.
Apparently it's not working.
John idly looks down at the bags of shopping still sitting at his feet. On top of one of the bags is a bag of jammy dodgers, and he reaches down and takes out the packet. He opens it and takes one out, and then holds the bag out to Donna.
"Jammy dodger?"
Donna's gaze turns from the car to the bag in John's hand. "Ooh, thanks love." She picks one out and takes a bite.
"Take a couple," John says, and Donna does.
They stand munching on their biscuits for a couple of minutes, and watch as a tape measure is precured from Berny's glove box (really, who keeps a tape measure in their car?) and the men begin to measure the distance between the ground and the scratch on Berny's car, and the mark on Sherlock's (well, sort of) car and the ground. The mark on Berny's and the mark on their car are clearly at completely different levels, but Berny still checks. Multiple times.
The shop assistant looks frustrated and cold, the nosy business-man is looking smarmy and pleased with himself, and Sherlock just looks pissed-off.
Donna and John stand side by side, sharing the jammy dodgers.
Donna breaks the silence. "So what do you do? As a job, I mean."
"I'm a doctor. Ex-army, actually."
"Oh really? How interesting. I'm in retail. Work at the Marks and Spencer down the road, selling makeup people don't really need to snooty women with too much money."
John laughs. "Well, we do what we have to do to get by, don't we."
Donna nods, smiling. "It's not bad. I don't mind it too much. How about your, uh, friend? What does he do?"
John wonders how to explain this.
"He's a… consulting detective." Donna's look of interest keeps him talking. "He basically solves crimes, works with the police, some private detective work, that sort of thing."
"Oh gosh, how exciting! I think Berny possibly picked the wrong man to argue with then…"
"Yes, he did rather," John laughs.
Sherlock and Berny, by this stage have come to some sort of arrangement. Berny looks grudgingly appeased and Sherlock looks smug. The business-man has wandered off by now, talking on his cell-phone, and the shop assistant shoots John and Donna a smile as she hurries back into the shop, arms wrapped around herself against the cold.
Sherlock motions to John, who stoops to pick up the shopping bags, including the ones Sherlock was carrying, and puts them in the back of the car as Sherlock holds the door open. Donna wanders over to Berny and puts a hand on his arm.
"Not their car, then, Berny?"
Berny shakes his head and replies, gruffly, "Apparently not. It must've happened in the street when we stopped in on your parents earlier. People these days need to learn to steer, and to own up to things if they damage property. It's unacceptable. I can't understand how-"
"Yes, dear, I quite agree. Shall we get in the car, I'm a bit chilly. Lovely to meet you John, and thank you for the biscuits." John raises and hand in reply and smiles, and Sherlock just looks confused.
Donna and Berny get in their car and, with John and Sherlock watching, back out of their park and then drive out into the road.
Sherlock gets in the drivers side of their borrowed car and John walks around to the passenger side. The car starts and they pull out of the parking space, and they're halfway down the street before Sherlock looks at John and says, "Biscuits?"