A/N: It's the first of November so now it's officially okay to post this. Hope you enjoy. :)
Important Things
by Flaignhan
He doesn't have a good track record with Christmas.
He hasn't given a damn about it for years, really, but last year was, without a doubt, a new low. Murder tends to have that effect, no matter how justified it may have been. Before that, he had barely known that the day had passed, so caught up in travelling he was, and the year before that, well, he'd had his head in a grimy toilet and had been retching most of the day. Drinking competitions hadn't been his thing at university, and going undercover certainly did nothing to aid him in his tolerance. The Christmas before that, The Woman had, apparently, been found dead in a ditch. It had, admittedly, put a bit of a dampener on things.
Tonight, however, Christmas eve, he finds himself sitting in his chair, stubbornly ignoring the cheerful music which Mary has insisted be playing constantly. The all too cheery voice is preaching about love and understanding, while bells jingle irritatingly in the background. He ignores it though, lest Mrs Hudson make another disastrous attempt to cheer him up. The round of charades had been all too intolerable, not least because he doesn't know half of the films or songs to which the others are referring.
Anderson sits down opposite him, in John's chair, which hasn't really been John's chair for some time, but nevertheless is still, in fact, John's chair. Sometimes Mary's. Anderson beams at Sherlock, his atrocious Christmas jumper even more gaudy than the decorations which Mrs Hudson has strung about the place.
"Having fun?" he asks, leaning forward with a grin, his nasally voice grating on Sherlock's last nerve.
"Tremendous fun," Sherlock replies dryly. He takes a sip of his drink, hoping that Anderson will be satisfied with the two words he has managed to crowbar from Sherlock, but unfortunately Sherlock's acknowledgement has only encouraged Anderson.
"I was thinking about that last case," Anderson says, leaning forward even further and dragging his chair a bit closer to Sherlock's. Sherlock closes his eyes and rests his forehead in his palm as an awful scraping noise breaks through the tedious melancholy of A Spaceman Came Travelling.
"Give it a rest, Phil," Lestrade says gruffly. "It's Christmas, even he likes a break sometimes!" He nods towards Sherlock, his eyes a little bloodshot from his merriment, though he is nevertheless sober enough to come to Sherlock's aid. Likely he is determined to make sure that Sherlock doesn't do anything that falls outside the remit of good will to all men, no matter how much he is provoked.
"Fine, I'll email you my theories and you can read them first thing on Boxing day, deal?"
Sherlock looks up to notice Lestrade give him a minute nod, his eyes quite clearly saying that he is to agree to this dull business if he knows what's good for him.
"Deal," Sherlock says, and with that, Anderson gets up, his face alight with glee, and heads off to refill his glass. Sherlock sighs heavily, hoping that will be the last of it. Anderson's only here because Lestrade felt sorry for him and wanted to get him out of his flat. And Sherlock had only agreed to it because Lestrade had given him a handful of cold case files as an early Christmas present.
"You ever think about letting him - ?"
"Nope."
Lestrade sits down in the empty chair, letting out a gruff grunt of middle age as he settles. "It'd do him good," he continues.
"It wouldn't do me any good."
"Yeah well John's not around as much, and you'll need someone to bounce ideas off. And he's fully qualified."
"He's fully qualified at being a pain in the - "
"It worked well when you had Molly," Lestrade argues. "But obviously she can't just give up work and float about with you all the time."
Sherlock huffs, but doesn't respond. He doesn't need anybody at all. Obviously he prefers it when John's around, but he has a family to attend to, patients. Working alone some of the time isn't an issue. It's only Lestrade who thinks it is, and Sherlock will not play care in the community for Anderson's sake. He has neither the patience, nor the inclination.
"She coming tomorrow?" Lestrade asks, apparently knowing that he has hit a dead end.
"Who?"
"Molly," Lestrade says, his tone laced with emphasised obviousness.
Sherlock's eyebrows twitch into a small frown. "No, she's working until the morning."
"So?"
"So, she needs to sleep," Sherlock tells him. He goes to take a sip of his drink, but finds it empty, having already been used for far too many distractions already. His eyes scan the room for the bottle, but it is on the kitchen counter, far out of reach, and if he does get up, he'll have to offer everybody a drink. He's not in the mood for playing host.
"Yes," Lestrade continues, his patience straining. "But she could get four or five hours and then head over. We could have a late lunch, save the gifts until the evening, job's a good'un."
"I'll speak to her later," Sherlock says, staring down into his glass. He taps the side of it with his index finger, and is about to get up and go and get the bottle when Lestrade opens his mouth again.
"She can't spend all of tomorrow on her own as well," he says. "It's not right. Especially after her spending all night alone in the bloody morgue. I can't think of anything more depressing."
"Oh I don't know," Sherlock replies. "Spending all night in the morgue with Anderson would surely be a contender."
Lestrade smirks, drains the last of his whiskey, and much to Sherlock's satisfaction, gets up and retrieves the bottle of whiskey from the kitchen counter, pouring Sherlock a generous refill upon his return. His spike in contentedness doesn't last however, because soon Mrs Hudson is adding to the racket of Christmas music by making stupid cooing noises and playing peekaboo with the baby, while Mary sits nearby, a small smile twisting her lips when she catches Sherlock's eye.
He can hear the music through the door. He pushes it open quietly and peers inside. She has, apparently, just finished with one of her deliveries. She's leaning on the counter at the side of the room, her phone plugged into a speaker dock which he is certain is only there because she was feeling particularly rebellious about her Christmas shift. Or because she knew she might need the distraction. She sways gently along to the music, a slow, relaxing, nearly pleasant tune, while she fills in her paperwork, her hand moving rapidly across the sheets, inputting information.
"Evening," he says, his voice breaking through the background noise of a tranquil number that he's already heard at least once tonight.
She drops her pen, inhaling sharply as she turns around. Having a living person in her morgue is something she hadn't anticipated tonight it seems.
"You scared me," she breathes. Gathering herself, she reaches across to the speaker dock and hits the pause button, stopping the music dead. The silence is nothing short of beautiful after an evening of enforced cheer, more Christmas cake than he would agree to have on a voluntary basis, and perhaps a little too much of the bottle of whiskey that Lestrade had brought with him, and had then encouraged Sherlock to embrace wholeheartedly. As such, his mind is working a little more slowly than usual, and a little bit more ridiculously. In the bright white light, Molly has taken on an almost ethereal look, the sparkly star shaped brooch pinned to her lab coat reflecting dazzling beams.
"Do I need to get ready for a new one?" Molly asks, looking towards the slab in the middle of the room. She reaches towards the dispenser of latex gloves on the wall but Sherlock speaks before she can tug out a fresh pair.
"No," he says quickly, initially baffled that she would think he was only here because there was a case which needed solving. But then he realises that he's turning up to her morgue, in the dead of night, at Christmas, when she knows he's had people round at Baker Street all evening. She must have assumed that only something important could pull him away.
"No?" she says, her eyebrows twitching into a small frown. "Just fancied the trip?" She's smirking now, that faint little lift on the left side of her mouth, the one that he has come to associate with her teasing him. She teases him these days, apparently. He supposes being dead for two years rather knocks you down a few pegs. Or perhaps, now that she has seen him at his most vulnerable, aided him in his hour of need, perhaps now, she sees herself as equal to him. His stomach shifts uncomfortably when his mildly inebriated mind wonders why on earth she didn't see herself as equal before that.
"I…" he trails off for a moment, blinks heavily, then refocuses his mind. He's not drinking tomorrow. Not even a snifter. Not a wee dram, not anything. He should have learned by now that this is really not his thing. He looks down at the bag in his right hand, and then hears himself speaking, though his brain decides against involving him in the thought process. "I thought you might be hungry," he says, lifting the bag a little to draw her attention. "Mrs Hudson made far too much food, and…well, we've both been to the canteen here before."
Her small frown grows a little deeper, and she surveys him critically, as though he has just said to her that his heart has three ventricles. He's not sure that Mrs Hudson's cooking is bad enough to warrant that kind of response. After a moment of silence, her frown disappears, and she looks across to the clock. It's a quarter to two.
"Perfect timing," she says brightly. "Just coming up to my lunch break."
He thinks, vaguely, that it is a mark of how out of sync with the rest of the world the pair of them are, how neither of them are perplexed by the concept of lunch at two o'clock in the morning.
"Come on," she says, picking up her pen and scrawling her signature on the bottom of the last sheet of paperwork. She shuffles the pages together and slips them into the folder, flipping it shut and tucking it under her arm. "Let's go to the staffroom." She grabs her phone from the speaker dock and drops it into her pocket.
Sherlock turns around, pushing open the door and holding it open for her as she strolls across the morgue. Outside, she deposits her folder into the trolley by the door and leads the way down the corridor, around the corner, and then through an old, splintering door. Inside there are a handful of mismatched armchairs, a rickety old coffee table (the shelf underneath bowing under the weight of magazines and medical textbooks), a small kitchenette with a kettle, toaster, and microwave, and a Star Trek poster that looks as though it may have been there longer than either of them have been alive.
"Tea?" she asks, pulling a recognisable polka dot mug out of the cupboard.
"Please," he says, choosing the least threadbare armchair to sit down in. He clears a space on the coffee table and places the bag of food on it, scowling at the unreliable joints when they let out a quiet creak.
After much noise from the kettle, some rifling about in the fridge for some milk that hasn't been claimed by someone else, and a few metallic clinks of the teaspoon as Molly stirs in some sugar for each of them, she is sitting opposite him, carefully lifting the various tupperware boxes out of the paper bag.
"Are you eating?" she asks, eyeing the contents of the boxes with a glint in her eye.
Sherlock shakes his head.
"Have you been force fed?" She pulls out the cutlery from the bottom of the bag, which he had grabbed at the last minute, in a fit of forethought and consideration that he isn't quite accustomed to.
"Three pieces of cake," he says, closing his eyes and resting his head against the back of the chair. He feels like his stomach is about to burst, acid gurgling as it fights to digest such overindulgence.
"Blimey," she says, and there is a soft pop as she peels off the lid of one of the boxes. "That's more than you eat in a year, isn't it?"
"Half a dozen sausage rolls," he continues. "Cheese and pineapple on a stick, because that's still a thing, apparently." He wrinkles his nose, and when Molly next speaks, there is something in his tone which convinces him that she is smiling.
"Sounds dreadful," she tells him.
"Well you can help tomorrow," he tells her. At last he feels relaxed, the quiet sounds of Molly eating serving as acceptable background noise, her conversation nowhere near as tedious as Anderson's enthusiastic attempts at case discussions.
"I'm working until eight," she says, a hint of disapproval in her tone, as though he's being tactless. Again.
He sits up straight, opening his eyes, then squints at the harsh lighting. "Oh we had an idea," he says, his words slurring a little in his rush. "Mrs Hudson's doing lunch at three," he tells her. "So you can sleep for five hours - which is plenty, by the way - and then come round as soon as you're ready." He nods, then awaits her response. She has a thick piece of glazed ham speared on the prongs of her fork, held in limbo, halfway between her plate and her mouth. She's looking at him curiously, as though she is the one doing the deducing.
"I suppose that could work," she says after a moment. But then she blinks, and her face changes, her small frown reappearing. "But I don't want to mess up anyone else's plans, don't rearrange everything just for me."
"We're not rearranging plans," he says dismissively. "We're only moving lunch back a couple of hours. And we're doing it because we want you there." He pauses, then before he can think better of it, adds, "I want you there."
At this, she looks down into the tupperware on her knees. She doesn't say anything, but when she eventually looks up at him, her gentle smile hits him like a freight train, though the whiskey may be responsible for such a bizarre effect. He knows how much it means to her, knows that she has just as shoddy a track record at Christmas as he does. He's not sure what she did last Christmas, they never quite got around to discussing it, after everything, but he hopes it wasn't a miserable shift with only a slow but steady stream of suicides for company.
After she finishes eating, he tells her all about the things she hasn't missed out on this evening, and she smiles as he talks, her fingers fiddling absentmindedly with the edges of her brooch. He spends, perhaps, a little too long complaining about Anderson, and even longer blaming Lestrade for the slight slur in his speech. It feels like mere minutes before she's telling him that she has to get back to work, but when he looks up at the clock, the thin dark hands inform him that it's approaching three o'clock. She packs away the tupperware, telling him that Mrs Hudson will be cross if he leaves her best tubs to the mercy of NHS staff. He offers to stay, to see her through the next hour or so at least, because tonight is always a bad night for hangings and overdoses, but she dismisses him with a gracious smile, a few words of reassurance, and the instruction to get some sleep, because he needs to be in a good mood tomorrow to be able to deal with everybody. He reluctantly agrees, but when he's laying in bed three-quarters of an hour later, he cannot sleep. His mind is whirring, his sense feeling simultaneously heightened and dulled as he stares the ceiling, trying to retreat from his own mind and get some rest.
All he can think about is how, when he had left her alone with a cadaver which had, in life, blown half of its own skull away, he had forgotten to say Merry Christmas.
She is, of course, wearing a festive jumper when she arrives, her cheeks flushed from the bitter cold. She has dispensed with her usual pony tail and is wearing her hair in a loose braid which rests on her shoulder, obscuring the face of one of many jolly knitted snowmen. She is greeted by a flurry of attention from the others, and she pauses to make a special fuss of Watson junior, before she indulges the grown ups in their desire for cheer, goodwill, and merriment.
He takes the wine out of the fridge and pulls the cork out of the top, then pours a generous amount into a clean glass, just as Mrs Hudson comes bustling in, with more urgency than is strictly necessary.
"Molly's here," she says brightly. "Pass us that bottle will, you, I think she'll need a glass after that shift last night. All alone down there for twelve hours, it's not right, not on Christmas." She purses her lips, the expression on her face suggesting that she might start a campaign for more festive-friendly working hours for NHS staff. Sherlock knows her better than that though. She'll huff about it for a few minutes, and will have forgotten all about it by her next glass of sherry. He turns around, wine glass in hand, and Mrs Hudson looks a little taken aback. He ignores her expression, and opens the fridge, placing the wine back into the shelf in the door.
"You've already done it," she says with a frown.
"Yes," he says slowly. Perhaps if he speaks slower, it'll give her more time to catch up.
She shakes her head, as though she has just witnessed something quite miraculous. "I'll check on the roast potatoes," she says, before she busies herself with the oven and the enormous tray of glistening potatoes sat on the top shelf.
He walks into the lounge, and Molly smiles when she sees him. He hands her the wine, and before she can utter a 'thank you', he blurts out two words which have been irritating him for a good ten hours. "Merry Christmas."
"Merry Christmas," she says in return. She takes a sip of her wine, then nods her approval. She looks tired, but that hasn't detracted from the distinct sense of Christmas cheer that seems to follow her everywhere she goes during the season. It's as though she's a walking poster girl for the perfect Christmas, and all she needs is the rest of her exceptionally photogenic fake family around her before she's ready to go up on a billboard in the west end. But she doesn't have an exceptionally photogenic family, false or not. She's got this lot, and he hopes that it can be enough for her. It's too much for him, if he's being honest, and he's already bitten his tongue at least a handful of times, but she is, of course, infinitely more patient, and infinitely more tolerant than he could ever be.
Lunch is served after a short while, and John catches his eye when he pulls out Molly's chair for her. That smug little smile gives him more than enough reason to grant Mrs Hudson the same courtesy, once she's stopped fussing about gravy and wine glasses. He wasn't raised in a barn, after all. His actions only serve to give John more cause for amusement however, and it is with a little more vigour than strictly necessary that he attacks his meal, his cutlery clanking against the plate whenever he lands a particularly heavy blow. The meal drags on and on, with several rounds of people politely declining dessert and then being coerced into a portion of Christmas pudding or chocolate log by Mrs Hudson. She is utterly ruthless in this respect. He considers himself lucky, however, that he only has to indulge her once on this matter, and when she tries to stuff him full of second and third helpings, his firm no is enough for her to move onto the next unfortunate person.
Molly looks like she's about to fall into a coma. She's slumped in her chair, her hands resting on her stomach, her eyes slightly glazed and half closed. He will admit to himself that he is feeling rather tired after so much food, so he can't imagine how she must be feeling with only a few hours' sleep to recover from a twelve hour night shift. When she catches him looking, her lips curve into a smile, which he briefly returns, before he turns his attention to Lestrade, who is bravely battling his way through a last round of dessert.
After dinner has been cleared away, Trivial Pursuit is brought out, and Sherlock seeks some sort of excuse for not taking part. He even glances over to the kitchen, but much to his displeasure, Mrs Hudson is just drying up the last of the dinner plates before she places them neatly in the cupboard, the kitchen tidier than Sherlock has ever seen it. He cannot bear the inevitable hours upon hours of torment, while each team tries to get itself a small wedge of success based upon outdated knowledge. Despite his intellect, quizzes are not his thing. General knowledge is one of the few areas of study that he has absolutely no time at all for. Knowledge, in his opinion, cannot be general, and yet, there are miserable hours dedicated to it on daytime television. Worse still, is that while he can remove himself from the vicinity of the TV most days, or find reasons to be elsewhere, on Christmas day he is obliged to remain with his guests (though intruders might be a better word) and indulge whatever whimsical activities they wish to pursue.
"Why don't I play some music?" he suggests, the words tumbling out of him in a panic. Anything to avoid that wretched board game. Anything. "I think I can remember a few Christmas songs…" He strides over to pick up his violin, ignoring the shocked expression on Lestrade's face, the curious one on Mary's, and the sheer delight of Mrs Hudson's. John's eyes follow him, and Sherlock focuses on pulling the melody out of his brain and transmitting it to his fingertips. Molly watches, curled up in his armchair, her chin resting on the heel of her palm, her front teeth biting down gently on her lower lip.
The box of Trivial Pursuit remains unopened on the table.
He starts, and though his first note is a little shaky, he gets into the piece fairly quickly, the smooth pleasant tune flowing through him and filling the room while his audience is quiet, their attention held. He drags it out for as long as possible, slowing the song down, adding in small flourishes here and there; anything to keep them from opening that wretched box of misery. As he draws to the end of the song, he glances at Molly, whose eyes are fixed on him. He imagines she remembers playing the song last night, remembers switching it off to save him from a Christmas overload, and now here he is, pulling the tune from the strings of his violin, just to save him from the sheer boredom of board games.
After a short round of applause, he moves onto another song, and another, and another, and when he eventually puts his violin down, when everyone is sleepy and holding their drinks loosely in relaxed fingers, he knows that he has dodged a bullet, with the box laying forgotten on the coffee table, the atmosphere thick with overindulgence and peace.
"Oh that was lovely, Sherlock," Mrs Hudson tells him, setting her empty sherry glass down on the coffee table. "Just lovely."
"Baby approves," Mary comments quietly, nodding down to the sleeping infant in her arms. Her tiny hands are curled into half closed fists, her small lips slightly parted as she snoozes. As a result of this wonderful child deciding that now is the best time to fall into slumber, the conversations are quiet, tranquil, and the Christmas playlist that features a ghastly song that warns against doing a tango with an eskimo, thankfully doesn't see the light of day. Eventually, the child is transferred to the travel cot in John's old room, and it is decided that they should all exchange gifts, given that Lestrade has already tripped over the same long package poking out from under the tree at least three times.
For his endurance of the day, Sherlock gains a handful of moderately thoughtful gifts. From John and Mary, a collection of books on various dull, but nevertheless very useful (and therefore incredibly relevant and interesting) subjects, including botanical maps of the UK, with detailed information about particular variations of plants and their locations. From Mrs Hudson, he receives a new dressing gown; obvious, given that she had only mentioned the state of his old one to him once, rather than the usual three dozen times. He had shrugged her off, and moments later seen the penny drop into place when she had realised that Christmas was only six weeks away. From Lestrade, he is given a book on unsolved mysteries - it's a brand new publication, bought, perhaps with the hope that Sherlock hasn't already seen it and solved every single case in it. (The Beeston Lake decapitation, mentioned on the back cover, is frightfully simple, but he doesn't mention it.) From Molly, he receives a new gleaming set of conical flasks and graduated cylinders, his old set having taken quite a beating since John moved out. He has found out that there are some stains the dishwasher just can't shift from the glass, and he recalls complaining to her about the situation more than once.
When it's Molly's turn to open her gifts, she does so slowly and carefully, sliding her finger under the folds of wrapping paper and gently tugging until the tape comes loose. Normally, such dawdling might irritate him, but today he welcomes it. The longer she takes, the later it gets, and the later it gets, the more likely it is that the box of Trivial Pursuit will remain ignored until next year. When she pulls a colourful jumper out from the wrapping paper, she holds it against herself, peering down at it with a smile on her face.
"Suits you," John says. "Who got you that?"
At this point Mary elbows him in the ribs, her mouth held in a cheerful smile. "It is the right size, isn't it?" she says to Molly. "They come up a little big so I wasn't too sure…"
"It's perfect," Molly says with a smile, while a look of realisation falls into place on John's face. "Thank you," she says, then, her smile growing wider, adds: "Both of you."
"You're welcome," John says, rubbing his side where Mary had elbowed it. "Very welcome indeed."
Mrs Hudson has gifted her an elaborate set of bathing concoctions, with various scents and dried flowers involved in the whole frilly affair. Lestrade has decided that he's going to be this year's comedian, by giving Molly a DVD boxset of Waking the Dead, though her enthusiasm for it rather cancels out any humour that may have been derived from the situation. Last, but not least, she comes to the small, rectangular box that is from him. He taps his fingers on the arm of the chair (John's chair, actually, as Molly has made herself quite comfortable in his), and waits for her to lift the lid. She looks across at him and gives him a small smile before she gently opens the box. When she sees what's inside, it takes a moment for her to register, but then her face breaks into an expression of shock.
"Are you serious?" she asks, looking up at him, her eyes wide.
Sherlock shrugs. "You do like them, don't you?"
Molly opens and closes her mouth a couple of times, flabbergasted, before she manages to say: "Yes, of course, I love them."
"What is it?" John asks, sitting up straighter, craning his neck to get a better look at what's inside the box. He glances over to Sherlock, but evidently his lack of reaction is not nearly as interesting as the contents of the box.
"Florence and the Machine," Lestrade says, reading over Molly's shoulder and nodding his head in approval. "Didn't realise you knew anything about popular music." He turns to Sherlock with a grin on his face and annoying twinkle in his eye.
"I don't," Sherlock tells him, bristling at the assumption that he has time in his life for such mundane things. "But she has a number of their CDs in her flat so it was fairly easy to arrive at the conclusion that she's a fan. And I had the misfortune of getting a cab driver a few weeks ago who insisted upon blaring out radio one. This…Florence was talking about some concerts she was going to do…with her machine."
"You do know there's not actually a machine, right?" John asks, a sly grin on his face.
"I couldn't care less if there's a machine or not," Sherlock replies. He reaches out for his glass, but when he raises it to his lips, he discovers that it's already empty and he sets it down again, irritated by the lack of distraction.
"How many tickets have you got there?" John asks Molly, and Sherlock can see where he is coming from a mile away.
"Two," Molly replies, holding up the tickets, their shiny holograms catching the light.
John turns his attention back to Sherlock. "You going to go with her then?"
Sherlock scowls at him, but refrains from blurting out a childish no. If Molly absolutely can't find anybody to go with, then of course, he will put up with other people, with loud music, with overpriced drinks and undertrained staff. He will of course do that. But it is, without a doubt, a very last resort.
"Don't be silly," Molly says, a seemingly permanent smile fixed on her face. "He doesn't want to go to a concert. And I'm so grateful for the tickets that I'm going to show my gratitude by not asking him to come with me."
At this, Sherlock's lips curve into a smile. She knows him far too well.
"If I thought you'd enjoy it," she says, looking across at him, "then I'd ask you to come. But I know it's your idea of hell so…" She turns now to Mary, who is sporting a smirk that matches John's. "What are you doing on…" Molly looks down at the tickets. "The 29th of January?"
Mary shrugs. "Not sure, but I do seem to recall John volunteering to babysit that night."
"Fair enough," John says, nodding his head as Mrs Hudson suppresses a sherry-encouraged giggle.
The rest of the gift giving passes in a decidedly dull manner, which suits Sherlock perfectly. It means he can slump in the arm chair and pretend to be vaguely interested in events, which doesn't take too much effort at all on his part. By the time they're done, the sky outside is pitch black, and the Christmas specials are due to start on the TV. The noise of this, the fake snow that falls on production sets in the middle of July, the horribly sentimental plot lines and the hammering home of traditional Christmas values would normally make him sick. He can, however, tune it out. It is, after all, the lesser of two evils.
Molly doesn't appear to care for any of the Christmas specials at all, because it's not long before she's fast asleep, her head dangerously close to slipping off of her hand. If he's being honest, Sherlock's surprised she's managed to stay awake this long. Her shifts over the Christmas period are always draining, always demanding, and she always obliges because she never wants to deprive any of her colleagues of an enjoyable Christmas. Next year, he might ask her to reconsider.
He pushes himself up from the armchair and crosses the space between them, reaching out to carefully remove the gold box containing her concert tickets from her hand. She doesn't stir, and so, instead of covering her in a blanket, he decides it might be best to put her to bed. John's old room has been taken over by Watson junior, so the only solution lies in his bedroom, something which he knows will not go unnoticed by John. However, given that she has given up her flat for him time and time again, he is sure he can manage to endure some baseless teasing from John. And apart from that, he owes her for not dragging him along to some wretched pop concert.
He picks her up in one smooth motion, his eyes fixed on her face to see if she makes any sign of waking up, but there's nothing. She's well and truly out for the night. Before he can hear whatever sly comment John or Lestrade has to make, he carries her over to the bedroom, pushing the door open with his toe, and once inside, he sets her down carefully on the bed, brushing a stray lock of hair from her face. He folds the duvet over her, then draws the curtains. He pauses by the window, looking back at her in the dark while she breathes slowly and steadily, in and out, completely at peace. He walks softly back over to the bed, then crouches down, taking in every detail, before he leans forward and presses a light kiss against her forehead.
"Goodnight," he whispers, before he stands once more, walking out of the bedroom and closing the door quietly behind him. He is immediately greeted by scrutinising eyes, while the television blares on in the background.
"Did you er, tuck her in?" Lestrade asks. John sniggers, and Mary shakes her head exasperatedly, though her neutral expression hasn't quite managed to mask her own interest in the situation.
Sherlock sits down in his chair, and glances towards the clock. It's still hours before any of them will actually consider leaving, and he isn't particularly keen on the idea of putting up with this nonsense for the rest of the evening.
"I think seeing as she spent twelve hours examining suicides, she deserves a comfortable night's sleep, don't you?"
Mrs Hudson pulls a face of displeasure at his words and returns her attention to the TV, the others following suit. Despite the fact that they say no more on the matter, Sherlock doesn't feel as though he's won this round, though he can't quite work out why. It bothers him for the rest of the evening, but eventually, John and Mary take their leave, the baby tucked into a carrier held firmly in John's right hand, Lestrade takes a wobbly legged walk downstairs and hails a taxi, and Mrs Hudson eventually leaves, after much fussing about tidying up glasses and putting lids back on tins of chocolates.
The time does come, a little after midnight, when he finally manages to get peace. He drags a blanket over to the sofa, drops a cushion onto one end, then lays down, fidgeting until he finally finds a comfortable position. He can't help but think of her, in the next room, sleeping soundly and comfortably. For some stupid reason he wonders what she might be dreaming about, and then he decides that it's none of his business. His eyelids grow heavy, his good behaviour having drained him of energy, and soon, he too is lost to the world.
When he next opens his eyes, it is light outside, the cloudy grey sky threatening a downpour to wash away any lingering festive sentiments. Molly is sitting in his armchair, wrapped in his second, no, third best dressing gown, watching the TV and sipping on a steaming mug of tea. As his eyes focus, he notes that there is a cup within arm's reach, and he sits up, letting out a quiet groan as his spine cracks back into place. At this, Molly looks over, a smile brightening her face when she sees that he's awake.
"Morning," she says, taking the remote and turning the volume on the TV right down.
After his first sip of tea, he begins to feel a little more human. "Morning," he says in response, sitting up properly now. His new dressing gown is neatly folded and resting on the other end of the coffee table, so he reaches out, tugging it towards him, and pulls it on, fastening the cord around his waist. He gathers, from the fact that Molly has made the tea (he can always tell) that Mrs Hudson hasn't seen light of day yet. The sherry, he imagines, holds a lot of responsibility for this blessing, and for that, he is most grateful.
Despite the previous day's indulgence, he is somewhat hungry, and his stomach rumbles loudly, the tea not quite enough to keep it quiet. He pushes himself to his feet and wanders over to the kitchen, noting that Molly hasn't had breakfast yet either. He opens the fridge, and sees half a turkey carcass in there, with a handful of foil covered plates balanced carefully around it. He turns his nose up at the offerings, and closes the fridge door, then catches sight of a red box sitting on the counter top, its end peeping open. He picks it up, then heads back to the lounge, holding the box aloft for Molly to see.
"Breakfast?" he says.
Molly frowns. "You can't just scoff a box of mince pies," she says critically. She gets up, a handful of Sherlock's dressing gown bunched in her hand to keep it from dragging on the floor. She passes him and opens the fridge, peering inside, and he is certain, so very certain, that she is going to insist upon something like a bacon sandwich, which will take far too long for his stomach's liking, or worse, a full English, which will take eternity to prepare.
He is therefore pleasantly surprised when she reappears with a jug of custard, and it's only a minute and a half later that they're sitting at the table, eating piping hot mince pies drowning in thick custard, courtesy of a quick burst of heat from the microwave.
He doesn't normally do breakfasts, but as breakfasts go, this is more than tolerable. What makes it less tolerable, is the alert that lights up the screen of his phone, informing him that he has a new email. He frowns at it, and Molly notices, pausing with her spoonful of pie and custard halfway to her mouth.
"If it's something important I can leave," she tells him. He looks up at her, his attention drawn away from his phone.
"It's just Anderson," he says, setting down his spoon and clicking the button at the top of his phone, leaving the screen dark and unobtrusive. He picks up his spoon again, and smiles briefly at Molly. He will receive another half a dozen emails before the day is out, each one getting progressively tetchier, but he can't bring himself to give a damn.
He has much more important things to be getting on with here.
The End