Prompt:
D'you reckon you could write me a drabble about Jim getting Seb a cello?
"It's your birthday, take what you want from his flat," Jim is sitting at the kitchen table reading news on his netbook, one hand dipping toast into a soft boiled egg. He has not looked away from the screen.
Seb frowns, he hadn't realised until Jim had mentioned. Birthdays... weren't his thing. Still... he could always sell something expensive for a small bonus, "Thank-you, sir," he mumbles as he walks out of their flat.
"Fat bugger," Seb grunts as the man falls into Seb's arms, neck broken. Seb drops him into a pool of water carefully arranged on the bathroom floor. A few moments clearing evidence, setting false evidence and the flat was his for the 'birthday' pickings.
Nowwheredoesafatbankerkeephisgoldwatches..?
Obviously the bedroom. He reads examines the floor plan memorised an hour before he came here. Master bedroom: Door left of bathroom. Easy. He casts a glance across his handy work before stepping over the body and exiting the room. A quick pull on a wire and the door is locked from the inside. Ingenious.
It is just as he mentally congratulates himself that a very particular shade of mahogany flashes in his peripheral vision. Second door to the right: Study. The door is slightly ajar, almost irresistible. A few steps more and the door swings open with a light nudge from his finger tips.
Leant in the corner of the room is a cello.
A cello on his birthday.
He almost jogs to its side. There's a thick layer of dust covering it and a few flicks of his fingers tells him it's hideously out of tune. Not here to be played then. He runs his fingers over the wood before spinning it around. Trust a banker to have an overtly expensive instrument for decorationin a room no one ever saw. Seb snarled at the idea. Birthday present found.
A quick sweep of the room finds a case, but no rosin. He stoops to brush off the worst of the dust before packing it away. A smile flickers across his face as countless memories of lessons flicker into his head. When he stands it feels lighter than he ever remembered. The discordance sends momentary doubt, but he shakes it off, Jimsaidanything.
When Seb enters the flat Jim is sitting at the kitchen table simultaneously scribbling in a notebook and eating sushi. Seb can't help but wonder if he's been there all day. Without looking up Jim addresses him, "You found it then, well done."
"Found it?" Seb looks at the case in his hand and sighs, "You planned this?"
"Couldn't have you grumpy on your birthday."
"I didn't even know it was my birthday."
Jim shrugs, "I got bored last Wednesday," that Jim Moriarty plotted a murder when he was bored did not surprise Seb. That Jim Moriarty planned his body guard's birthday present, and an utterly perfect one at that, was something else entirely.
"Why the cello?"
"With your education obviously you were taught an instrument, the callouses and muscles on your hands and wrists but none on your neck pointed to a cello or double bass however your posture while seated occasionally mirrors the posture taught to cellists. Military service obviously forced you to stop, a cello is hardly practical for Afghanistan, and of course you don't own one now." Jim pauses to drop a piece of sashimi into his mouth, "You usually listen to jazz, but more recently you've been choosing music with cellos in it, especially cello focused pieces. When I've seen you listening your fingers twitch as you imagine playing. You want to start again."
Seb grunts in affirmation, he should have known Jim could read the perfect gift off a person like he read anything else.
Jim smirks sensing his victory, "Will you be playing tonight?"
"No," Seb snaps suddenly embarrassed by the effort Jim had put it. He didn't know when Jim's birthday was, it was hard to associate a man like him with a something as human as a birthday.
Jim chuckles, "Of course you want to molly-coddle it like you do with all your guns." Jim smirks at Seb who's trying to hide the blushing burning his cheeks, "be careful it's worth at least thirty grand."
"Sir-"
"Calm down, Sebby, I didn't pay for it," Seb rubs his face and leaves the room. Jim being thoughtful was too odd for his liking.
Jim smirks into the pillow as he falls asleep able to hear the deep notes coming from the basement. Not one out of place in the melody, just as he had predicted.