Three thousand and seven hundred
John walked into the flat, still irritated from his most recent fight with the chip-and-pin machine, headed for the kitchen to begin pulling out groceries, and stopped. Several seconds passed, than a familiarly confused yell echoed through the apartment. "Sherlock!"
There was no answer. Abandoning the paper sacks, John reluctantly gathered up a handful of the items that littered all the available space and went looking for his friend.
It didn't take long, although the doctor was unimpressed at finding Sherlock sprawled across John's bed after a two minute search. Knowing the younger man, Sherlock was sulking due to lack of a puzzle or riddle to solve.
The consulting detective never even glanced his way when John held out the assortment in his grasp. Before he could ask, Sherlock sighed and declared, "Consistently three thousand and seven hundred. Boring."
John raised his eyebrows and waited, still not comprehending.
The taller man huffed before swinging his legs over the side of the bed and coming upright. He repeated himself. "Consistently, three thousand and seven hundred. Only off by a few numbers in either direction the six times it wasn't that exact number."
"I… don't understand," John admitted.
"It's boring," whined the detective.
"Please just tell me," the doctor persisted.
A loud groan proceeded the pouty response of, "Three thousand and seven hundred licks."
John stared from his flatmate to the items, than went to find his computer, an old memory of Harry resurfacing from her time obsessed with American telly.
Sure enough, there was a window open on the machine to a Youtube video of an old-fashioned commercial. Watching it through, John's brain finally made the leap, and he walked back to his room. Entering, he discovered Sherlock had gone back to lying, unmoving and boneless.
Slowly, the stockier man asked, "You decided to run a series of experiments to discover how many licks it takes to reach the center of a Tootsie Pop?"
Sherlock opened his eyes long enough to glare and flip over, pressing his face into the pillow.
John didn't leave.
Eventually, Sherlock's tense shoulders loosened in a sort of reluctant surrender and he admitted, mumbling around the fabric encased goose down, "It was on your blog."
Puzzled, John echoed, "On my blog?"
Frustrated now, Sherlock heaved himself off the matress and onto his feet, frowning. "Your sister, Harry. She suggested I could neither hypothesize nor prove the correct amount."
"My sister… dared you to answer a stupid, hypothetical question posed by some American advert over a decade ago, and you actually made an experimentof it?"
John had never seen Sherlock blush before, but there was no denying the rosy pink blooming on each pale cheek. It was –dare he even think it?- nothing less than adorable.
His friend peered at John and growled, "Don't look at me like I'm some sort of mentally deficient infant animal!"
Grinning, the ex-soldier shrugged. "You do remind me of a kitten, sometimes."
That made Sherlock stomp right by him, but there was no escape and John followed the detective out, watching him flop on to his usual spot on the couch.
Getting back to the original subject, John again held up the hand filled with lollipops. "So the final count was three thousand and what?"
"Three thousand and seven hundred," Sherlock instinctively finished, which caused the fading pink in his face to darken again. The glower that followed had no effect on the doctor, who nodded.
"Alright then."
As the older man headed back towards the kitchen, intent on putting away the groceries and gathering up the remaining sweets to throw out (He had considered keeping and giving them to the children brought in to see him at the hospital, except the treats had spent at least a day in close proximity to Sherlock's lab equipment, leaving no guarantee they were safe.), Sherlock yelled after him. The tone was embarrassment masked by anger.
"And don't even consider putting this up on your bloody blog!"
John's answer was a less than reassuring chuckle.
end.
… …
a/n This fic was inspired by an entry on the hilarious website dearblankpleaseblank which read:
Dear world,
3700 licks to get to the center of a tootsie pop.
Sincerely, you're welcome.
a/n2 I actually plan to write a series of fics for different fandoms that are inspired by other post on said website, so keep watch!