"Tea, Sherlock?" a frail John Watson called down the garden from the kitchen door.
Sherlock looked up towards their country cottage. He set down his equipment and started to remove his protective clothing.
The bees hissed impatiently at their keeper, like they knew he was leaving them.
"Coming!" Sherlock shouted, his aged voice cracking as he made his way slowly along the cottage garden path.
John smiled as he watched his friend's steady approach.
Thirty years they had been married.
Fifteen crazy years running around the streets of London, solving crime, and fifteen blissful years of retirement in the country.
John still did a couple of mornings a week at their local clinic in the village, and Sherlock had his bees: his devoted hive of followers.
As Sherlock neared the house, John turned to make the teas.
By the time he was pouring, his lover was entering the kitchen.
"There's good honey this year." he said croakily, taking a seat at the kitchen table. "Should have plenty for the Summer Fayre."
"That's good." John nodded. Sherlock always donated his honey income to the rehab facility in the city. It pleased him when he could make a sizeable contribution.
The doctor smiled across the table at his husband, remembering Sherlock's thirty year promise to him.
"I will never again leave you behind."