By Any Other Name
Mrs. Holmes looked down at the tear streaked face of her younger son. She knelt on the kitchen floor next to him, pulled him into an embrace, and cooed to calm him. This was the third time he had come from the school yard in tears.
"They were picking fun at me again, because of my name," a young Sherlock explained.
"Sherlock is nothing to be made fun of for," she answered drying his face of the moisture her frock hadn't already absorbed.
"Not that one!" he exclaimed. "It was my middle name. Why was I named after Uncle Cornelius?" He broke into a fresh wave of tears at the thoughts of the tormenting the other kids would continue the next day.
Mrs. Holmes hugged him again. "Uncle Cornelius was my brother and giving you his name was my way of honouring him. He passed on when he was a little more than a year older than you."
Sherlock pulled back to look at his mother.
"I'm glad I did. You act so much like him sometimes," she added with a smile.
Her son smiled back and ran off with a newfound pride for carrying the name.