Napoleon's Journey
Chapter 1
"Mrs. Preston…" Joan could only just contain her sigh," "you do not have a brain tumortumour." Joan offered her best fake doctors smile. She was normally never this blunt withto her patients, but Mrs. Preston was really working on her nerves right now. It was probably the fourth - no - fifth visit in two weeks. Being her GP, Joan didn't have any choice but to listen to her made up stories and nod understandingly.
"Are you sure, Ddoctor? I've read all about 'em on the internet, about the symptoms,"", she said. Un-be-lievable. She was sure her day couldn't get any worse.
Early morning that same day, Sherlock had woken her up with a wild Sibelius concert and by lunchtime there'd been a young boy throwing up all over her new pumps. Of course Joan was used to all kinds of bodily fluids -, she iswas a doctor, for god's sake. In the course of her carreercareer she had been spit on, bled on, and puked on constantly and also combining all of that, with the gritty desert sand of Afghanistan.
There was that memorable moment when she examined her first corpse at Bart's. The professor had accidently pushed on the abdomen, with a resulting 'purge' from the mouth. The foul smelling liquid proceeded to land precisely on her face, which had been too much for a fellow student, who fainted and fell to the linoleum floor. She wiped her face with the sleeve of her shirt and quickly helped him move, with the aid of the professor, to a more comfortable position. She patted his cheeks for a moment until he was conscious again. She asked if he was okay, if he remembered his own name and the current date. He muttered his name and date. He peered at all the faces hovering above him and back at Joan, and joked that he ought to eat more if he wanted to survive this semester. It worked out in the end. Mike Stamford was one of the best doctors Joan has personally known.
"Yes, quite sure, Mrs. Preston. It's just a high blood pressure, nothing to be worried about," Joan answered. , "You can always have a second opinion if you want, of course."
"Oh well, I think I'm all right."
"Well Mrs. Preston, is that all?"
"Yes, thank you, Dr. Watson." The little old lady left her office and Joan finally dropped her mask and sighed. That was her last patient for the day. She looked at the clock on the wall -, she had two hours of free time left. She went to Sarah's office and asked if there were any more patients she could help with. Sarah told her she was doing fine, it wasn't really busy after all and told her she could take the rest of the day off.
Joan wrapped herself in her coat, shawl, and fluffy earmuffs. The beginning of January and it was freezing, luckily without any snow, yet.
She walked to the tube station and considered surprising Sherlock with her day off;. Sshe thought of hot tea and freshly baked biscuits from Mrs. Hudson.n,; she thought Oof Sherlock in her dressing gown lying on the couch;, she thought of her shirt riding up and revealing her soft looking belly. ; sShe thought of pressing her face into that belly and just…
herJoan's thought process halted abruptly when a black vehicle slowly stopped next to her.
"Ugh... bBloody hell,"", she muttered out loud. Of all the people in London she wanted to see today, emMycroft/em was definitely not one of them. She ignored MycroftsMycroft's PA, and walked on. Sod this, sod Mycroft, she thought. If he really wanted to speak to her so badly, he could just phone her. The black car drove away. When she had almost arrived at the tube station, she received a text from a private number., iIt said:
06/01/81
- MH
Seriously, Mycroft? A date? That's it? What is she supposed to make out of that? The Holmes brother could be such a pain in the arse, with his cryptic messages. She stared at the numbers for a bit longer. 81. A moment later she finally understood. It was sherlock'sSherlock's date of birth -. The onesomething that Sherlock didn't want Joan to know for an inexplicablecitly reason.
Joan remembered the morning where she was in her favourite chair, reading a novel, while Sherlock was lying leisurely on the coach. She peeked from above her book to take a better look at herSherlock.
Her dark curly hair was splayed over a cushion, as if trying to capture the sunlight that was filtered throughew the windows, only making her cheeks redden, and her black round earrings shine a little. Sherlock only wore one pair of earrings, in contrary to Joan, who had a vast collection of all colours imaginable.
Sherlock actually received diamond earrings from a client once. The next day she gave them to someone from her homeless network, while explaining that she would never wear diamonds, only buttons.
Joan cherished these quite moments onin Bbaker Sstreet. Sherlock, just having just solved a difficulta difficult case, was perfectly content. In only a few hours though, the boredom would return, and the boredom only a few hours, was perfectly content beforeand she would begin to shatter dishes against the wallstart to throw the dishes against the wall into smithereens. If Joanshe would wanted to ask something more personal to the detective, thisat was the moment.
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Sherlock was perfectly content with herself until Joan had asked her that stupid question. Of course she saw it coming, ever since Joan's dinner party, but it was still a little surprisinge. Joan had impacted her life in so many ways, had saved her from death itself, so why was she so uncomfortable with telling Joan when her birthday wasould be? Sentiment, Sherlock thought.,
"Why would I want to celebrate my birthday," Sherlock said, lying on the couch in her thinking pose., "I'm not a six year old girl any more, Joan."
"I don't know, because it's err... .. fun. We don't have to do anything special. Only gifts and cake, that sort of stuff." Joan said.
"Oh, god. ..yYou sound just like my mother."
"Your mother!" Joan said, while laughing humourlessly. .
"No, I don't."
"Yes, you do."
"No, I don't!"
Sherlock made Joan shout a little, in only one minute this time. . Mmh… tThat's interesting, Sherlock thought. First, therey're was that break up with Nick, Nigel, Nathan? two weeks ago, after only five days of hooking up. Second, the increase of Joan's unconscious fidgeting in her chair, whenever sheJoan wore a pairone of her tight jeans. And now, Joan was incredibly snappish at her even though the doctor was always patient, even with Sherlock's so called 'dark moods', as Joan once described so poetically to her.
She stored the data away in theher 'Joan-Section' of her mind palace., iIt was a room at first but it became immediately became too crowded at the start of their acquaintance, so she'd made it an entire wing.
Joan's probably just sexually frustrated. A nice case would do them both good and gives Joan an outlet for all her pent-up frustration. Her recent break up with Neil, Noah, Nemo? was to blame for all this, or as Joan would say, she was to blame for it. How could Joan stand all of these idiots in her life, onlyjust to have sex with them, Sherlock couldn't fathom. She was glad she scared them away,away; Joan belongs with her, and not with Nestor or Nelson.
"You're such a git sometimes, you know," ", Joan said with more fondness than irritation." "Tea?" she asked a bit hesitantly, in lieu of an apology.
"Yes, please,"", and Sherlock smiled back.