"Twenty-four hours of leave left, mate. You really going to spend half of it sleeping?"
John groaned, but there was really no point to arguing. Bill always got his way. "It's almost midnight and I'm knackered," he said. "Not sure I've got much more in me, to be honest."
Bill threw a loose arm around John's shoulder and pointed to a cross-street a few blocks ahead. "Speedy's Coffee, there. I've told you about it. Here's your chance."
Bill had talked about the coffee shop, at length. Apparently it was staffed by some tall posh bloke who provided the rudest customer service in London but always made the perfect cup. Didn't even let you order - just looked you up and down and announced how much you needed to pay. Bill had told the story at least a dozen times, whenever someone new moved into their unit - how he'd stumbled in one afternoon, terribly hungover and having just awoken at some woman's house whom he'd never met before. How the posh bloke sized him up in one glance and then poured him the best damn quadruple-shot-espresso-with-caramel-and-extra-sugar he'd ever had. Sobered him up pretty much immediately. Enough for him to stumble outside, find the sign designating Baker Street, and call a buddy for a ride, anyway. John did have to admit he was curious. Four shots of caffeine sounded like a bit much, but hopefully the bloke (if it even was the same bloke, after all this time) would figure him for something a bit less over the top. Maybe.
The coffee shop window was a cheerful light on an otherwise darkened street, foot traffic having all but disappeared due to the hour and the vague threat of drizzle. Bill ushered John in and had to give him a little extra shove so John didn't just stop in the doorway and stare.
Because the shop was . . . ridiculous, really. The tables on one side of the room were all made up with doilies and plastic floral centerpieces and the overwhelming sense of being back at John's grandmother's cluttered flat, afraid to move lest he knock over some painted figurine. The other side of the room was absolutely night and day different - even the walls were split, a soothing light blue on the grandmotherly side and a vivid dark wallpaper on the other. There were no dining tables on the wallpapered side, just some leather armchairs and a couch with low end tables beside it framing a fireplace in the middle of the wall. John got as far as mentally trying to catalogue the items on the mantel (a slipper, a candle snuffer, some sort of ornate clock, a rack of antique titration equipment, a human skull?) when Bill snapped his fingers in front of John's face and jerked him back to the present.
"You weren't kidding about being tired, mate," Bill said with a grin. "How you think you're going to keep up with all the bright young things you'll be working with this time around is beyond me. You're practically ancient."
Okay, yes, it was John's second tour and he was definitely a good sight older than most of the new blood, but he only had a year on Bill. A year in age and about a decade more maturity. John used some of that maturity to refrain from clobbering Bill in the back of the head for yet another age reference.
"You'll be wanting coffee," a voice from somewhere behind the counter announced. "Ugh."
It seemed an odd comment from someone who worked at a coffee shop. John turned, curious, and caught his first glimpse of an absolutely gorgeous man. "Tall posh bloke" really had been a good description - he must have been a full head taller than John, and probably had an inch or two even on Bill. He was wearing a pressed dress shirt and trousers underneath the "Speedy's Coffee" apron, and it looked really damn good on him. He gave Bill a bored glance, sighed, and turned to retrieve something from the cupboard behind him.
"On leave from the army," the man intoned as he pulled out a cup and started filling it from assorted nozzles and carafes. Nothing was labeled, John noticed, but he seemed to know what everything was anyway. "Enjoying your last night on the town before being deployed. Or-" he paused and gave John another look "-re-deployed, as the case may be. Three pounds fifty for the blend, extra caffeine, agave extract, almond cream. I combine and grind my own beans so don't bother asking where it's from."
Bill tossed a fiver down on the counter and grinned at John. "Told you."
"You did." John looked back up at the man - Sherlock, his nametag proclaimed - and realized he'd subconsciously slid into parade rest. "Care to guess mine? Because I have no idea what I want."
Sherlock rolled his eyes. "I never guess, I deduce. And you don't even like coffee."
Bill barked out a laugh at that, quickly stifled as he took his first sip of his drink. "Bloody hell, this is amazing. I think I may need a few minutes of alone time with this cup, seriously. Fuck."
There was a slight crinkle at the corners of Sherlock's eyes, even though his mouth didn't move, and John got the impression Sherlock was maybe just a bit smug about Bill's reaction. The way Bill was moaning and sighing, perhaps he had the right to be. John kept his head up and kept eye contact, even as Sherlock turned that laser-focused attention to him.
"Tea," Sherlock said slowly, as if coming to a momentous decision. "Not a blend I keep here in the shop. For you, though . . ." He frowned, then nodded sharply. "I can make an exception. Shop's closed, now - time to leave. Tell your friend goodbye."
John looked around at the empty room. "But-"
"You can catch up to him later. He's desperate to pull a sex partner tonight anyway." Sherlock made a shooing motion at Bill. "You. Go. Try the pub two blocks west of here. Bartender's name is Laura. She has long hair and large breasts and just broke up with her on-again-off-again boyfriend last night, which means she's going to be eager to take home whoever's willing to stick around until the end of her shift in a little less than an hour. She also has a military fetish. Talk up your previous tour, tell her I sent you, and don't mention the boyfriend. She'll ensure you're suitably under-rested for your deployment tomorrow."
Bill blinked twice, gaped, then recovered and practically beamed at the man. "You, sir, are a god among men. John, enjoy your tea; I apparently have a sure thing to flirt with."
John didn't doubt for a minute that Sherlock's information was accurate - big tits and long hair were definitely Bill's type, so it went to reason that Sherlock's assessment of the woman's turn-ons was accurate as well. He barely even had time to call a parting "G'luck, mate!" before Bill was tossing back the rest of the coffee and practically sprinting out the door.
"That was, um." John sucked in a deep breath. "That was amazing, actually. You know all that from personal experience?"
Sherlock grunted. "Not really my area. Come along. What's your name, by the way?"
"John."
"Excellent." He offered a firm handshake over the counter. "Nice to meet you, John. I'm Sherlock, obviously, you must have noticed. Turn out the lights and lock the door, would you? I'm leaving everything else for Mrs. Hudson in the morning." He tossed some of the assorted coffee-making equipment in the large sink behind him, ran some water over it, then waved John forward through the "STAFF ONLY" exit in the back of the room.
John followed - after doing what Sherlock had asked - but his head was spinning. "Sorry, who's Mrs. Hudson?"
Sherlock waved vaguely at the flowers-and-doilies side of the room. "Landlady and co-owner. She decorates her side, I do mine. She takes the morning shifts and does the baking and I take the evening shifts and do the coffee and tea."
"Ah." John nodded as if he understood. "The skull on the mantel, then?"
"Friend." Sherlock led the way up a narrow flight of stairs, pausing near the top. "Well, I say 'friend' . . ."
"Right. Okay." John found himself being ushered into a cluttered sitting room which was every bit as oddly decorated as the coffee shop had been. No old-lady lace, here, but there was some sort of bovine skull with headphones on one wall and a mishmash of scribbled-on notebook paper tacked onto another. Everything smelled of coffee. And Sherlock had been correct - John didn't like the taste of coffee, particularly, but that didn't mean he couldn't enjoy the smell.
Sherlock continued right on through to the open kitchen, pausing to put a kettle of water on, then commenced digging through the overflowing cupboards. Most of which were entirely filled with tea, John realized.
"You do this often?" John's face heated as soon as the words were out of his mouth. "I mean, take customers up to your flat? This is yours, right?"
"Of course it's mine. Who else's would it be?" Sherlock's voice was muffled because his head was currently stuck in the refrigerator as he rummaged, but the don't question it came through loud and clear. "Ah! Here it is. Sit, sit - plaid chair behind you. I knew I had the Indonesian in here somewhere. And to answer your question, no. I can count on one hand the number of customers who've required something other than the blends I keep downstairs, and none of the others were interesting enough to catch my attention. Bisexual army medic, overqualified but too addicted to danger to settle into a surgery here in London? What's not to appreciate?"
Shit. John cleared his throat. "Not that I'm saying I think you're wrong, but . . ."
Sherlock sighed loudly. "Do you really want me to explain my deduction? Or would you rather get to the sex and the tea? I thought I'd been rather obvious, but perhaps I should have been clearer."
John's brain more or less froze at the word sex, the rest of Sherlock's proclamation a bit fuzzy in comparison. He couldn't see what Sherlock was doing in the kitchen, not from the chair Sherlock had directed him to, but there was a clattering of glassware and what was probably canisters of tea and then Sherlock was striding back out into the sitting room and unbuttoning his shirt as he did so.
"Don't be boring, John," Sherlock groaned. "I did promise tea also. The best tea you've ever had, to be precise, and quite possibly the best you will ever have unless we come to make this a regular arrangement once you get back. Do you require the use of condoms during reciprocal fellatio? I'm disease-free and the risk of transmission is very low between healthy partners, but I have some in my bedroom if you feel they're necessary. Not flavored, though - they'd ruin your taste buds for the tea."
John was still stuck on the sight of Sherlock's pale chest as the man shucked the dress shirt that had fit him so amazingly well. It took an extraordinary act of will to tear his eyes away and actually use his mouth to form words. "Yes," John stammered. "I mean, no, I don't want condoms, and yes, the blow job thing sounds lovely. I'm just . . . I didn't know you were thinking more than tea."
"Oh, there's much more than tea," Sherlock said in a voice so low and molten it made John's toes curl. "Now are you going to get yourself out of those clothes, or do you need my help?"