Hello, everyone! Nice to meet you all. I've had these ideas floating around in my head for a while now, and I finally decided to write them down. This is a series of brief one-shots (or as I prefer to call them, sketches) about random scenes from the lives of Sherlock and John that caught my fancy. My sketches so far range from about 500-2,000 words, and I really don't know how many I may end up writing because it's just so much fun! (I had no idea how fun writing fanfiction is.) I have tried to remain in character, but as this is my first attempt at proper fanfiction, I don't know if I succeeded. Anyway, I present to you Sherlock Sketches, and I hope you have a fabulous day! :)

Arachnophobia

OR

The Time John Made an Unpleasant Discovery

Woman last seen three days ago near the Thames, having dinner at the Riverfront Grill with her boyfriend. Arrived at 6:30. Sent several text messages of irrelevant information to older sister and tweeted a picture of her gourmet shrimp platter. Left at 8:07. Nothing heard from her after nine o'clock. Management confirms that both consumed average amounts of liquor. No previous reports of any problems between them, and older sister states that couple intended to marry. However, strange bruising on the body suggests that the boyfriend may have—

"Holy— SHERLOOOCK!"

Sherlock nearly jumped out of his skin as John's sudden shriek shattered his thought process. What the…. He blinked rapidly at the ceiling, trying to clear the cobwebs and resurface to reality. John had claimed he was cooking dinner that night and had been in the kitchen clanging pots and pans around for over an hour. It did not smell like dinner, but Sherlock had told himself that anything was better than Chinese food for the fourth night in a row and tuned John's ruckus out. I bet he spilled something. No, probably burned himself. Not my problem right now. Woman last seen three days ago with boyfriend…

"Sherlock!" John cried from the kitchen again. It occurred to Sherlock that his flatmate sounded frightened.

"What?" he called back without stirring from the couch, slightly annoyed that he had been interrupted on the brink of solving his new case. No previous problems reported between them…

"Come here!" John's voice was definitely laced with fear, Sherlock decided, which was rather odd.

"Why?" Strange bruising on the body…

"Just come here."

"I'm busy." Sherlock closed his eyes, wondering what had possessed John but determined to drag it out of him before getting up. Boyfriend must have been…

Several moments of their silent stand-off passed until John broke down and pleaded, "Will you please just come in here?" John's unusually fearful tone finally intrigued Sherlock enough to motivate him to roll off the sofa. He crossed the living room and poked his head into the kitchen to find John kneeling on the floor, staring into one of the cupboards.

"I thought you were burning dinner."

John ignored Sherlock's quip about the steam drifting from the pot on the stove and remained frozen with his eyes fixed on something inside the cupboard. Sherlock studied him curiously, noting the terror etched on his face, and then knelt beside him to peer into the darkness under the sink. John promptly jumped up and backed away. "Just kill it, will you?"

Sherlock immediately spotted what had distressed his flatmate. "Tegenaria domestica," he murmured, observing the eight-legged creature lurking in the back corner of the cupboard.

"What?" John watched in dismay as Sherlock's eyes lit up with fascination.

"Tegenaria domestica," Sherlock repeated. "Domestic house spider. Non-aggressive. They weave funnels into their webs in order to—"

"I don't care what you call it! Just kill it!"

"I wonder how long it's been here," Sherlock mused without making any move to reach for the fly-swatter. "The web is intricate and quite large. When was the last time we cleaned the cupboards?"

"They're all going to be thoroughly cleaned every week from now on," John vowed, "as soon as you get rid of that thing."

"Had a nasty encounter with a spider before, I imagine. When you were a child."

John breathed deeply, fighting the memories, and resisted the urge to swear at his friend. "If you must know, yes. My sister wanted to play hide-and-seek, so I hid in the cupboard."

"And something crawled onto your hand."

John felt the tickling sensation and quickly scrubbed his hand against his pants to chase it away along with the memory that often haunted his childhood nightmares. He knew Sherlock was watching him and refused to look back at the detective.

"All right, John," Sherlock abruptly smiled. "I'll put it outside." He retrieved a beaker and glass rod from the table and reached into the cupboard. A few seconds later, he emerged holding the beaker, the spider safely secured inside. John averted his eyes as Sherlock held the beaker up and briefly inspected it. "Interesting," he finally said as he headed out the door.

John took a few moments to compose himself and then turned around to attend to the acrid odor permeating the air. It was emanating from the stove, he realized, when the smoke detector went off.