Finally spring has arrived in this last story for my year-round theme about retired Johnlock. I hope you will enjoy this one, and have read the other three (A rose in our garden; Just you and me, and the stars; Defying the cold, looking for you). Thank you for your attention, alerts and 'favorites', as well as the reviews. I've appreciated them immensely. Now, this features spring and it's written from Sherlock's POV, so he and John got two chapters each. Enjoy the last season!
Sweet husband of mine.
His husband swore and grumbled as he smeared a pleasant-smelling ointment on Sherlock's swollen hand. John had positioned them on the white garden chairs outside and the bright light of a sunny spring morning helped the doctor see his handiwork.
Sherlock sighed dramatically and turned his head from his enormous, throbbing hand, towards the garden, especially the roses. He smiled fondly at the loyal Captain John who had grown much taller and now carried a lot more buds than last year. The rose was thriving as he had expected.
"Your rose will bloom in eight weeks," he commented just as his husband applied a dressing over Sherlock's incapacitated limb.
"Don't try to change the subject with words that you hope will make me swoon," John muttered. "I don't forget that easy just because I'm approaching seventy."
"It was just an observation. And you are a lovely man," Sherlock replied innocently but his husband bit his lip and decided to stay dismayed.
"Sherlock, I'm horrified at your latest observation! And look where it's gotten you: hostile bees attacking your meddling hand until it looks like a prop from a horror movie!"
"They were perfectly right to be stressed…"
John placed Sherlock's hand back in the detective's lap and dragged his own over his wrinkled face. "The Foreign Secretary is apparently considering consulting Mycroft because of the delicacy this diplomatic crisis requires!"
"Oh, God," Sherlock groaned in protest, knowing he would be subjected to John's completely unnecessary anger. He lifted his feet up on the chair and clasped his arms around his knees, bracing himself. Still, sparring with John could be invigorating this early in the day.
"Sweden is really upset by this! Mycroft told me the press there are calling us greedy, disrespectful, imperial bastards who don't care about other countries, and expect other countries to bow to our power."
Sherlock scowled in disgust. "Your boring brother-in-law is exaggerating as always. He's become worse after the knighthood. You must learn to filter out the essential information he gives you and ignore the rest. Like I do."
"Yeah, you do that too bloody frequently, my darling," John mumbled under his breath.
"They are making a fuss over nothing," Sherlock exclaimed sourly and held out his hands, or rather one hand and a small, deformed mummy.
John packed up his medical kit under loud noises and opened the top button on his shirt.
'Warm from anger. Won't freeze since the temperature is rising. Don't smother him with worry,' Sherlock deduced and snuggled lower in the collar of his black coat.
"I figured it out, you know. Your experiment. Not so romantic as the rose. Did you want to show off your prowess at fooling officials, because the joke wasn't particularly funny," John said coldly and had Sherlock squirming uncomfortably on his seat. He was embarrassed by his obvious fiasco but wouldn't admit it out loud at least.
"It was the possibility that tempted me. Unfortunately I underestimated a non-governmental environment organisation's suspicion towards the number."
John snorted and gestured erratically at the busy bee hives. "You honestly thought you could smuggle out one hundred wild bees and a queen from a nature reserve in Sweden without anyone finding out? Jesus, Sherlock!"
"I believe they can make good honey! And I would have succeeded if I had gained the local biologists' and municipality's trust for this project Sherlock exclaimed defiantly but John clicked his tongue, and clenched and relaxed his fists. 'Uh-oh.'
John wasn't happy with him. Sherlock cowered a bit in the chair, anxiously waiting for the eruption. The hair on the top of John's chest peeked out from his shirt and provided the detective with some measure of comfort. There was a point even for Sherlock where John's anger went from arousing to downright frightening.
"The Swedish press, citizens, and officials believe the UK attempts to be an egotistic colonial power again."
"Then Mycroft should be pleased," Sherlock interjected but a stern glare from his husband made him wince and fall silent. John never liked it when he interrupted him. Sherlock should have remembered that. Stupid.
"What I can't understand is why you would go through all this trouble just for a bunch of bees when we already have four hives. I kind of noticed the fifth hive even if you'd had it painted in camouflage colours."
John lifted an eyebrow and Sherlock understood he was permitted to speak. Thoughts flew wildly inside his head. How to please John and make him forgive him for this error? He felt panic rise. "There was a similar official project in 2012. The UK wanted to reintroduce bumblebees to the nature here and went to gather them in Sweden. The project caused an uproar when the people thought UK was all but stealing the rare specimen's from their homeland, but after some calls, everything cooled down. It was only a big misunderstanding and miscommunication. I thought it could be interesting to try the honey of foreign bees for a change, and to make the project happen as a private person made it all much more entertaining."
"No wonder you spent most of the winter at my laptop writing away," John grumbled and Sherlock noticed he was concealing his mood. John's face had turned enigmatic and Sherlock was unable to read anything except the obvious things: awareness of Sherlock's medical predicament, stirring hunger for Sherlock after three days without getting off together due to sleepiness, contemplating what to have for lunch.
John muttered, "Sweden's environment minister and foreign minister are involved in the affair. Mycroft will have to apologize on your behalf, or preferably hide your identity so no mislead Greenpeace activist or Swedish patriot will hunt you down. I never imagined this for my retired years," John complained and Sherlock believed the doctor's next gesture was called face-palming.
Still, he had to defend himself. "I don't concern myself with trivia. Politics are at best a nuisance to enable communication and transportation of people and goods," Sherlock drawled and then added, "This incident will not have any lasting consequences for the world peace, I assure you. EU will continue to prosper."
But instead of reacting to Sherlock's words, John hung his head, sighed heavily and then heaved himself from the chair. His eyes were downcast and his tense shoulders hunched. The left one would trouble him if he kept it in that position.
"John?"
John didn't reply, didn't even spare him a glance before spinning around and strolling towards the backside of the garden. This indifferent behaviour sent a shiver of fear through Sherlock. Where was the forgiving smile, the reproachful kiss on the corner of his mouth, the small shake of John's head at Sherlock's mad but never boring ideas? Had Sherlock really upset his husband so much that he deserved the silent treatment?
His stomach churned and he flew up from the chair and was by John's side in a few seconds, improvising since this situation was completely new to him. "John? Where are you going? I'm sorry, I only had an idea and it turned out I could follow it through, until someone alerted the media. I didn't mean to make you angry."
After they had rounded the corner of the cottage, and the glistening dewy grass shimmered before them in the morning sun, John must have grown tired of the tall, dark-clad man crowding his space and all but shouldering him into the wall to beg his forgiveness. But Sherlock would never dare to nudge John against a wall and slide his still functioning hand under the jacket and the shirt beneath at a time like this when he couldn't anticipate his husband's reaction.
With a quiet curse, the aged doctor turned around, his hands balled up by his side, a frown on his face and a glare at his apologetic husband who wrung his hands, and shifted from one foot to the other. It had been many years since Sherlock had seen John this furious, and possibly disappointed. It scared him and he cringed when he summoned the courage to meet John's hard gaze.
To Sherlock, it seemed like the bees weren't done causing trouble, because now it appeared that the worst thing in Sherlock's nightmares was about to occur: A nasty breakup fight after John at last had had enough of him, and then a divorce. To sleep alone in a bed without John on his left side...
Sherlock felt nauseous, ready to be sick.
"Sherlock Holmes."
The pale head was raised and attention fixed on John.
"Yes?"
His voice trembled and his throat muscles were beginning to cramp. Wetness tickled as tears gathered in his eyes. John wouldn't, surely. Would he? Sherlock awaited his conviction. Then, John tilted his face up and smiled curiously. "Why do you look like that?"
With great difficulty, and God, the suspense was killing him, Sherlock swallowed and managed to explain in a pitiful whimper. "I love you, John. Don't leave me. Don't judge me for the bees, but for the rose I gave you. I don't want you to divorce me."
The smile fell from John's face, he looked rather shocked for a long while until he burst into laughter. Jarred by this, and frankly a bit annoyed at John's glee while he was experiencing hellish anguish, Sherlock growled, "Well, don't just stand there laughing! Tell me what you wanted to say."
"Oh, Sherlock, you brilliant, stupid idiot!" John snickered and supported his shaking frame with one hand on the house. The sight of his happy husband caused the corners of Sherlock's sad mouth to twitch but the fear lodged deep inside was hard to make vanish just like that.
"Will you tell me what on earth is so amus…" Sherlock began when his husband of twenty-two years grabbed his coat and pulled him close. "I wasn't going to leave you, you silly dick. See, I love you." John gave him a peck on the lips and nipped the delicate skin of his neck which made Sherlock gulp. He was confused and everything was spiraling so fast beyond his control, from the import of the bees to this affectionate John.
"I thought you'd had enough," he mumbled with heating cheeks and watched how John brought his stung hand up and gently kissed the knuckles through the bandage, with his eyes fastened on Sherlock's face.
"After having had run-ins with murderers, mobsters, and angry old ladies, wandered through sewers without a torch, dived into the Thames in November, wrenched knives, swords and guns from criminals, kept quiet about body parts when the police visited the flat, disinfected our table in the kitchen daily to not get poisoned by your chemistry experiments, lied to Lestrade's face inside his office, endured bombs strapped to my body, gotten cock-blocked by my own date who just happened to find a murder when he was supposed to be at a restaurant with me, smiled at the semi-automatic rifle you gave me that Christmas, and climbed a bloody tree in Hyde Park despite my limited agility and height, and to the amusement of an assembled crowd, I might add, I can tell you this, Sherlock Holmes: a few bees and an imminent diplomatic crisis will not deter me from living with you. Because I love you higher than anything."
Sherlock peered blankly at him for a moment before wrapping his long arms around John's still broad shoulders and practically attaching himself to the man. A warm hand came up and stroked his greying curls as Sherlock buried his head in the crook of John's neck. Relief surged through him and he was about to say something clever when the hand in his hair gripped tight and jerked his head back.
Astonished, Sherlock blinked at John who gave him a serious look. "I've still not forgiven you for the bees, Sherlock. We're a family and we decided to talk about the bees together so you were wrong to make a decision on your own and buy us another hive and new bees without my knowledge, not to mention the global impact said purchase made."
"I'm sorry. What can I do to make it up to you?" Sherlock whispered, tinting his voice with silk and velvet to please his husband.
John tensed his jaw before taking a deep breath and revealing in a neutral voice, "Make the best, sweetest, most ecological, potentially award-winning honey you can for me this summer. Put it in my tea, on my toast, over your fingers when we are in bed and I'll see if I can forgive you."
With a smug grin, John left the perplexed and flustered Sherlock behind and went to mow their green lawn as the sun kept rising.
Sherlock has been a bad boy. Good for him it seems that John will forgive him eventually ;) This story was inspired by a real situation that happened this spring which, in my eyes, was very amusing to follow in the newspapers. Here is an article retelling how a seemingly simple bumblebee project turned into a minor but hilarious diplomatic crisis, featuring UK and Sweden: www. bbc. co. uk /news/ uk-england-17939123 (remove the spaces of course). And I imagined Sherlock would want to be a copycat just for the fun of it, ha ha. Send me reviews, pretty please?