A/N: I wrote this for my friend Vera as a birthday present, because she's my bff 5eva. She gave me permission to publish it - in other words, to traumatise other people with either my writing or this story. You decide.
The title is, of course, from Tennyson's poem "Ulysses".
There comes a time when parents are eagerly waiting for their children to finance their own holidays, to leave their parents behind while they go out exploring the world all by themselves. But that lasts one or maybe two summers long, and never more than one Christmas break. Then they're back to "we never see you anymore!" "When will you come and visit us?" "We're not planning on going anywhere this July and you're more than welcome to stay with us."
Sherlock's parents (or rather his mother, since his father had died some years ago) were currently in the phase of this development in which they (or rather she) were trying to convince him to come and stay with them (or rather her) during the summer vacation. Sherlock's initial response had been a declining one, of course. He was not willing to spend weeks and weeks in the company of his mother and, which was even worse, his grandmother (on his father's side). But, to his great misfortune he was related to one Mycroft Holmes who could be very persuasive when it came to his family. It was not as if he was planning to attend any family gatherings this summer. You see, the thing about Mycroft Holmes was that he was far too busy and far too important to leave London, even if it was only for a few days. But Sherlock – Sherlock had enough time on hand, had he not? University was not such a big deal. The only thing that worried people at university was that they were not able to fit all the parties they were invited to into their already overflowing party-schedules.
To cut a long story short, at the beginning of July Sherlock found himself in a first class compartment on a train on its way to Scotland. The Holmes family owned a mansion somewhere in the Highlands. It was rather beautiful there, if you enjoyed rain, and clouds, and meadows which swayed in the forceful untameable wind, and temperatures that never climbed over 20 degrees, not even during the summer. Sherlock was not an appreciator of meadows that were slowly torn to shreds or fanciful cloud formations and he wasn't bothered by rain or low temperatures. He would much rather have stayed in London, where there were people, and noise, and excitement, and criminals to hunt, and crimes to solve. But no, he had to travel to Scotland, where there were hardly any people around, where it was eerily and unnaturally quiet most of the time (except for the wind of course, which howled with the power of a jet plane taking off), and where a criminal mastermind was someone who managed to steal their neighbour's sheep without them noticing. Yes, Sherlock was in for the most boring summer vacation ever.
Holmes Manor was less a mansion than a solid castle which looked like something out of a Gothic novel thanks to some reconstructions at the beginning of the 19th century. It was surrounded by steep, green hills all around and heather, and thistles, and grass that was so thick and sharp that it could leave deep, bleeding cuts on any exposed part of the body it came into contact with. A stony, narrow road was the only way that led to the mansion, unless you wanted to swim through an ice-cold powerful stream and climb across the afore-mentioned mountains.
As the cab approached the mansion, Sherlock could not help but roll his eyes at the five Edwardian cars that were parked in a neat row next to the main entrance. As long as the weather was reasonably sunny (which basically meant that it was not raining), his mother ordered two servants to park the cars in the driveway, so that anyone who somehow found their way to the mansion could see how much money the head of the house had. Sherlock would never understand this urge to display your wealth. He found it was silly, similar to a five-year-old who takes his new toy to school and rubs everyone's noses in it. "Hey, look at us, we're rich! Come and rob us maybe?" To Sherlock, this behaviour was inexplicable, because why would other people be interested in whether or not the Holmes family was wealthy or not? It had no effects on their lives, after all.
To his mother, this was the most important thing in life – showing other people how rich she was. Sherlock never failed to express his disapproval of this behaviour, but she did not listen to him. His opinion did not count while he was under her roof, and it also did not count while he was away at university. And then there was his grandmother (on his father's side). His mother, at least, stopped at showing everyone how rich she was and hardly ever talked about money, because who talks about money? People who don't have any. But his grandmother? She hardly ever talked about anything else except money, money, money. Had he heard about the job the neighbour's son had acquired recently? He now earned half a million per year. Had he heard about how well his cousin had married? She was now married to this banker who owned houses in Florida, Spain, and Japan (why would you even want to have a house in Japan, honestly?). Had he heard about the death of that one person who had somehow been related to them? He had left his son the castle up in Inverness and his daughter his company. And Sherlock did not care about any of these people. Why would he? He did not even know most of the people his grandmother talked about. He had not even heard their names before. That was the reason he hated spending his holidays with his family. They were so unbelievably boring! And his grandmother was the one who made them so boring.
Therefore, Sherlock climbed out of the cab with a heavy sigh, dreading what was to come. He heaved his suitcase out of the boot and made his way up the steps to the front door (or rather gate (or rather huge, grand double-winged, oaken gate that no average human being was able to open and that's why it was electrically operated)). He rang the bell and got some high-pitched barking as a response. Sherlock sighed again. The barking meant that his grandmother had a new dog (again), a bigger-than-usual Yorkshire Terrier, judging be the sounds it made. She changed dogs fairly often. She only "adopted" older ones, because she herself was no spring chicken. Every time a dog died, she swore to herself never to buy one again. But two months later she had a new one, an old one, which she gave so much to eat that it only managed to survive a few years, at most. And then she had to look for a new one again. All of the dogs were obnoxious, fat rats that only barked all day long and were allowed everything, from sleeping in the same bed as their mistress to attacking the sheep on the meadow near the mansion. Sherlock doubted that his stay could get any worse now.
And indeed, when a servant opened the door, a small, brown and grey fur-ball shot past him, barking its lungs out as if its little life depended on it. It circled Sherlock, not sure if it wanted to attack or to keep its distance. While Sherlock was thinking about stepping on it to shut it up, a woman appeared at the door. She was around 50, her hair was grey; she was very thin, almost unhealthily thin, wearing a close-fitting, dark green dress which made her appear even thinner.
"Shush, Lizzie," she mumbled, looking at the dog. "It's quite enough now."
But Lizzie did not think about shutting up. It continued to circle Sherlock.
"Hello dear," his mother said, trying to hug her son without accidentally stepping on the dog. "How was your journey?"
"Fine," Sherlock answered, secretly asking himself why this was of any importance.
"Do come in, dear," his mother invited him, taking him by the hand and dragging him into the entrance hall. "Bob, the suitcase," she said into the direction of a man whom Sherlock would not even have noticed if his mother had not addressed him.
Lizzie, the crazed Yorkshire Terrier, followed them into the hall, its barking becoming ten times more annoying because it was multiplied by the cold, grey stone walls.
"Sherlock, you have to say hello to your grandmother," his mother went on, nearly shouting at him to drown out the dog. "She can't wait to see you."
"I doubt that," Sherlock said to himself and then raised his voice over the barking. "I would prefer to lay down for a while first. I had to get up at five this morning to catch my train. I'm exhausted."
"Of course, dear. I'll let Bob bring you your suitcase to your room. You do, of course, remember where you room is?"
"Of course, Mummy," Sherlock replied. "I'll be down in a bit, okay?"
And with that, he made his way up the unnecessarily wide staircase to his room.