A/N: This is a story about Sandra (an OC). John and Sherlock are in it, but don't play a huge role. If you don't like to read about OCs, the back button is conveniently located at the top left hand side of your browser. You were warned in the summary and now you're warned again, so I don't want any complaints. No one's making you read this - I'm not coming round to your house to give you a significant look. Not only is that creepy, I don't have time for that ;)
When Sandra was seven, it was a prince. It didn't matter which prince; any prince would do. As long as he was rich and handsome. And had a palace with servants and horses and hosted balls and took her on expensive holidays. She watched and re-watched The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast and Cinderella as often as she could. She tried to draw pictures of the dresses they wore but it never turned out quite the same. Still, she would have dresses like that one day, when she married her prince. He would buy her everything she wanted and she would look brilliant and beautiful and everyone would be in awe of her, especially Joanna.
Joanna refused to watch The Little Mermaid with her because she said that Prince Eric was stupid and Ariel should have pushed him out of the rowboat and left him to drown. She would watch Beauty and the Beast, but only because she loved the fight scenes and she'd cheer for Gaston, which was clearly stupid. He was the bad guy! Jo would just shrug when Sandra pointed that out, saying:
"I know that, Sandy. That's why he should win. He's way more fun."
Sandra hated when her sister called her 'Sandy' and would retaliate by calling Joanna 'Joey' which make her sister would storm out of the room in a huff, leaving Sandra to watch her movie in peace.
When Sandra was ten, she knew she was going to marry Jason Orange. She just knew it. She could feel it in her heart and in the pit of her stomach, like an iron certainty. Jo said that was creepy because he was fifteen years older than her, but Sandra didn't care. Jason wouldn't care, either. When she was older, it wouldn't matter. She'd show her sister.
And she'd show all those girls at school who thought they were going to marry Jason Orange. Because they were stupid.
She got poster of him and begged her parents to let her go to a Take That concert but they said she was too young. Sandra pouted in her room for two days and thought about running away and going to the concert herself. But she didn't have the money and Joanna told her that the tickets would all be gone by now anyway. Her sister told her Jason Orange was a weirdo and looked like a girl, which was not true. Joanna had a poster of that American actor, Brad Pitt, whom Sandra thought was ugly.
A year later, when Take That disbanded, she was devastated. She kept the poster up for months in hopes that they would get back together, but took it down that summer because they were clearly a stupid band and she was only wasting her time on them.
When Sandra was fifteen, she was in love with Matthew Demery. He was gorgeous – tall, with blond hair that he wore long because he was so cool, smart, popular. He was on the rugby team and wanted to play professionally and everyone said he would.
She didn't think he'd ever notice her, because who was she? She was just Sandra Casey. She wasn't tall or stylish or interesting like the popular girls and she wanted to be a nurse, which probably sounded really boring and stupid to someone like Matthew Demery.
But they had maths together and she helped him with a problem one day and he'd told her she was brilliant. Sandra had smiled and thanked him and he'd found her after the class was over and asked her if she wanted to go to the cinema with him. He even let her pick the film.
He was a perfect gentleman – he'd paid for the film and their snacks and after, kissed her in the alley beside the cinema, which had been brilliant. His lips tasted like salt from the popcorn and sugar from his Coke. It was her first kiss. She thought it was perfect, the night was perfect, he was perfect. She remembered being seven and wanting a prince. She thought Matthew Demery could be a prince – he looked like one, with his beautiful hair and dark brown eyes and toned body. She thought that if he played rugby professionally, they would live in a big, fancy house and drive fancy cars and even have horses.
Then he tried to grope her and she punched him.
She gave him a black eye and everyone at school found out it was her. The girls all grinned and giggled and demanded she show them how to punch. It wasn't hard – Joanna had taught her after taking a kickboxing class. The boys made fun of Matthew and gave Sandra a respectfully wide berth. But they grinned at her, too. She ignored them because they were stupid in thinking she was a challenge.
Later that year, she started dating Michael Davenport, who didn't try anything until she snuck into his house one day when his parents were away for the weekend.
When Sandra was twenty, her heart was split between half formed dreams of catching the eye of a handsome doctor and believing that if Jason Orange could just meet her he'd fall in love instantly. Take That had reunited and Jason particularly had aged well. He looked even better, even sexier than he had ten years ago. This time she did get to see them in concert, going with some old school friends to relive their childhood and sing 'Never Forget' at the tops of their lungs. She was only slightly disappointed she didn't miraculously meet the man that had graced the walls of her bedroom as a young girl.
But her head, which always got first say, was busy studying and she discovered a lot of men (doctors) were not as interested in her sexually as they were professionally. Which was brilliant, actually. She made a lot of friends among the student doctors and went out with them on a regular basis. Sometimes she was the only woman there and they'd insist on buying her drinks, trying to compete with each other as to who could treat "the girl" the best. She hooked up with one or two of them, nothing serious. She was busy and they were busy – but she kept the idea of marrying a doctor in the back of her mind. It held a certain appeal.
When Sandra was twenty-four, she almost did marry Nicholas Chilcott. Well, she almost got engaged to Nicholas Chilcott. They'd been dating for two years and she loved him madly and she knew he loved her just as much. They'd talked about moving in together, getting a nice flat.
He was perfect. Four inches taller than her, with curly light brown hair that he kept cut short so it wouldn't be difficult to manage, brown eyes the colour of milk chocolate and a smattering of pale freckles across his nose that would darken with hers in the summertime. He was kind and considerate and shared the chores when he stayed at her flat – he'd more or less moved in already, but it was really too small for the two of them. He made her laugh and took her seriously. Her family loved him and she loved his family. They liked the same music, the same kind of films, the same activities. She'd never before dated anyone who would go running with her first thing in the morning.
But he wanted to leave the city. He wanted to live in the country, to be a nurse in a small hospital or surgery somewhere, to own a tiny cottage in a tiny hamlet and settle down and enjoy the quiet of the countryside. He wanted to be away from London, away from any of England's big cities, to be able to walk around his town, to know everyone and have everyone know him. He wanted the peace and tranquillity and the slower-paced lifestyle that came with living in a small town.
To her, it sounded like hell.
She'd lived in London all her life – she'd been born and raised in Wandsworth, had studied nursing at Bart's and she had a good job at St. Mary's working on one of the short-term care wards. She wanted a flat near the city centre, not so close that it was too expensive, but close enough that it was a short tube ride away. She wanted to be able to go out any given evening and do something – go to the theatre, the cinema, a new restaurant, a new pub.
And he wanted kids. Sandra wanted kids, too, but not until she was at least thirty. She was twenty-four. There was so much she wanted to do, so many places she wanted to go. She wanted to travel and he didn't, not really. He was content with Britain, maybe Ireland, but that was it.
He wanted to settle down and she didn't.
When they broke up, she cried for a week even though she'd been the one to initiate it. Losing him hurt like nothing she'd ever known, leaving a gaping hole in her life. It had almost been a relief when he had moved north to Ripon. It was bigger than he'd been looking for but far too small for her. Part of her hoped she'd never see him again because it would be easier. Part of her hoped he'd realize how boring it was and come back.
He didn't move back and she did see him again a couple of years later, at another friend's wedding. By then it wasn't too hard to talk to him and catch up a bit. She made sure she left the wedding with her date – an old friend – and that she went home alone. She didn't want to, but she also didn't want to deal with the disappointment and sadness all over again.
When Sandra was twenty-six, she met John Watson and Sherlock Holmes for the first time. She met John before Sherlock, really, although they were both at St. Mary's together. At first, Sherlock was another patient, wrapped in bandages, obscured by medical equipment, and John was the man beside his bed, watching and waiting. When she'd found out John Watson was in fact Doctor John Watson, her concern had deepened. It was always so much harder for doctors and nurses. They knew what to expect and couldn't be kept from the harsh reality. She bought him Chinese food after the first night he stayed on her ward, because it was clear he wasn't going to leave his husband's bedside and he was stuck eating the food the orderlies insisted on delivering for an unconscious patient. He was exhausted and clearly terrified and needed some real food.
Sherlock's family had visited, of course, and she thought they were an odd bunch. His mother seemed genuinely loving and worried. His brother seemed annoyed at the situation and the fact that it could neither be resolved nor could the medical staff provide any hard and fast answers to his questions about Sherlock's prognosis. His father had been stiff and uncomfortable, as if he'd never been in a hospital before.
The better she got to know John, the more she thought it was someone like him she wanted to marry. Not him, obviously, since he was taken, gay, and thirteen years older than her. But John was kind, patient, dependable, solid, and had a brilliant sense of humour that shone through even in the worst of circumstances. When Sherlock regained consciousness, she began to see hints of how much they loved each other. It was obvious with John, a little less so with Sherlock.
When his vision returned, Sandra really started to see it. As Sherlock improved, so too did his own sense of humour, which Sandra suspected existed largely because of John. She listened to them banter good naturedly and occasionally caught a glimpse of them through the window of Sherlock's private room, curled up very carefully on the bed together, just holding each other. Later, she would find out that John was not actually gay but bisexual but she scarcely thought it mattered. It was clear they were meant for each other.
It made her miss Nicholas in a way she hadn't in over a year.
Later that same year, in November, when Sandra was twenty-seven, she was late for work because she was stuck in traffic due to some delay on the Waterloo Bridge. It took ages to clear up and they were eventually just rerouted. She wondered what it was – there were rumours floating around the bus while they were still caught in the gridlock. A jumper on the bridge. A hostage situation. A massive accident. The possibility that part of the bridge was going to collapse. A terrorist attack. The news reports people were reading from their phones were vague and contradictory.
By the time she got to work, she was more than two hours late.
"Oh my God, did you see it?" Carrie asked when Sandra arrived.
"No," Sandra said, shaking her head. "The police rerouted us. What was it?"
"That PC who was kidnapped! He was being held hostage! There was a stand off and someone was shot."
Sandra frowned then leaned over Carrie's shoulder to see the computer monitor. The other nurse pulled up the BBC news site and played a clip. Sandra frowned again, watching the oddly deserted bridge and the three figures in the distance. Two on the parapet, one of them presumably the abducted constable whose disappearance had been all over the news that day and another on the road, holding a gun.
He looked familiar.
"Oh my God!" Sandra exclaimed. "I know him!"
"What, the cop?"
"No, no, him, the one with the gun! That's Sherlock Holmes! Remember, he was on the ward in January? He was, um, in some vehicle pile up."
"Bloody hell," Carrie muttered but Sandra barely heard her. She gasped in horror when the man holding the PC hostage jerked, obviously shot, and started to fall back. There was a moment's indecision in which the constable almost remained upright, then tumbled backward and out of sight.
"Poor sod," Carrie said.
Sandra called Stephen to let him know.
"So?" he said. "Your patient was fine, right? You didn't know the cop who died. You're out of the traffic jam anyway. I'll talk to you when you get home from work."
It was about three months later, right before New Year's, that she kicked him out.
New year, fresh start, she thought to herself.
When Sandra was twenty-nine, she was seeing a man named Jason Morgan in whom she was not particularly interested. He was nice enough but she felt like something was missing. She supposed 'seeing' was too strong a term, really. They'd been on three dates. She felt bad, because he would be a brilliant friend, but there was no romantic spark. She'd have to call it off. She wasn't going to settle for someone she didn't want just because she was feeling ready to start settling down a bit. She was coming up on thirty and had spent her twenties doing the things she loved – going out, meeting up with friends, travelling around Europe, even visiting Egypt once. She still wanted to do these things, but she also wanted someone to share them with, and someone to be at home with when she was having a night in.
Jason would be perfect for someone, but not perfect for her.
"Hey, Sandra, break time," Carrie said, coming back to the nurses' station. Sandra looked up from her work and smiled, stretching her arms above her neck.
"Right. I'm going down to the cafeteria. Want anything?"
"Yeah, bring me back a cup of what they jokingly call coffee, would you?"
"Sure."
Downstairs, Saraswati waved her over and Sandra sat down with her for the precious few minutes of her break.
"Hi, Sara. Busy night?"
Saraswati rolled her eyes.
"Friday, Sandra," she replied with a grin. "It's the pub fights, you know."
Sandra laughed and helped herself to some of Saraswati's chips.
"How many?" she asked.
"Really only one so far, but it's early," Saraswati answered with a grin then took a sip of her coffee. "Oh, mm, one the blokes, get this: his name is Sherlock. Ever heard that one before?"
Sandra sat up straighter.
"Yes," she said slowly. "I have. Tall man? Dark curly hair?"
"How did you know that?"
"Because I know him. Sorry, Sara, have to go. Thanks for the chips!"
She took the stairs to the A&E instead of the elevator so she could keep moving. She was right of course – how many people were there in London named Sherlock? He was lying on a gurney with the telltale glassy eyed look of someone with a concussion.
There was another man with him this time, not John. It gave her pause – but no, Sherlock was still wearing his wedding band. The other man was younger than Sherlock, probably close to Sandra's age, with light brown hair that had the barest hint of curl at the ends and startlingly green eyes. He looked startled by her sudden appearance but then relaxed.
"Sandra," Sherlock slurred.
It had taken him a moment to remember her name but it was a good sign that he did. And that he was conscious.
"You know each other?" the younger man asked, watching her. Not suspiciously. But carefully. As if evaluating her response.
She smiled at him and he smiled back. It changed his face, lighting his eyes.
"Yes, I was his nurse here once before," she said and extended her hand across the foot of the bed. He gripped it, holding it just a moment longer than necessary. "Sandra Casey."
"Sam Mitchell."
"Sandra, have him call John," Sherlock mumbled, distracting her. She wondered if he'd been looked at since he was admitted.
When John arrived, she agreed to help get Sherlock cleaned and stitched and left to get supplies. When she returned, Sam Mitchell was gone but Sherlock was accosting her with a small white rectangle of paper. She passed the supplies off to John and took it with a curious frown.
"You're giving me your friend's business card?" she asked.
"Yes," Sherlock murmured, then looked annoyed. "John, get on with it!" he snapped.
Later, she found the card in her wallet and considered it for a few minutes, flipping it back and forth between her fingers.
Why not? she thought. The worst he could say is no.
"Mitchell," he said by way of reply when she rang his cell.
"Sam Mitchell?" she asked.
"Yes."
She took a deep breath.
"This is Sandra Casey, we met the other night at St. Mary's when you were there with Sherlock. I don't know if you remember me–"
"Of course I remember you," he interjected and it made her grin.
"I was wondering if you'd like to go for coffee?"
He was not perfect.
It took some time for her to get the whole story, although he'd been upfront about having been assaulted on an undercover assignment from the beginning. She hadn't enjoyed learning that – but it wasn't the kind of thing anyone enjoyed knowing. When he realized she remembered the incident on the Waterloo Bridge, he'd been dismayed. When she told him she remembered it because she'd known Sherlock, he'd been relieved that she hadn't recalled it because of him.
He had problems but at least he dealt with them. It took five months before he'd stay over at her place and then only on the couch. It took another month and a half before he didn't wake up tense when he slept in her bed.
Joanna had liked Sam at first but had been wary of him when she found out about his past.
"It's a lot of baggage," she said.
"I know," Sandra replied. "But do you think because bad things happened to him, he doesn't deserve good things anymore?"
"You can't save someone, Sandra."
"I'm not trying to. He's doing a good job of taking care of that himself. And nobody's perfect."
Joanna had smiled slightly at that and rolled her eyes.
And there were bad days. Sandra knew Sam was more sensitive to these, and more inclined to remember them and make himself feel guilty. But there were a lot more good days than there were bad ones, especially as time went on. He smiled more often and with more feeling, laughed more. He relaxed, didn't hold himself quite so tense, didn't startle quite so easily.
It was a lot more work than any other relationship she'd been in, but Sandra didn't think that necessarily a bad thing. She'd worked hard to get into Bart's and then graduate from the nursing programme near the top of her class. That had been worth it.
He had the same ideas about his life and what he wanted from it as she did about hers. He took her travelling – he had to go to France occasionally for work and she would accompany him. They would take two or three days after his meetings to go somewhere new or to a favourite destination. He'd joined Interpol in part to see the world, he'd told her. Mostly he'd seen England and France, and a bit of Ireland.
They had the same taste in music and enjoyed live shows and going out to pubs. For the second time in her life, she found someone who was willing to go on morning runs with her.
And he wanted kids, too, but after they'd had some time together. Sandra thought he'd be a great father even with everything he'd gone through. Maybe because of it. He'd be more aware than most people. He paid attention to what he needed for his own health. That awareness extended to her needs, too.
He did things for her that no one else had ever done. Things he probably didn't think were valuable. Things that were priceless to her. He bought a small programmable coffee maker and set it to have a fresh pot of tea waiting for her when she came off a night shift and he was working during the day. He made sure that there was breakfast that could be reheated to accompany the tea. If he wasn't working, he made her fresh breakfast when she walked through the door then would often crawl into bed and lie with her until she fell asleep.
She took over the cooking for the most part, because she was better at it than he was and she enjoyed it. He took on the washing up without being asked. He made the effort to get on with her family, something that no one since Nicholas had really done. If he was going to be late because of work, he called or sent a message.
He paid attention and remembered her birthday. He bought her jewellery that she liked – he was the first man she'd dated who had ever done that. She couldn't wear much at work, no rings or bracelets and she didn't much like wearing earrings. The first thing he ever bought her was a simple silver chain and a silver heart-shaped pendant with a small emerald inlaid in it. She could wear it under her scrubs and not have it get in the way when moving equipment or patients.
He wasn't perfect.
She'd told Joanna that no one was. She knew she wasn't. She knew there was no perfect, not really.
But he was one of the best men she'd ever known. He worked at it. And he was perfect for her.
When he asked her to marry him, she said yes.