"This should be nice and cosy, dearie. Is this your first place on your own?"
"Yes ma'am it is." I said politely, studying her in interest. She had a bad hip, had once been married, was extremely worried about John, and was still grieving for Sherlock despite trying to keep up a good façade around the doctor—and indeed, everyone else.
"You don't have to call me ma'am, dear."
I faked a smile at her, but had absolutely no intention of changing it, lest I get into bad habits. I caught a glimpse of myself in the window and was struck by how similar I looked to my father there.
"Is there anything else I can get you?"
I smiled genuinely—that's what I'd wanted to hear. "Yes. Can you teach me everything you know about managing a household?"
"Oh, I'm not exactly an expert." She said, laughing. "This place is a mess, after all."
"I think it's brilliant. Please? I grew up in a wealthy household, so we had all sorts of people to do this for me. I never learned."
Naturally, I was lying. What on earth was I supposed to do besides housework?
There's only so much careful studying you can do when you've got a brilliant mind like mine. (I realise that sounds wildly narcissistic, but how many of you can honestly say you finished an anatomy textbook cover-to-cover in three hours, yet never forgot a word of it? I thought so. Now, let's accept that I am a genius, plain and simple, and move on, before I start reciting it word-for-word, backwards, in Latin.)
"Surely a girl like you has something better to do than listen to an old lady's ramblings."
I was beginning to like this self-deprecating nature. It could be very useful in a situation where I needed an enemy to underestimate me.
"Nonsense. I took my classes over the summer, and I have a month until I travel to America. I can't imagine a better way to spend my last week of freedom than learning something new."
"Well… I suppose."
I clapped my hands together and beamed. "So it's settled! And naturally, I'll compensate you for your services."
"That's quite alright, dearie." She said, waving the thought away.
"Nonetheless, I insist."
Mrs. Hudson paused and studied me. "You remind me of someone…" She said after a moment.
"Really?" Remembering that she'd known my father, I felt the slightest bit uneasy. "Might I ask of whom I remind you?"
It was her turn to beam. "You're related to Mycroft Holmes, aren't you?"
"I'm afraid I don't know what you mean." I said coldly, but the mirror behind her once again made me regret it; I sounded just like him.
"I knew it. It's the eyes, dear; you can never hide family resemblance that much."
I stared at her. She didn't hate me, though I knew from her file she didn't get on with my father that well. How had this woman, a woman of no great intelligence, figured it out so easily?
"Um."
"So how is this little teaching thing supposed to work?"
"I suppose you just go about your usual business and I ask whatever questions I have."
"Oh, well, I need to make tea for John first. Come on, the kitchen's this way, dearie."
I looked around her kitchen, and then perched in a corner and began stirring the scone batter. She didn't seem interested in conversation, instead humming to herself and bustling around.
After she went through the bridge of the song for the third time, I decided to make conversation:
"Roman girls would follow their mothers around as adolescents in order to learn how to properly go about running a household. It was the female equivalency to the boys going to school."
"You like history?" Mrs. Hudson asked as she set a kettle on to boil.
"Actually, I like Latin; it just happens I learn a lot of history."
"You must've inherited the Holmes brain."
How casually she refers to my family's brilliance, like it's all the same. My father is calm, collected, his mind a well-oiled machine. My uncle—yes, for all the more idiotic readers, if Mycroft is my father, Sherlock is my uncle—has a mind like flames, jumping from topic like a raging wildfire. My grandmother had a leisurely mind that moved at whatever pace she asked it to with no problem—or so I'm told.
But my mind? It moves too fast for me to get anything done on purpose, and heaven forbid something get in its way. I guess the best simile would be that it's like a river, rushing downhill at impossible speeds, unable to go back uphill but too powerful to be stopped.
Rather than explain this to her, I said: "I must have." Then, anxious to change the subject, "What's taking this kettle so long?"
"A watched pot never boils."
"That's ridiculous; my watching it wouldn't have any effect on it. It's not like the water could possibly be aware of my presence."
"Just an old saying, dear. It means if you're impatient things seem to take longer."
"Patience is not in my nature."
She clucked. "I bet it isn't, dearie, with your family."
"Enough about my family!" I said, voice raised and fingers clenched into fists.
"What family is that?" A sleepy voice asked.
"Ooh, John, this is Mycroft's daughter; she just moved into 221C, isn't that lovely? We just put the water on for tea."
"Mycroft Holmes?" Dr. Watson said in disbelief. "Never figured him for the sentimental type."
"You figured correctly. Pleasure to meet you; the name's Rosabel Odette Holmes."
I think it was the Holmes flint to my voice that rallied the broken man before me. He shook his head as if to clear it and offered a hand. "I'm—"
"Doctor John Hamish Watson, ex-army doctor, sent home with a psychosomatic limp from an injury to the right shoulder and supposedly PTSD from the war, resident and now sole owner of 221B Baker Street. I read the file."
"Your dad let you go looking though files?" He asked sharply.
"Not usually, but upon realising I'd be living in close proximity to you and would eventually go looking for answers he gave me the facts instead."
"And the facts are?"
I smirked. "Confidential."
"Tell Mycroft to send people who don't look like him to come spy next time, will you?" He stormed off rather theatrically with that.
I frowned. "What did I do?" I asked Mrs. Hudson, tilting my head to one side.
"You reminded him of Sherlock, I think." She said sadly. "Here's his tea, dear, you'd best go apologise so he doesn't sulk."
The tea cup was warm against my palm as I carried it away wordlessly. I've never apologised before, so it was bound to be a disaster.
John Watson was sitting down, halfway doubled over and gripping the arms of his chair like it was a lifeline. "Mrs. Hudson, I'm really not—oh. It's you."
"I'm afraid so." I replied, setting the cup down.
"Go away, please."
"You're in the middle of a paroxysm of grief. I don't think I'm morally allowed to leave."
"I don't want you to—" He broke off again.
"See you cry?" I guessed shrewdly. "It isn't a weakness, John."
"What would you know?"
Okay, so I also had never seen anyone cry before, and hadn't cried myself since I was three years old and learning to cut up onions.
I cast about for a literary reference. "You know the great Greek hero Odysseus? Well, there's a bard singing of the Trojan War, and Odysseus hangs his head and weeps openly."
"Oh, so reading an old book makes you an expert?"
"Look, Dr. Watson, I'm sorry your best friend committed suicide and left you floundering about in a world that doesn't make sense without him.
"I'm sorry it's mostly my father's fault.
"I'm sorry I don't understand the point of apologising for something that isn't my fault.
"I'm sorry I've never socialised outside of carefully arranged social interactions in appropriate settings with people all picked by my father and the staff.
"And I'm sorry that all that's left of my uncle is a broken military man and a flat full of junk in boxes you can't bear to discard.
"But last time I checked I'm not Moriarty, or Sherlock, or Mycroft. So stop moping, drink your tea, and give me a chance."
He stared at me and I folded my arms. "I'm genetically predisposed to melodrama, okay?" I mumbled.
For what I suspected was the first time in a while, John Watson laughed.
x-x-x-x-x
The next day wasn't nearly as interesting. Actually, I'd been up for five hours and the most interesting thing I'd done was find out how to make omelettes (you can't stir them, even though you feel absolutely certain it'll burn to the bottom of the pan if you don't, because then they'll be scrambled eggs).
And my arms hurt, because the last hour or so had been dedicated to mopping. I had discovered rather quickly that mopping could, in fact, be aerobic.
"Make sure you mop with the grain of the wood, dearie. I'm making plum pudding, by the way."
Damn my stubborn nature that had insisted I take care of the mopping.
x-x-x-x-x
"The best way to clean a window is to spray, like that, and then wipe in a circular motion with a scrunched up newspaper before it can drip."
"Won't the ink bleed onto the window?"
"Not at all."
"Hmm… Who do you reckon thought to use newspaper first?"
Mrs. Hudson shrugged. "I haven't the faintest. But this is why you always keep old newspapers around, because they're great for catching messes and cleaning windows."
x-x-x-x-x
"I always cover baking sheets with aluminium foil so they're easier to clean."
x-x-x-x-x
"It doesn't matter who's visiting or if you want them out, it's always nice to offer guests tea, coffee, and biscuits."
"I suppose it's bad manners to poison them?"
"Yes, dear."
"You can, um, call me Rose."
"Rose it is, then."
x-x-x-x-x
"There's more to running a household than welcoming guests and keeping it clean."
"Really?" I hadn't seen her do much else, honestly.
She nodded emphatically. "You have to take care of people in the household."
"What if we don't have other people?" I asked. "What if we're alone?"
"Then you could always rent rooms out. Sometimes there'll be unpleasant tenants, but sometimes you might be lucky to get perfect dears like you and John."
"I'm not good with people."
Mrs. Hudson looked at me with something I can only assume was maternal instinct and connection to Sherlock making her feel affection for me. "Neither was he, Rose. You remind me of him—it's a good thing, too, because he was a good person." She laid a hand on my shoulder here, as if to put emphasis on her words.
"I'm not sure if I want to be a good person yet."
x-x-x-x-x
We were watching the first few episodes of Doctor Who after I finished my chores that day. John and Mrs. H had been horrified to discover I hadn't seen it, but I could tell almost immediately that just maybe a normal person and an enigmatic stranger grabbing each other's hands and running through London was too close to an old reality for John's likings.
I rather liked that there was a girl named Rose, even if she was a sentimental idiot.
It was then that Mrs. Hudson announced she was going to see her sister the next afternoon, and could I please take over for the day?
"But tomorrow's Thursday." John said blankly. "We go to the graveyard on Thursdays."
They had, the past three weeks, gone to the graveyard each Thursday and Monday. I'd gone twice myself.
"Rose can go with you."
So that's how I ended up going to the graveyard with just John for the first time.
Standing on an empty grave with a grief stricken man when I knew the person supposed to be six feet beneath me was actually roaming the streets of Cairo… Not exactly my first choice of ways to spend a lazy afternoon.
"Shite," Was the first word of John's mouth.
I had to agree, even if such vulgar language was beneath me. Not only was the word fraud spray painted in huge all-capital letters across the tombstone, but the journalists were on the scene.
Upon seeing us, one of them bounded over and shoved a recorder under John's nose. "Dr. Watson! What do you have to say in response to this instance of vandalism?"
"Doctor, get back in the cab." I ordered.
"Rosabel—"
"Please, John!"
He obeyed. I must've sounded like Sherlock because that's the only time he ever obeys my orders.
"Who might you be?"
"Are you the mystery girl who's been accompanying John Watson to the grave the past two weeks?"
"What's your name?"
"Why are you grieving for Sherlock Holmes?"
"Do you believe he's a fraud?"
What would Mrs. Hudson expect me to do? This was never covered in all of her little lessons…I scanned the journalists and allowed a smirk to show across my face as I realised it had been. There's more to running a household than welcoming guests and keeping it clean. You have to take care of people in the household.
Mrs. Hudson had refused to take my money in return for this (though my father assured me she'd be paid indirectly), and I realised in that moment that this was the best way to repay her, better than all the money in England.
"I know he's not a fraud."
"If he's not a fraud, why did he commit suicide?"
"I would imagine Moriarty reminded him he had nothing left to live for. The city and people he dedicated his life to—solving crimes for Scotland Yard without so much as minimum wage, taking murderers off the streets—had turned on him on the word of his enemy. His only friends were bound to be outcasts at the hands of heartless jackals like you.
"One week you were singing his praises and an interview from a jaded amateur journalist is enough to make you back up his worst enemy as the victim. I would jump off a building too, if I were surrounded by idiots like you."
They were brave (brave is by far the kindest word for stupid, isn't it?), I had to give them that; rather than back off, they tried to get me to trip up on myself.
"Why do you consider yourself such an expert on Sherlock Holmes?"
"Because much like Sherlock, I'm invariably smarter than most of London."
"What makes you so sure you're smarter than us?" Another replied sharply.
Oh, this was going to be fun. "Does your wife know you're sleeping with your male assistant?
"And you, it must be so pathetic, living alone with four cats and shagging your boss.
"And you faked your credentials from college, so you might as well stop sniggering at this sod and his gunsel.
"By the way, can I borrow your phone? I want to call NSY and inform them that she painted this herself knowing John would come here today, hoping to get a good scoop.
"Oh, sweetie, running won't stop you from being arrested for vandalism; I can just track you based on the fact that you work for The Sun and your car is in the shop."
There was a long pause, and then one of the guys who hadn't been deduced yet turned to his camera man. "Please tell me you got all that." He whispered.
"And you're colour-blind and knew all about the vandalism ploy, so I suggest you delete this footage. I hope you remember this, at any rate: for all the things I figured out here, I am but a mere student to the master. Uncle Sherlock taught me deductive reasoning when he came to my tenth birthday party, as a present."
I heard two footsteps and then John's hand found my shoulder and spun me around. "That was…"
"Mediocre compared to him, I know." I said. "Now get me out of here before I punch someone."
x-x-x-x-x
I was up until midnight that night, scrubbing down a marble surface with a citrus based paint stripper. I could've used a more effective one to get it done faster, but Mrs. Hudson always used eco-friendly cleaners, and I figured if I was going to clean outside I ought not to dump poisons around.
x-x-x-x-x
"Rosabel! I saw you on the news." Mrs. Hudson said by way of greeting.
I pushed my hair back. "Yeah, not my best moment for self control, but I think I understand this whole housekeeping lark."
"I run a household, Rose, I'm not a—"
"Housekeeper, right."
"I think you get it too."
x-x-x-x-x
"And you said you're not good with people!" Mrs. Hudson exclaimed when Mrs. Turner and her "married ones" left with their kids.
"Thank you, Mrs. Hudson. I think… I think even if I end up in a big mansion by myself, no matter what job I'm in, I want to have kids—I'll adopt a few high IQ orphans."
"Will you be leaving, Rose?"
"Just for a while. I have business in New Jersey."
"Come back anytime." John added.
I smiled. "I was wondering if maybe a few months from now, you might agree to tell me about being a doctor?"
"Absolutely."
