Author's Notes:
To start, I'd like to thank Totally-T3ii3 for pointing out to me that John's gun is a pistol, not a rifle (as I've been mistakenly calling it). Thanks, and I shall fix that in upcoming chapters!
Now, I'd just like to thank everybody who is reading this story and sending in reviews – they mean a lot to me, and I love getting to hear what you all think, so thanks so much and I hope you continue to enjoy!
Anthony, Chapter Three
John awoke the next morning to the sound of knocking. He raised his head from his arms-he had fallen asleep at the kitchen table. It didn't take much deducing to figure out who was knocking on his front door. Groggily, he got up and went to the foyer. He unlocked the door, opened it, and his friend was standing helplessly on his porch, a tray of coffee in hand.
"Come in, then," John told him, rolling his eyes. Sherlock stepped through the doorway and just stood there until John took his coat and hung it in the closet. He stood in front of Sherlock, eyeing him for a moment. The detective looked so ashamed, and John was ashamed too-ashamed of how he had reacted to Sherlock's best efforts at being a good friend. They were silent, and then John reached his hand out and clutched the scruff of Sherlock's neck, giving it a friendly squeeze. The two men grinned and John chuckled, and just like that they were the best of friends once again. John pulled Sherlock into the kitchen and took the coffee tray.
"You slept here all night," Sherlock stated, not needing to ask.
"Like a baby." John took the coffee with the letter 'C' on it's lid: cream, no sugar. He gave Sherlock his coffee and lifted Mary's tea out of the tray, too. "Shall I go wake her up?" he asked.
"No need." Mary was yawning as she entered the kitchen, arms stretched out above her head. John gave her the tea and turned, giving Mary and Sherlock a chance to share a knowing look. John went back to the tray, one to-go cup left.
"He's a little young for coffee."
Sherlock sat down at the table, in his usual chair. "It's hot chocolate," he justified.
John rolled his eyes. "Hold on a second." John left his coffee on the table and went out of the room. He could be heard running up the stairs, and a few minutes later he re-entered. Behind him, a groggy Anthony was tip-toeing into the kitchen, and he pulled himself up into a seat opposite Sherlock. He had a determinedly exhausted look on his face, and when John placed his hot chocolate on the table he simply glared at it bewildered. He still hadn't noticed the presence of his Godfather in the room. Sherlock, at a loss for what to do, reached over to the cup and opened the lid for Anthony, who finally looked up at the what the strange hand was attached to. He eyed Sherlock for at least a minute before his confused scowl became a grin, and he leaped from his seat to run around the table and jump on the detective. Sherlock joyfully pulled him up onto his lap and held the three-year old, eventually fetching him his hot chocolate and allowing Anthony to use him as a seat as they drank together.
John sat down opposite the pair, Mary joining him to his right. "See?" she prodded, playfully. "He knows exactly who you are."
"Sherly!" Anthony cheered, spilling some of his drink as raised his arms in celebration. Sherlock grabbed a tea towel from the oven rack near him, wiping the spill. John always noticed that while Sherlock never cleaned up his own mess, he was always more than willing to tidy up after Anthony. He made a mental note of taking his son to 221B sometime.
"Anthony," Sherlock began with a mildly scolding tone, "My name is pronounced Sherlock. Not Sherly."
"Sherly!" Anthony shouted again, as ecstatic as before. Sherlock rolled his eyes, but he spent the rest of the morning with the Watson family, drinking coffee and tea and testing out all of the skills Anthony had learned during his year away. Just before Mary was about to take Anthony to bed, Sherlock stopped her, going to his coat pocket and pulling out another tiny box, exquisitely wrapped once again. This year, Anthony was old enough to open it himself. He ripped off the lovely wrapping paper in true toddler-fashion, and there in the box was a bronze key, slightly larger than the last. He helped Anthony add it to the chain of the first one, leaving him with a necklace of two different keys.
"He still hasn't figured out the last one," John reminded Sherlock as he was leaving that evening.
One side of Sherlock's lip twitched upward. "Of course not."
Throughout the coming months, Sherlock visited the house as often as he'd used to, teaching Anthony lessons, chatting with the family and taking John out on the (very) occasional adventure. Anthony would often draw pictures for Sherlock, and John would occasionally wonder what Sherlock did with them. When Anthony was dangerously close to four-years old, John went out for a night of drinking with Sherlock, Lestrade, and some of Lestrade's friends from the Yard. Sherlock (who himself was exceptionally inebriated, for Sherlock) refused to let John drive home that night, insisting that he stay at his apartment that night. John called Mary (he doesn't remember what he said, only the sound of her laughing at him on the other end) and slept on the couch, his old bedroom having been turned into a second lab (the kitchen, of course, was the first lab).
When John woke up the next morning, he had to trudge through the apartment's mess in order to get through the kitchen into the coffee cabinet. He opened the familiar cabinet and pulled out the closest coffee tin. It seemed light, so John assumed it was nearly empty, but when he opened the can he saw that there was no coffee mix inside of it at all. Inside the tin was every picture Anthony had ever given Sherlock. Little sketches of stick people, drawings of animals and lists of the numbers Anthony had learned from Sherlock. There was even a piece of paper with a list of alphabet letters and a picture to correspond with each letter (which Anthony's pre-school teachers had helped him complete, but the toddler was so proud of himself for drawing the stripes on the Zebra himself). He sifted through the collection, his heart melting, but when he heard Sherlock's bedroom door opening, he swiftly closed the tin and shoved it back into the cupboard, retrieving the second closest coffee jar. Sherlock strode into the room fully dressed, looking wide awake and not at all as hung-over as John felt.
"You look terrible," he told John, who couldn't keep himself from grinning despite the insult.
"Good deduction."
Sherlock was so apologetic when he missed Anthony's fourth birthday party for a case that he showed up the next day with an adult sized birthday cake and a present much larger than the ones before it, about the size of a large Oxford dictionary. John wondered if it was, in fact, a dictionary. John, Mary and Sherlock gathered on the floor of the living room around Anthony as Sherlock presented the gift to him.
"Thank you, Sherly!" Anthony cried (to Mary's delight) before tearing the gift wrap to pieces and discovering that the box underneath was the gift itself: a shiny, wooden black chest with a brass keyhole. Anthony reached into the front of his shirt and pulled out his key necklace.
"Good, Anthony," Sherlock praised him. "Now: which key do you think goes with this safe?" Anthony pointed his right index finger to the brass key, and Sherlock nodded approvingly. Anthony smartly removed the necklace from his body and twisted the brass key into the brass lock, as Sherlock had taught him. He opened the safe. It was filled with parchment paper, every piece footnoted with Anthony's full name (Anthony Jonathan Watson) and a space for the date. There was also a set of differently coloured markers.
"This is for you, Anthony, so that when you learn something new, or find something important, you can use this special paper to draw, or, when you're able, write what you've discovered. That way you'll never forget it," Sherlock explained. John nearly scoffed, reminded of Sherlock's mind palaces, but he couldn't help feeling touched by the thoughtful gift. "It's all for you, and only you have the key to open it when you want to look back on everything you've learned."
"It's your special safe-keeping box," Mary offered, and Sherlock nodded, accepting her more child-friendly explanation with a small smile.
Anthony gently looked through his gift, naming every colour of marker as he observed it. He stood and approached the kneeling Sherlock.
"Thank you, Uncle Sherly," he said again, this time with the precocious sincerity that only a four-year old could have. He wrapped his arms around Sherlock's neck, and the man rubbed the boy's light, curly hair. John thought he was mad when he heard Sherlock give a tiny sniffle, but it couldn't be. He must have imagined it.
Anthony began Primary school a few months after his birthday, and all of his teachers said he was doing brilliantly. John loved coming home to find his son in the living room doing his homework. John helped with math, and Mary was the one who helped with letters and the alphabet. Sherlock still came over, of course, and sometimes John thought he could see a tinge of jealousy every time Anthony would tell him that his parents had already assisted him in finishing his take-home assignments, but the disappointment would end with whatever project of his own Sherlock had brought to teach Anthony.
While Anthony was learning to read and write in school, Sherlock was teaching him about the stains in his shirts and where they came from, or which accents came from different parts of England. Anthony learned subtraction from his teachers, but he learned induction from Sherlock Holmes. Anthony was completely obedient with Sherlock, only leaving his lessons when he was particularly inspired to run to his Safe-Keeping Box and draw a picture of what he had learned. Of course, John never saw any of these drawings, and neither did anyone except for Anthony, as promised.
Anthony was improving in skill every day, and while he knew a plethora of interesting and useful words, he wasn't particularly talkative. When he would talk, though, it was almost always in questions. Anthony loved asking questions, and Sherlock took no greater joy than in answering them. The two would sit for hours on end, Anthony drawing something artistic on some spare paper (he only used his Special paper if it was something really important) and asking Sherlock questions about things-about everything. Sherlock's answers were always too brilliant, too advanced, but Anthony would pretend to understand. In that way, John saw himself in his son.
When Anthony was in bed, Sherlock would sit in the house with John and Mary, and John would always find himself thrilled when his wife and his best friend would go on chatting about something or other and he could simply drink his tea and listen to two of the adults in the world that he adored best. When John first met Mary, he was only barely getting over the loss of Sherlock Holmes. He was damaged, in need of repair, and Mary had been the one to do it. She saved his heart, rebuilding it and filling all the empty spaces. It wasn't until they were picking their wedding parties that John had considered the possibility of Sherlock meeting her, but at the time the idea was preposterious, since there was no Sherlock. Greg Lestrade had graciously stepped in as a Best Man to Molly's Maid of Honour, and Harry had acted as his groomsman so Mary could include her own sister in the wedding. It was a lovely wedding, but up until the ceremony John still wished that Sherlock would come trampling into the Hall, dressed in a tuxedo and ready to take over for Greg at the last minute. His wishes were forgotten as soon as he saw his wife coming down the aisle in her white dress, and he didn't think about Sherlock as much until they were at the hospital, seven months into Mary's pregnancy. He thought about how Sherlock would feel about him becoming a father, and how he would feel about the coming child. Mostly, though, and perhaps only because Mary was someone John knew (unlike the unborn baby inside her), he wondered how Sherlock would like Mary, and how they would get along.
"Besides, it's not as if you're such a stranger to the tabloids yourself, Mr. Holmes! Or should I say, Mr. Deerstalker."
"That damn hat has been the hindering of my entire career!"
John grinned like an idiot as he listened to the mock-banter, the same kind he often had with each of them. Oh yes, he thought, they like each other just fine.
Anthony's fifth birthday was the first Sherlock was able to attend since he turned one-year old, but back then their bond hadn't formed to be what it was with Anthony at five-years old. John and Mary threw him a party with his friends from pre-school, and the Watson backyard was filled with parents and children. Sherlock arrived an hour into the afternoon party with a nervous look on his face.
"Jeffrey will finally be starting Primary school this year..." Mr. Downey was telling John on the other side of the yard. John politely excused himself and crossed the grass to where Sherlock was stalking. Sherlock didn't even notice him until he placed a hand on his shoulder. He practically jumped at the touch.
"What is it?" John demanded, praying there wasn't any bad news. Sherlock brought a hand to his mouth. He looked as though he had just seen a ghost. "Sherlock?" John prodded, now frightened himself.
Sherlock was breathing too heavily when he spoke. "It's alright. Enjoy the party."
"No." John knew better than to accept that. "Come inside, let's have a chat-"
"We will later!" Sherlock hissed, and then he forced himself to be calm. "I swear." Sherlock pretended to be fine for Anthony's sake, and when it was time to open presents, he gave him a magnificently detailed map of London that was meant to be pasted onto his bedroom ceiling. John allowed himself to stop worrying for a moment as he went through Sherlock's previous gifts to Anthony, trying to solve the puzzle of them: it was, after all, a puzzle, in true Sherlockian fashion.
That night, after all of the guests had left, Anthony refused to fall asleep until John had fascined his new map to the ceiling of his room, a request to which John only agreed because it was his son's birthday. Anthony fell asleep on the floor next to his bed while John and Sherlock stood on chairs, fighting with the huge piece of wallpaper above them. John saw this as his chance to interrogate Sherlock.
"I over-reacted," Sherlock interrupted him before he could begin any questioning.
"That's bull-" John glanced at his sleeping son and bit his tongue before continuing, "-You said you'd tell me what was up. You promised."
"Alright. I do have something to tell you, but I don't know that I should." He was being just as vague as he was at the party.
"Since when do we keep secrets from each other?" John asked sarcastically.
"I just...don't know that it's my place to say anything..."
"Sherlock!"
Sherlock struggled with a staple gun and a corner piece as he spoke. "It's not what you think. It has nothing to do with Moriarty or Anthony or anyone."
"Who does it have to do with, then? Mary?" John was joking, until he saw Sherlock's face grow a little too still. "Christ, Sherlock!" John stepped off of his chair, having fixed enough of his side of the mall to the ceiling for it to stay there a moment. Sherlock kept working on his corner. "What is it? Who's after my wife?"
"No one is after her,John. She's...she's perfectly safe."
John's arms spasmed into the air before he grabbed Sherlock by his waist and pulled him down to the floor. Anthony stirred, but didn't wake up. John held onto Sherlock's collar aggressively, muttering in mere segments. "What? Is wrong? With my wife?"
"Nothing!" Sherlock insisted, now seeming as nervous as he had been before.
John began to shake Sherlock. "What aren't you telling me! WHAT'S WRONG WITH MY WIFE!"
"NOTHING!" Sherlock yelled this time. And then: "She's pregnant!"
John dropped Sherlock instantly. Sherlock was inhaling and exhaling quickly, and John would have worried about him hyperventilating if he wasn't starting to himself. He backed up until he hit the bedroom wall, and his knees gave out as he crouched down against it, leaning his head back. Sherlock stumbled over to him. "It's okay," he insisted. "Just keep breathing...well, maybe a little slower than that..."
"How do you know?" John demanded. "Did she tell you?"
"No...but she's gained weight."
John's breathing did slow. "That doesn't mean anything!" he complained.
"Yes. It's not the gain, it's the placement of the weight. You know, in her hips and br-"
"Shut up. Shut up now." John didn't need to know exactly where Sherlock had been observing his wife. "You're sure?" he finally asked, settling down.
"Is he ever not?" Mary was standing in the doorway, wearing her nightgown, peering in at the two men against the wall. John eyed her, trying to see what Sherlock had been referring to.
"Well? Are you?"
"Would that be bad?"
John gaped. "What? No! God, no!" And all of a sudden, a wall of clarity fell upon him.
Actually, it wasn't a wall of clarity. It was a ceiling map of London, and it landed on his head. Mary watched as the map covered three of her favourite boys in the world and started laughing, softly at first, but growing into hysteria as the men under the paper joined in, and the three adults went on and on laughing until they had fought their way out to the hallway, Sherlock carrying the (somehow) still sleeping Anthony in his arms. John grasped Mary around the waist and kissed her square on the lips, having realized just how wonderful it was to have such a beautiful wife, a brilliant boy and the blessing of another child on the way. He turned to Sherlock.
"So, that was it? The big scary news?"
"I didn't know if it was proper to mention a woman's...state...before she herself deemed it appropriate."
Mary giggled. "Well, I've still got to see the doctor and make sure. But I think he makes house calls."
"Oh no, you definitely are. I'm quite certain of it now," Sherlock insisted, and John was quite certain that his wife wasn't wearing anything under her nighty. He gave his friend an offended look, but Sherlock's naivety was too clear and he let himself chuckle as he looked back into the bedroom and the mess they had made.
"Looks like Anthony's sleeping in our bed tonight," he decided, not wanting to clean up until morning. Sherlock gladly handed the birthday boy over to his father and congratulated Mary before leaving the Watson home. The next morning, when John brought Anthony into his room to start fixing up, the ceiling was plastered with a shiny, brilliant map of London framed with little glow-in-the-dark stars, and there was a cold breeze coming in from the open window.
