Disclaimer: I still don't own anything.

Chapter four: Conversations

"Sherlock! Psst!"

Both of them turned to see Lydia at the bottom of the stairs, following them. She waved to Sherlock to stop and hurried up after them.

"Oh, my dear," she cried softly as she neared Sherlock, holding out her hands towards him. "My little love, can you ever forgive me? I am so, so sorry."
Her big blue eyes were bright with tears, and her flushed face bespoke her agitation. Sherlock took her hands and squeezed them.

"Of course I can forgive you." he assured with a slight grimace at his aunt's words. "Anything. You know that."

Others, such as Aunt Beryl, called Lydia a "fribble," and Sherlock had often enough bemoaned his aunt's vague, haphazard ways, but there was no one with a warmer heart and Sherlock knew it.

"Thank you. You don't know how that relieves me. I was worried that you would hate me."

"I could never hate you." Sherlock took her arm and led her down to his bedroom, John following behind them. "But I don't understand what is going on. Why did you say he was my husband?"

They reached the door of Sherlock's bedroom and walked inside. A small fire burned in the fireplace, and a lamp was lit, giving the room a soft golden glow.

"It was terribly bad of me," Lydia caught her lower lip between her teeth, "If I had only thought about it, I would have realised it might cause trouble. But I simply could not stand it anymore. You know how Beryl is."

"Well, I don't," John put in bluntly. "My good woman, what are you talking about?"

"Why, the reason I said you were Sherlock's husband. It was because of Beryl. She was driving me quite mad- all those sly digs and innuendos. She was convinced from the start that it was folderol, though how she could tell, I'm sure I don't know. Your letters sounded so convincing that sometimes even I thought that you really had gotten engaged."

At the moment John looked as if he had been smacked on the head with a brick. So someone besides Mother Holmes and Mycroft knew about the whole affair, but he kept silent as the woman went on.

"But she would make remarks in that insinuating voice of hers- You know what I mean. So vastly irritating. Your uncle Varian always used to say he wanted to pinch her lips shut whenever she began to talk that way."

"Yes, Aunt," Sherlock said, trying to bring her back on track. "But what happened this time?"

"She kept saying why you were so vague about your wedding plans. She said it didn't sound natural for a soon to be married person. And I can quite understand why you wouldn't think of putting things like that in your letters, my love, since you have no interest in marrying. I should have thought of it, for that is exactly how I was when Varian and I were engaged, always talking about my dress and flowers and-"

"Mrs. Elliot..." John reminded her flatly.

"Oh. Well, one day she said, in that silly jesting way of hers, right there in front of the Holmes'- I am positive she meant to do it that way- that she thought you had made the whole thing up, although I'm certain that's what she wished to say, for she knows that the Holmes won't listen to her speak an ill word about you. That is why she always couches her statements in that pseudo-laughing way. But she said that she thought you must be getting cold feet, and she reminded him how you had always been so set against marriage. 'So unnatural in a man that age.'" Lydia imitated her in-law's drawn-out vowels and nasal tone to perfection, even adding the way Aunt Beryl had of lifting her chin and stroking down her throat.

Sherlock had to chuckle. "So you, of course, decided to tell her that I had already married."

"I didn't mean to. But she was looking at me in that way, you know, and I opened my mouth and somehow it just came out. I told her that I had got a letter from you, and that you and your Mr. Lassiter had gotten married two weeks ago."

Sherlock let out a low groan.
"I'm sorry Sherlock, but once I'd done it, what could I do? I didn't think it would do any harm. And it was so pleasant to see Beryl sitting there with her mouth opening and closing." She paused, then added, a trifle resentfully, "I never dreamed you would actually bring a man with you. I thought you would arrive by yourself, with some excuse why Mr. Lassiter could not come. And since we would only be talking about him, what difference would it make whether he was your fiancé or husband?"

"Of course," John agreed. "A mere trifle."

Lydia smiled at him, pleased by his understanding, and said, "Exactly. I am so glad to hear you say so." She turned to Sherlock. "Where did you find him? I don't understand how you managed to come up with him."

"I paid him." Sherlock told her bluntly and let out an indignant yelp as John pinched his side in response.

Lydia's eyes widened, obviously believing the joke. "You mean you can buy a husband?"

"Actually, he only bought a fiancé," John stuck in, struggling to keep a straight face. "Now that I am a husband, perhaps I should charge more. What do you think, Sherlock?"

"Frankly, I can see your point, John. It's true that I have purchased a husband, but let's not forget that it will also require you to fulfil some of the husbandly responsibilities..."

The pair of them kept this on, until Aunt Lydia's eyes couldn't have got any larger and her mouth was almost reaching the floor. Soon they took pity on the woman, who looked about to have a heart attack and revealed that they were, in fact, good( best) friends and had known each other for quite a while. Of course Aunt Lydia was immensely relieved to learn that his dear Sherlock had not indulged himself into the whole pretending business with some strange man, God knew from where, but she was still rather cross that the two of them had tried to fool her.

("But Aunt Lydia, I think this is precisely the time for humour." He turned back to his aunt. "I didn't mean it quite like that...The truth is that I only paid him to pretend to be my fiancé."

"Sherlock!"

"See? John's nothing but acting his part. And very splendidly I might say.")

Soon with a short good night, Aunt Lydia made her way out of Sherlock's bedroom and for the first time since they had entered the room, John became aware of it-the soft light, the intimate setting... the large, postered bed that dominated the room. He swallowed hard before a deep rumbling chuckle made him turn away in the direction of the window where his friend was positioned.

"Don't worry, John." Sherlock said, a teasing smile, playing on his lips. "I give you my word that I will not seduce you or force you, if that's what's bothering you."

John rolled his eyes, but grinned in response. "Very thoughtful of you, but what will you- I mean, where will we sleep?"

"You will take the bed obviously." he said and held up a hand at John's attempt to protest. "Bad shoulder remember? I'll take the couch."

John agreed eventually and stared vacantly at the glistening fire from the fireplace while the detective resumed to investigate out of the window.

"So how are we gonna continue this?" the good doctor asked after a while, effectively catching the other's attention. "Are we gonna stick to plain lies or something?"

"Ordinary is the most believable," Sherlock pointed out. "Not to mention the easiest. Why don't we tell them that we were in love, but you were promised to another and then this fictitious girl broke it off, and you and I were free to marry? Because of my grandfather, we decided to get married without delay, knowing how it would please him."

"Alright." John nodded and turned away, hoping that they would wrap it in for the night as he was feeling rather tired after all of the anthem that took place that day. Obviously his friend had other plans.

"John." he called weakly, a strange hesitance showing in his gaze. "I-I didn't mean to cause you any trouble... I had no idea that Lydia would so profoundly slip up. If only I had known about it sooner... I would never expect you to..."

"Hey, stop right there." John said quickly, walking back to the detective. "If you think that I am blaming you or am angry with you, then you're an even bigger idiot than I have originally thought. You may be paying me money, and it may be your idiotic little story that we're playing out here..." he dropped his teasing matter as soon as he noticed the unusually pained expression on Sherlock's face. "But I am in this thing, like it or not, and as long as I am, I plan to make sure that it goes as smoothly and cleanly as possible."

Sherlock drew in his breath sharply, but John put his hand over his lips.

"No. Hear me out. If you have any sense at all, which is something I rather doubt about your aunt Lydia, then you saw tonight that Mrs. Elliot did not believe your story. I am undecided about the dandy and the other two men- though I cannot believe that anyone could be quite as foolish as that poet fellow..." he said with a grimace and Sherlock smiled against the palm of John's hand still pressed firmly against his mouth. The good doctor, as if only noticing the location of his hand, drew it away quickly and cleared his throat, before going on.

"The important thing is that your aunt does not believe you. And unless I am gravely in error, she would like nothing more than to prove to your grandfather that you are lying. So it is up to us to make sure that she doesn't have an opportunity to do so."

Sherlock's expression remained mostly unreadable, but there was something warm and undeniably grateful in the way he kept gazing at his shorter friend, which had John feeling remarkably chuffed.

"Aunt Lydia is not a bad woman." the detective said after a while, changing the theme.

"I'm sure she's a wonderful woman," John replied disinterestedly. "She is also feather headed."

"You don't even know her." Sherlock challenged, raising an elegant brow at him.

"One doesn't need to know her. It's obvious. Only a nincompoop would have told Mrs. Elliot you were married, knowing that you weren't even really engaged."

"I thought it was really clever of her to give us that hint, though, when we first came in the drawing room."

"It would have been more clever to have waylaid you before you reached the room and told you the whole of it. At least that way you wouldn't have looked like a landed trout when she called me your husband."

"You are the most insulting man I have ever met, John. You know that?"

"No doubt. But that has nothing to do with what we're talking about."

"It certainly does. I don't want Aunt Beryl to think that I actually married someone as boorish as you."

"Tell her I have lots of money. That always makes up for a great deal of boorishness. Besides, just think how pleasant it will be when you can tell everyone that I have died."

"Perhaps we could arrange an accident tomorrow," Sherlock said pointedly and John couldn't help it anymore. He laughed and a smile flashed briefly across the detective's face.

Sherlock turned away. He went to the window and pushed aside the drapes, gazing down into the moon-washed garden below. "How can you do this?" he asked slowly. "How can you pretend to be married when you have such a view of women?"

John was silent for a moment, then said. "Well, you're my friend...and that's what friends do. Help each other out..."

"I don't mean why did you agree. I meant, how could it be possible for you to act like a married man, feeling as you do?"

He looked into Sherlock's eyes and there was a long silence. "I can remember." His voice was hoarse, and he cleared his throat. "I can remember the fool I was before..." Before your infatuating self has bloody well came back from the dead, before my only anchor was Mary...my sweet, lovely Mary, before everything wasn't so bloody messed up.

Something about his voice sent a sympathetic pain through Sherlock's chest, but he decided not to comment on the tense his friend had used or what that could possibly mean.

"You must love her very much." he said instead, their conversation breaking off there for the night.

AN: I decided to end the chapter here, not only because I'm an evil person, but also I decided to try out something called 'character building'. A grand thank you to every one who's sticking around this fic(I'm reading all of your reviews and am very thankful for them even if sometimes I don't have time/forget to reply.) and so sorry for the delay, I've been awfully busy as of lately. Hopefully I'll be able to update more frequently from now on. Thank you.