It wasn't until the next morning that John truly realised the extent of Sherlock and Kirsty's cosmetic shopping spree.

The top shelf of the bathroom cabinet, which had always been Sherlock's territory, had been crammed with hair products since John could remember. Over time though, the little bottles and tubes and sprays had begun a gradual invasion of the rest of the bathroom and, indeed, the rest of the flat, spreading and multiplying and taking over flat surfaces until John began to feel like Sherlock's hair was a third flatmate, a twirly dosser that didn't pull it's weight with the housework and left the bath drain clogged up.

Sherlock would huff and stick his nose in the air and claim that John, with his boring military haircut, couldn't possibly understand how much work it took to deal with curly hair, and always had a ready answer when John suggested that, as it was so much trouble, he could just cut it short.

Sherlock was vain though, that was the long and the short of it really. He was certainly good looking, and John had to admit that if he looked like Sherlock he may have become vain too. Life tended to be a bit easier for attractive people, from what he'd seen.

Anyway, even on the days that Sherlock spent sprawled on the sofa in his pyjamas, he didn't forgo, at the very least, a good fifteen-second-long ksssshhhhh from a large aerosol can with Cyrillic lettering on it, followed by several minutes carefully crushing and twisting his curls into place with his fingers. John had watched this process in fascination more than once, standing in the bathroom doorway as Sherlock thought out loud at him, and while somewhat impressed, he'd never been more grateful for his own well-behaved, straight hair.

By Thursday morning though, the hair product invasion of the bathroom was complete. John had to pick his way carefully through enemy strongholds of little piles of boxes and bottles all over the floor, only to reach the sink and find two hairbrushes in it, one still with a shop tag attached to its handle and sweet Christ! was it really possible to pay thirty five pounds for a hairbrush?

He opened the cabinet under the sink to find that even his very own territory, the bottom shelf, had been annexed. His poor little comb, shaving kit and toothpaste were shoved callously to one side, their personal space invaded by a large chrome hairdryer with an attachment that looked like part of an old television set on its nozzle.

Sherlock had money besides what they earned from the cases, John had always been sure of this, some sort of allowance or inheritance that kept him in designer suits and hazardous chemicals. If he wasn't careful, John was going to start insisting that the hair paid its fair share of the rent.

::

A long day at work due to another doctor being out at a conference had John feeling a bit tired and, if not actually grumpy, certainly rather less patient than usual by the time he got home. The fact that both Sherlock and Kirsty, ensconced in armchairs, went suspiciously silent the moment he walked in the door, didn't do anything to make him feel more relaxed.

"What?" he asked, eyeing them.

"John, we've been talking about your role on Saturday. Sherlock told me he hasn't actually given you much detail," Kirsty began, sounding a bit uncertain.

Sherlock snorted. "John never needs much in the way of detail. He John cut him off.

"John never gets much in the way of detail, no matter how much he'd like it. Sherlock, Kirsty's right. This is a more complicated situation than we're used to and I'm not such a natural actor as you are. It would actually be nice to know a bit more." He dropped onto the sofa and settled with his elbows on his knees, and watched Sherlock's face closely enough to see the split second of chagrin and rueful realisation there.

Message received, quite painlessly which was good.

"Go on Sherlock," Kirsty encouraged, and Sherlock nodded at her and leaned back in his chair, steepled his fingers.

"John and I will be portraying a married couple," he began, eyes sliding over to John to check he was listening with sufficient attention. "We will say married about eight years, which is roughly long enough for the relationship to have soured and for patterns of abuse to set in, not yet so long that anyone has intervened with sufficient persuasive skill to convince me to leave him. John is frustrated and dissatisfied with his career and his marriage, which has allowed his innate cruelty to come to the surface. I have low self esteem due to being bullied during adolescence for my height and pronounced Adam's apple. This has left me lacking the confidence to resist abuse and risk the harbour of my marriage."

Kirsty raised her eyebrows, though John wasn't quite sure what she was surprised at. Possibly the level of detail, which he himself had long become acclimated to.

"So, you need me to get into this...character then," he said, and Sherlock nodded thoughtfully.

"I realise it won't be easy for you John, you aren't naturally a cruel man, and I've observed you have some rather...chivalrous tendencies when it comes to women."

John couldn't help but glance towards Kirsty at that, flattered that she was nodding agreement of Sherlock's assessment of him.

"Still," Sherlock continued, "You've worked as a doctor in many contexts over the course of your career. You've surely encountered a victim of domestic abuse at some point. Possibly even the abusive party. Surely you'll be able to draw from those experiences."

And sometimes John really hated Sherlock for that prim little 'there we go, everything's sorted out' tone he sometimes spoke with. Sherlock was studying his face carefully now. Best to say it rather than let him deduce it, John decided.

"I encountered it enough of it in my family when I was a kid," he admitted.

Kirsty's face flooded with sympathy and discomfort, while Sherlock's sharpened. No, John's confession hadn't been enough to head off the deductions at all, had it.

"Not your father or mother," Sherlock stated confidently after a few seconds. "Uncle?"

John sighed and rubbed his hands over his face, then nodded. "My Dad's younger brother," he admitted. "He was awful to my auntie, didn't even try and hide it from us. The public got the benevolent act, but not family."

"And your father did nothing to put a stop to it, even though he could have."

"That's right. I was furious with him."

"You liked your aunt?"

John nodded. "I still do. She divorced him and went to live with her brother. I stayed in touch, so did Mum. Not a bad ending, I suppose. Not the worst."

Sherlock nodded, Kirsty smiled uncertainly at John, and there was silence for a moment. Then Sherlock smacked his palms down on his thighs and grinned.

"Perfect then John. You'll have plenty to draw from. I'm sure you'll make a very good abusive husband."

Kirsty and John both glared at him, but Sherlock continued.

"And people will be only too happy to be convinced, I doubt you'll even have to be that explicit about it. Despite what statistics may say, people like to believe the 'little Hitler' stereotype. A short man with a temper and a cowed spouse, and every onlooker will be cheerfully and stupidly putting two and two together to make nineteen. It'll be fine John."

"Can we not compare me to Hitler, if you don't mind," John gritted out. He thought about saying a bit more, but wasn't sure he could keep his vocabulary clean. And what did it say about him that the person he felt so strongly for was also the only one who could make him so angry with so little effort?

"It wasn't a direct comparison John, don't take offense," Sherlock said airily, and rose from his seat.

"Sherlock!" Kirsty snapped, but Sherlock was already off in the kitchen, fussing about with some of the pile of things on the table.

"It's okay," John told her. "I'm...sort of used to him."

The truth of it was, John had always been very aware of how short his own fuse was. He'd always nursed a fear of being like his Uncle Philip, or like the man he was going to be posing as at Sherlock's side. Maybe that was part of the reason for, as Sherlock put it, his chivalrous tendencies. Overcompensation, for fear of what might happen if he didn't.

He glanced up at Sherlock through the kitchen doorway; Sherlock had his back to him and both hands in a large paper bag that sat on the table, apparently fascinated by the contents.

One of John's worst moments, one of the ones that he'd remember with a cringe of shame for the rest of his life, had been the time he'd hit Sherlock. A priest/mugging victim had been one of Sherlock's more mystifying ideas for a cover, but for his own reasons he'd felt it essential enough that John would have to be goaded into hitting him. And John, tired and annoyed and having over-estimated how good he'd become at letting Sherlock's insults slide off him, had been goaded.

Goaded so far that he'd not only given Sherlock, his best friend, that very dramatic bruise-mottled cut on his cheekbone, a cut that hadn't faded for weeks, he'd also struck him again and again and even choked him! John had barely been able to believe it afterwards.

Sherlock brushed the whole mess off of course, wouldn't do to show a weakness, oh no. But the next day, long after the drugs had worn off, all the ice was gone from the freezer and Sherlock had surreptitiously squashed his sandwich flat with a side plate at lunch time, unable to open his jaw wide enough to bite into it because of the bruising, and John had watched him and felt his guts roil with shame.

God, he could barely bring himself to think about it.

Sherlock emerged from the kitchen carrying the bag, and tucked it just inside the door to his bedroom before coming back to his seat. Kirsty was glaring at him still, but he ignored her.

"We got my dress," he told John brightly. "I think you'll be impressed. And I'm going to get you a suit, I decided."

"Why?" John asked, his annoyance coming through in his voice more than he'd have liked. "I've got a perfectly good suit. Even you approved of it."

"Yes, but this is an evening event," Sherlock replied. "The suit you have is day wear. You're getting a new one. You don't have to like it."

John sighed. That said it all, didn't it. Sherlock got back to his feet and went into the kitchen, gathered up a few things, then headed off to the bathroom, presumably to claim some more territory in the cabinet. John leaned back in his seat and shook his head.

He felt Kirsty's gaze on him for a few moments, before she got up and came to sit next to him on the sofa.

"Is he always like that?" she asked worriedly.

"Yeah. He's...he's brilliant, but he has a blind spot where people's feelings are concerned."

"It didn't seem like a blind spot to me," Kirsty said softly, glancing in the direction Sherlock had gone. "It seems more like willful disregard."

"Well, I see how you could come to that conclusion, yeah..." John found he couldn't really argue, and ran his tongue over his lips before he continued. "He likes to think that it isn't important. He says he only needs to know about emotional reactions as far as they're relevant to his cases, so he...ah..."

"He's safe," Kirsty finished. "I knew a man like that once, I think."

John nodded weakly, and they sat there like that for a couple of minutes, awkward silence with their arms brushing together.

"You um..." she began after a while.

"Go on," John said, turning to look at her.

"You're bisexual, right? Sherlock said."

He nodded, too used to Sherlock telling everyone he met all about his personal life to be cross with him.

"But you...you're at peace with being attracted to other men, and to sleeping with them. But falling for one is still a bit of a shock, isn't it?"

John felt his mouth open, but no sound came out. Kirsty gave him a little, embarrassed smile and he abruptly felt quite glad that she'd turned him down.

"I...er, you're very perceptive," he told her. "You'd give Sherlock a run for his money if you turned to detecting."

And suddenly they were both sniggering, their shoulders bumping together.

"He told me about all the times he got stabbed," Kirsty blurted between the giggles. "I think I'll stick with hair dressing!"

And that was it, John was laughing out loud, gasping for breath. The whole thing was just...it was so...

"What are you doing?" Sherlock asked, reappearing holding the toilet brush.

Kirsty whooped and buried her face in John's shoulder, and John was laughing too hard to do anything other than drape one arm around her and wheeze.

Sherlock continued to stare at them until they began to calm down, then wrinkled his nose at them, which only served to set Kirsty off again.

"Oh God, I'd better go," she chuckled, getting unsteadily to her feet. "I'm meeting my Graham later and I've got to pop home and change. You two have a good evening."

John got up to open the door for her and she pecked him on the cheek as she went by, which was nice.

When he turned back to the room, Sherlock was still holding the brush aloft and staring at him.

"What was that?" he asked.

"What?"

"She kissed you!"

"Yes. Some people kiss me. Sometimes."

"Not often though."

"Oh shut up, Sherlock!"

::

I hope that nobody thinks that I am trivialising the issue of domestic abuse in this story, because I really do understand how dreadful and damaging it is and the last thing I want to do is make people feel that I'm brushing it off as unimportant by not fully exploring it.

What I am trying to do is write a light, fairly comedic story and so I've not included a lot of the angst and detail that I could have used. If this offends or upsets anyone then I am truly sorry.

Somebody asked me when in canon this story is set, and I don't think it is. I seem to have created a little alternate timeline in my head-canon where, at the end of ThoB when Moriarty is let out of his cell, he slips on a puddle of water that had dripped off Mycroft's umbrella, cracks his head on the floor and dies. So this story takes place some time after that.

I like this universe as it doesn't make me cry.