"Holmes! I swear...!" Sera bellowed as she stomped through the flat. "Come here this instant!"
Holmes ducked out of a door she had just passed and said innocently, "Yes, Satan?"
Sera turned livid eyes on him. "Why is my room broken into?" She had taken to locking the room whenever she left it, in deference to her predecessor's warnings.
"Whatever do you mean?" he asked, casually putting more of the door between them.
"There are lockpick marks around the keyhole. I assume you were drunk when you perpetrated this attempt on my sanity?"
"How do you know what lockpick marks look like?" he said, sliding under the accusations.
"Stop avoiding the question. None of your business," she shot back, throwing up her chin. "Why did you do it?"
"I do not 'perpetrate', I investigate. I was in search of suspicious substances. I have reason to believe you are drugging my tea and food." He regretted to mention that he had been drunk on the previous occasion of picking the lock, when he had slipped a mouse into dear old Nanny's underclothes drawer.
Sera scoffed. "And what is your evidence?"
"I am sleeping too much, which cuts back my best pondering time drastically, and I find myself unable to focus." The latter part of the statement was a thinly avoided admittance that she was constantly invading his thoughts. It made him more than a little ill-tempered at her. He stepped from behind the door.
"Oh, boo-hoo, you can't play your violin before the rooster and you can't work on you elephant pistol. Do you have a hankie?"
"Madam, your subtle herbage in interfering with my work."
"Holmes, this is the world's smallest violin, and it's playing just for you." She rubbed two of her fingers together. "And this is the orchestra." She rubbed more fingers together.
His eyes narrowed. "See here, witch..."
"What is going on here?" asked Watson irritably, rounding the corner.
The two arguers pointed at each other simultaneously and said, "He/she started it!" What followed was a rabble of each trying to explain their point in increasingly louder voices.
"I don't care who started it, I'm finishing it!" yelled Watson. "Look at you two, acting like children! At the very least argue reasonably like adults."
The detective and the landlady looked somewhat shamed, but nonetheless sulky.
"I have a leeching scheduled in thirty minutes, and the patient must be calm and I must be undisturbed if the treatment is to be successful. Are we clear?"
"Crystal," replied Sera, sneaking a glare at Holmes.
"Transparently," agreed Holmes, glaring back. Once Watson had turned away, he mouthed, "This isn't over."
"No, indeed," Sera whispered back.
"I know you're drugging me."
"I know you're insane."
"Shall we settle this as mature individuals?"
"Yes, let's."
He gestured grandly but tightly for her to enter his room and shut the door behind her. She turned around, arms folded, looking more hurt now than mad.
"Sherlock, I thought we had put this sort of nonsense behind us. I am not a witch. I have no dealings with the devil-"
"Save for adopting his likeness on occasion."
"-and I am no different than Doctor Watson, though my methods for curing are more natural. You know I do not harm with my knowledge."
"Causing sleep is not harmful," he said, catching her loophole. "I just want to know if you're doing it."
"I am not putting anything foreign in your body. I promise." She turned sincere eyes to his face, looking like a kicked puppy. "I don't know why insomnia has fled you." Or why you would want it to begin with, she added silently. He is so weird!
"Speaking of foreign, I would like to take a moment to formally request a list of the places you have traveled. You aren't dropping nearly enough clues, and my patience wears thin."
She narrowed her eyes. "Never. It does not concern you, and it means little to me that your prying nature is unsatisfied." She was a little surprised at his forwardness, though.
"Au contraire, mademoiselle," he said. He stepped closer and leaned down a bit, his face a mere six inches from her own. "You see," he continued in the same voice, "It is driving me rather insane."
She had to agree, he looked haunted by the not knowing. His hair was streaked with ashes (the reason why escaped her), his eyes staring with a hint of desperation, and his lean boxer's body so close she could feel the heat from it. But she wasn't afraid of his proximity: in fact, she had a shaky feeling in her legs that was not fear, but something else. Like her heart had fallen through a hole in her stomach.
Sera had a hard time forming words around the excited beating of her heart. "My past is mine to share," she said, a hint of - that something - lacing her voice. She turned her head to the side, so she did not have to see his serious eyes, but then rematched them with her own bold, green ones. "You have to earn my trust, for it is not easily given."
The minute they held their staring contest masqueraded as an hour. Finally, he stepped back. Sera let out the breath she had been holding. So soon, too soon the air between them was back to normal. Had that even happened?
"Well," sighed Holmes awkwardly, the last of his irk leaving him. He rubbed the back of his neck. "I suppose my tactics were a bit uncalled for. I apologize for entering your room without your permission."
"And for smelling my nightclothes."
His eyes bugged out almost comically at that, in his trying-to-control-the-shock sort of way. He opened his mouth to ask how she knew.
She tsked, shook her head, and gave a sly smile. "Now now, resident pervert: I can't give away all my secrets, can I?" She strode to the door and paused to look over her shoulder. "You apologized," she said softly, with quiet wonder. "Thank you."
As the door clicked back, Holmes whispered unbidden, "You're welcome." And then he was left in his empty rooms to wonder what was wrong with him.
A couple of days later, Sera knocked on Holmes's door and asked him for a hammer and nails.
"Whatever for?" he asked.
"I found some scrap wood and I want to make a window box."
"And what makes you think I would have said items?"
"You have everything in this house that is not useful on a regular basis."
Holmes was inclined to nod. "Excuse the stench," he said, motioning her in.
"What stench?" She asked, hand to her nose.
"Ammonia. I am preserving a fetal pig."
"Disgusting!" She covered her eyes with both hands. "I don't want to see that. Just find the tools and I'll leave. Quickly," she added impatiently.
She heard him chuckle. "I am only joking. There is no pig, only this infernal smell that I cannot seem to get rid of, nor find the source of." He took one of her fingers laced tightly over her eyes and peeled it back gently. "See? Your weak constitution is safe."
She sniffed. "It actually smells nice in here, for once."
"Says the woman whose hobby is scented things. Albeit a secret hobby."
"Funny," she said sarcastically. "It smells like lavender and chamomile and..." she trailed off and her eyes got wide.
"Care to enlighten me?" Holmes asked archly.
"You're going to hate me for this," she fretted.
"If it's that good, you must tell me."
She pointed at the floor. "See that vent?"
"What about it?" asked Holmes, crouching beside the vent.
"It goes from my room to yours."
"So that means..."
"The candles I light to fragrance my room float to yours." She chewed her lip guiltily. "It also explains why you have been falling asleep so easily."
Holmes stared at the vent, then began to laugh. "You're telling me that a simple candle and some woman's perfume have been influencing my sleep habits?"
"Yes," Sera replied. "They are rather powerful, like anything I make. I'm so sorry! I won't burn the thing anymore."
"Seraphima," he sighed, straightening. She flinched at his use of her full name, more in surprise than anything else. "I am not angry," he continued. "Give me more credit than that."
"But in a way I was drugging you," she said.
"Hmm...yes, the unwitting alterations to my biological functions must cease, but all in all, no harm done," he assured. "If you try to repeat this, I will deny it fervently. I sort of enjoyed sleeping. Would you be willing to lend me one of those candles?"
A minute later she exited the room with the hammer and nails, wondering what was happening to Holmes to change him so much. First apologizing, and now wanting to sleep at normal hours? Preposterous!
Surely something was changing him. But what?
She dared to think it: did it have anything to do with her?