Chapter 37

Disclaimer: I don't own Sherlock or anything.

Author's note: Please review! Thank you! A bit of a time jump here, hope you enjoy!

In his eighth year of school Hamish reached the grand age of thirteen. Just before Christmas he's stopped seeing his physiotherapist and was pretty much able to walk, grip and talk as he did before the injury. Sherlock and John were very proud of him for working so hard on regaining his movement. And they were also very relieved to have gotten their days back. Looking after Hamish at school had impacted on both of their working lives, but they didn't mind-Hamish came first.

Sherlock and John were beginning to notice subtle changes in their son as he slowly made his way towards hitting puberty. His moods were a little more unpredictable, he seemed to get a little lazier (which wasn't too bad because he'd been a very active child), and he was growing more. John had to take him to buy a new pair of shoes twice in a month because they got too small.

He was now as tall as John's shoulder and Sherlock's chest, something he was enjoying very much as he paraded around the house, reaching the cupboards now.

Sherlock and John both knew that physically Hamish had been going through body changes since he was twelve, as they had to assist him in changing due to his grip difficulties, but there weren't any big changes.

Half way through the school year John came home to Hamish sat on the armchair with a laptop on his lap.

"Nice day?" John asked, Hamish was usually home first if Sherlock had a case.

"Mhmm." Hamish nodded, obviously not paying attention much.

He was getting thinner, John noted. It wasn't like he didn't eat-Hamish usually snuck extra portions of food! But he was thinning out and becoming quite like Sherlock in his stance, thin and straight backed, though not tall enough to loom as Sherlock did. Hamish had had a haircut recently too, a cut similar to John's. The wavy hair was undetectable with his short blonde hair and people always commented on how Hamish had "John's hair".

Hamish was becoming a rather handsome teenager, with Sherlock's small ears, Sherlock's nose, the keen grey eyes, John's care-free grin and rather chiselled face shape and jaw line. But he seemed clumsier than ever recently, like he didn't quite know how to work his long limbs.

"What are you looking at?" John asked as he unpacked his satchel that he took to work.

"Nothing." Hamish stated quickly which made John frown but he didn't push any further.

Once Sherlock got home and Hamish put his headphones in and went to his room (he was loving his iPhone that he'd got for his birthday), John approached his husband.

"Sherlock, Hamish was… odd today." John said.

"How so?" Sherlock asked.

"He was on his laptop, I asked what he was doing and he was quite quick to say 'nothing'." John explained.

"Hmm…" Sherlock pondered the thought and said "We'll have a little investigation later."

John nodded.

"Dad?" Hamish called loudly from in his room.

"Yes?" John shouted up.

"When's dinner?" Hamish shouted.

"Ask your Pa." John smirked and Sherlock was about to make an indignant response when John just raised his eyesbrows questioningly and Sherlock sighed "Forty five minutes!" Sherlock shouted.

"Ugh! That's ages away!" Hamish complained.

"Patience is a virtue." John shouted up to Hamish's room.

At dinner Hamish was quiet.

"Are you alright?" Sherlock asked.

"Fine." Hamish stabbed a potato with his fork and didn't eat it.

"You're clearly not, what is bothering you?" John asked.

"I… am I… normal?" Hamish asked.

"In what respect?" Sherlock asked.

"…Physically. Like… I'm changing." Hamish said, blushing already.

"Ah." John understood what he was going on about having been through Hamish's exact trouble when he was the same age.

"Hamish, you are a brilliant biologist and chemist, you are aware of puberty." Sherlock said, frowning.

"I know, I just… never mind." Hamish sighed and shook his head.

"It's alright, Hamish. It's normal to feel a little confused and anxious when you're changing during puberty. Everyone does, I did-"Sherlock cut John off.

"I didn't. I read books on the subject and was aware that I was changing correctly through the stages of puberty."

"Well, you were luckily very logical, but sometimes feelings can cloud logic." John said "Most people get a little anxious during physical changes-your body goes from looking like one thing to another, we all know our own bodies better than anyone, and to see it change, sometimes quite quickly, is unnerving. You may know about puberty, but it's rarely not confusing and scary. It's fine, I'm sure you're progressing well."

"What if I'm not?" Hamish asked, biting his lip nervously.

"I walked in on you when you were taking a shower and singing some ridiculous new song that keeps being repeated on the radio. You're physically normal, Hamish." Sherlock reassured his son.

"That was so embarrassing. Can you get a lock on the bathroom door, please?" Hamish asked.

"If you want a lock we can get one. But when you were three we had to get the lock removed because you kept locking yourself in the bathroom and we kept fearing you wouldn't be able to get out." John explained.

"How did I get out?" Hamish asked.

"We bribed you with chocolate." Sherlock stated.

"Cool! I was a smart little fellow!" Hamish grinned.

"Yes, smart and devious." John nodded.

Hamish relaxed against his chair and John tapped his wrist "Eat or it'll go cold."

Once Hamish was in bed Sherlock found his laptop and opened it.

"Hey! That's an invasion of his privacy!" John scowled, he thought they'd done their investigating at dinner, he didn't want to go through his son's laptop. He was thirteen now.

"That may be, but I would rather invade my son's privacy than not protect him from the things on the internet that he may not be ready for." Sherlock said and logged in, muttering "His password is weaker than yours, John."

John sighed and sat beside his husband on the sofa, putting an arm around Sherlock's shoulders and gently stroking his hand over Sherlock's neck as he did so.

Sherlock checked Hamish's internet history and saw a lot of google searches.

"Oh, around about the time you would have gotten home he was on google searching for puberty stages in males, oh and even an image search to see what genitals male teenagers should have. I'd say the research was decent, though he probably didn't feel completely reassured until he actually discussed it with us." Sherlock said.

"Well… at least it was just research." John sighed in relief as Sherlock logged off of his son's computer and put it back where it was.

"Mmm." Sherlock sat back down and leaned into John's side, resting his arm on John's shirt-clad stomach "Anyway, what would you like to do this evening?" he rubbed gentle circles into his husband's toned abdomen.

"Ohh, I have a few ideas." John grinned.

Despite John being forty four and Sherlock being forty three, neither were physically feeling old yet, they were still able to run around the streets of London, but that was probably because they did it so often that they kept their muscles and such moving and in-action.

Hamish was eating his breakfast one morning in March before school and John was sat opposite him, trying to finish the last pages of his recent book while eating toast, when suddenly an almighty squeal came from the bathroom.

"Sherlock?" John shouted, checking in on his husband.

Sherlock ran into the kitchen wearing a pair of trousers but nothing on his upper half, he had obviously been in the middle of combing his hair after drying it.

"John!" Sherlock sounded horrified.

"What? What's wrong?" John tensed.

"I have a… I have found a white hair… I'm going grey." Sherlock looked as if he were about to cry.

"Oh, that's alright." John relaxed, seeing it wasn't as bad as he had thought.

"It is not alright, John! I'm… I'm getting old." Sherlock whispered, kneeling beside his husband's chair.

"You are not getting old; you're forty three, perfectly normal time to start getting grey hairs." John reassured.

"Look at it, John!" Sherlock pointed at his head and John sighed but had a comb through his husband's hair, looking for the accused white hair.

"I can't see anything." John frowned.

Sherlock pointed and John spotted the one white hair.

"Ah, found it. Well, not to worry." John said, stroked Sherlock's hair once, then took a sip of his tea.

"John! How are you not more upset about this? This is a serious issue!" Sherlock demanded.

"Sherlock, you do realise that I've been going grey since I was in my mid-twenties, right? It's been kind of slow but I'm pretty much all grey now." John said, "Are you trying to tell me that grey hair is a bad thing?" John raised an eyebrow.

"No, not on you! You look dashing with grey hair-a silver fox, I would say! It's just… me, John! Me!" Sherlock exclaimed.

"You will look gorgeous whatever, alright?" John said and pressed a kiss to Sherlock's lips to reinforce his claim.

Sherlock was silent for a moment "Fine, I suppose it isn't the end of the world." He admitted and stood and was about to make his way back to the bathroom to finish getting ready for the day but he was stopped by Hamish's gasp.

John and Sherlock stared at his shocked face.

"What?" Sherlock asked.

"Dad…" Hamish's eyes turned to stare at John "You… you went grey in your mid-twenties…?"

"Well, yes, but only a bit, it was a very slow process, people used to get confused as to whether I was blonde or grey all the way into my mid-thirties." John shrugged.

"But… what if I go grey like you? When I'm in my twenties!? What if I only have about a decade left with my blonde, young hair…?" Hamish pouted and put a hand to his hair which was growing a little longer, it wasn't long enough to start curling, but his fringe was starting to make it's way down his forehead.

"Why is everyone in this house so fussy about grey hairs?" John threw his hands up in the air in exasperation.

"Because I'm too young!" Hamish insisted.

"Well," John sighed "I don't know what you lot are so fussy about, you are both handsome, and grey hair doesn't necessarily mean old. It suits many people… think about Greg, he's had grey hair since as long as we've known him, I couldn't imagine him without it!" John tried.

Hamish pouted and mumbled "Too young." And Sherlock simply ruffled his blonde hair and said "You could have my genes, hold onto that." And walked off.

John sighed and shook his head in exasperation.