21. From mrspencil: a letter brings back memories.
When I relocated from Montague Street, I was faced with the reality of the number of papers I had hoarded since my university days. Many I carefully packed away to reorganize in my new study, as they poised practical importance to me and my burgeoning work, but others I considered longer whether I ought to keep them.
I had never been an avid letter writer, far more likely to misplace letters or simply forget to ever reply to them, but my brother had dutifully written me weekly during my time at university, perceiving with some truth I would isolate myself and dive more thoroughly into the pursuit of knowledge than relationships with my peers. The vast majority of these letters were brief, polite, and informative about the goings on within the family, as Mycroft had often acted as the go-between between myself and our surviving family. They rarely contained much sentiment, as we both preferred. I burned them accordingly, in reverse order. Presently, I found myself with the very first of the letters.
Brother mine, it read.
I will keep my sentiments brief, but congratulations on your admission into such a fine institute. I trust you will expand your mind and seek truth, as a young man of your age and station rightly ought. I am proud of you, and I trust mother and father would be as well. The sale of the estate is going well; I trust it will be finalized shortly, and I will send a cheque to the university to pay your tuition in full until you graduate. My work continues to be absorbing. I see some points within it you might yourself be suited for. Consider it, as you work towards what undoubtedly will be a bright future.
Yours,
Mycroft Holmes
I am nary a believer in fate, but it felt momentous to discover these words as I prepared to leave behind the last of my doubts and youthful ways and advance my consulting to a full-time, unique profession. I would never dare tell my brother it, but I stashed his letter among my papers and have kept it all this time. I uncovered it again as I left 221B the final time, and laughed the laughter of an old man, who has lived to see his full potential and accepted that others will one day eclipse him. Age is the greatest teacher, I can attest. Little has taught me more than the sheer passage of time, the way it swirls and repeats and meanders in patterns predicable and uncontrollable. My papers stay in my attic, mostly unused these days, but awaiting a time when another may find them helpful. The world turns, and boys become men and men become elders. And letters yellow and curl and disintegrate, lost to time itself.