From Domina Temporis: A family dinner
...Alright, so this one might have gotten away from me a bit
"Eat your asparagus, John."
I poked at the limp rope on my plate instead of taking a bite. "Martha is wrong," I finally announced, "eating something repeatedly does not make one acquire a taste for it. Asparagus is disgusting."
"Here, here!"
Mother looked away from me to frown at Harry's castle, one made primarily of asparagus. "How many times must I tell you not to play with your food?"
"As many times as we have to tell you that we don't like asparagus," he shot back when he saw that she was not truly angry. The playfulness behind the words showed their irreverent rather than disrespectful nature, and I knew it was safe to laugh when amusement appeared in Father's expression.
"I suppose we could light them on fire," I said with a grin. "They do look remarkably similar to Father's cigars."
"Taste like them too," Harry quipped, also grinning widely.
"How do you know that?" Father asked.
"I stole one, of course," was Harry's easy reply. "You said I could have one when I turned sixteen, and then you were conveniently out of the house." He pulled a face. "I don't understand why you like them."
Father chuckled. "You may change your mind when you get older."
Disbelief laced Harry's answering shrug, but he said nothing, and the topic turned to other things.
"Supper is ready, Sherlock."
His brother never looked up from the chemistry set their parents had given him for Christmas. "Not hungry."
Mycroft frowned. "You said that for breakfast and dinner as well. How can you not be hungry?"
Sherlock shrugged, his attention focused on the beaker in his hand, and Mycroft tried again.
"Cook roasted a turkey today."
The hand froze, and Mycroft continued, "and there are tarts for dessert."
Sherlock hesitated a moment longer before putting away his supplies with a sigh. "Fine."
Mycroft smirked but said nothing, leading the way toward the dining room.
"Nice of you to join us, Sherlock," Father said as they took their seats. "What has you so captivated as to skip meals?"
"Chemistry experiment," Sherlock said quickly, the reply short but respectful, "the object of which both you and Mother would say is an inappropriate topic for the table."
Mycroft looked down at his plate to hide his amusement. Sherlock despised discussing his chemistry experiments with anyone, especially their parents, and after a similar question had resulted in a discussion of the differences between animal blood and human, stealing their parents' appetites, he had started using the answer any time they asked him at the table. Father could not even remonstrate him for it, on the chance that he was being truthful.
"Have you been doing that all day?" Father asked, not trusting that feigned innocence.
Sherlock nodded, swallowing a bite before adding, "Except for early this morning, when Mycroft let me borrow his violin."
It was harder to hide his amusement that time. He had not exactly allowed his brother to borrow his violin, but he also could not claim to care that Sherlock had stolen it. He had returned it unharmed almost before Mycroft had noticed it missing, and Mycroft had never taken to the instrument anyway. Their parents could have done a better job at deciding which instrument each of them would learn.
"Why did you not practice your bass?" Father asked.
"The violin is better."
Their mother had been silently watching this exchange, gaze flicking to whomever was speaking, but Sherlock's reply was so direct, so matter of fact, that understanding lit her gaze.
"Would you prefer to learn the violin?" she asked, gently breaking into their father's irritated reply.
Sherlock nodded quickly, his affirmative abundantly clear even with his mouth full.
"You can have mine," Mycroft told him. He never used it, anyway.
"Seriously?"
The question was surprised, nearly incredulous, and he nodded. A large grin split Sherlock's face. "Do you want the bass?"
Mycroft thought about that. The bass was a larger instrument, one played similarly to a violin but with the instrument resting on the floor. He might prefer the seated position over the work that went into holding the violin correctly, and he nodded again.
Father finally let a chuckle escape, deciding to be amused rather than irritated. He had been arguing with them for ages about learning an instrument, refusing to listen to Mycroft about his disinterest in the violin, then to Sherlock's dislike of the bass. Perhaps he had taken the lack of interest in the individual instruments as a lack of interest in instruments in general.
"I will inform your tutors in the morning," he told them. "Please try not to frustrate them as you did the first time around."
"But it's fun!" Sherlock sputtered, eleven-year-old mischief in every word.
Mycroft allowed a smile to escape. No matter his age, Sherlock had managed to find the delicate balance between warranted solemnity and irreverent playfulness, and Mycroft hoped he never lost it.
"Their frustration when you both flawlessly learned the scales overnight after over a fortnight of refusing suggests otherwise," Father replied, obviously trying to be stern, "not to mention his reaction to the frog you put in his tea."
Sherlock scowled. "I told you I had nothing to do with that."
"Then why did you laugh when he quickly spit the tea back into the cup and ran from the room?"
"It was funny!" he protested. "He had been going on about 'proper decorum when near the instruments,' and then he did that! You would've laughed too!"
"Not likely."
Mycroft lowered his head, fighting to hide his amusement. He had been present for that lesson, and it had been highly entertaining. The bass instructor was an old music professor from the nearby university, and while Sherlock's intellect easily matched that of an adult, the instructor had had no idea what to do with his very boyish mischief. While Father was not as serious as he was trying to portray, however, he was not amused enough to risk voicing such a thing. It was better Mycroft stayed silent.
Besides, nobody needed to know that Mycroft had brought the frog, hoping to lighten Sherlock's frustration after a very long couple of days.
Sherlock pouted but made no reply, and Mother turned the conversation to a gathering scheduled for next week.
I ignored the call for supper, no more interested in food than I was in leaving my room. Pitying stares followed me whenever I did, wherever I went, wordlessly announcing that I was half-crippled, a cast-off old soldier for which even the Army had no use. I was not yet thirty, yet I felt antiquated, useless.
I needed to get out of this hovel, dirty, dilapidated set of rooms as it was. My surroundings were affecting my thoughts, but where would I go? I could not go home, to that large, familiar house in the rambling countryside where I had grown up and that I had expected Harry to keep waiting for me, nor could I go to Martha, our housekeeper who had become second mother to us both. Even she did not know what had sent Harry to drink while I was away, but he had sold the house, and though Martha had insisted I stay with her, I had not stayed long. I could not live in a town where I knew my brother sat in the local tavern, too drunk to recognize me. My injury and convalescence meant I could not even treat patients. I had no home, no remaining family, and no purpose.
Martha had saved some of my things from the auction that had sold the house, mostly books and my viola, and I stared at that viola now, sitting in its open case on my bed. It seemed to mock me, sitting silently like that. I wished I could play it, wished I could make the strings sing as I use to, but I could not. My injury had weakened my shoulder, and I could not even hold my precious instrument no matter how I tried to support it. The silent strings seemed to scream in tandem with my thoughts.
Crippled. Unwanted. Useless.
I pulled myself out of my chair, using my cane to maintain my balance as I roughly closed the case and hid it before I left the building. It was growing dangerous to stay here.
"Sherlock, are you going to eat?"
Silence answered him, and he peered into the darkened bedroom. He did not like how quiet Sherlock had been since the funeral.
"Sherlock?"
Again there was no answer, and he lit a candle, confirming the room was empty before closing the door. He knew where his brother had gone.
A creek bubbled through a shallow valley behind the house, and his brother sat on a rock nearby, his back to the path. Mycroft took a seat next to him.
"Supper is on the table," he finally said when Sherlock remained quiet.
His brother's gaze remained locked on the water trickling over the pebbles.
"Sherlock?"
An animal moved in a nearby tree, but there was no other answer, and he moved to look at his brother's face.
A hollow, broken gaze stared through him, the grief Sherlock had been hiding having finally taken over his thoughts.
"Oh, Sherlock."
Barely four days had passed since their parents' deaths, and he had yet to see his brother grieve. Twelve was far too early to lose one's parents.
Neither of them had ever cared for physical contact, but Sherlock did not protest when Mycroft resumed his seat, wrapping an arm around the smaller boy and pulling him close.
"Can you hear me?"
His brother leaned against him in wordless response.
"It is alright to grieve," he said.
Sherlock's eyes remained perfectly dry and heartbreakingly empty, and Mycroft tried again.
"Let it out, Sherlock."
"Can't."
Mycroft forced himself not to react to the nearly strangled word, continuing to move his hand in a soothing motion up and down his brother's arm.
"Why not?"
"Interconnected," came the almost detached reply. "I will go with it."
"I will catch you."
Sherlock shook his head, the intense grief in his gaze already fading as he boxed it up for another time. "How can you do that when you miss them, too?"
"That is what brothers are for. Let it out, little brother. I will catch you."
Sherlock shook his head again, and Mycroft realized he might soon have another loss to grieve.
His brother would not remain the mischievous, playful, smart, serious boy he had been if he continued like this.
"Doctor! Supper is on the table!"
"Coming!"
Quickly grabbing the reason I had come up here, I hurried back to the sitting room and took my seat at the table.
"I thought you said Sherlock is the one that is always late," Mycroft rumbled, amused at the ill-timed trip to my room.
I smirked. "So you would prefer I did not share this?"
A bottle of Australian red wine landed with a thump in the middle of the table, and pleasure lit Holmes' gaze.
"Is that from your uncle?"
I nodded, grinning. I had stayed at my uncle's vineyard for a year as a child, and we had continued occasional contact even after I had moved back to the island and the aphids had destroyed the crops. When production had resumed shortly after my return from abroad, he had sent us a bottle to try, and Holmes and I had thoroughly enjoyed it. Since then, a bottle arrived two or three times a year, and I had been saving this one for today.
"There should be enough for everyone to have a glass. Are you going to try some, Mrs. Hudson?"
She looked up from eyeing the bottle, grinning. "Of course. Lizzie would never forgive me if I turned down the chance to try an Australian wine."
"Didn't you say your sister considered moving there for a while?" I asked, taking the plate Holmes offered and dishing myself some meat before holding it for her.
She shook her head. "Never seriously, and that was before we lost Jenny. Lizzie is content to dream about traveling. I doubt she would know what to do with herself outside of London."
"Sounds like someone else I know," I replied, trying to smother a laugh.
Holmes scowled at me around a bite. "That is not true."
That laugh broke free. "No, I suppose not," I replied, grinning, "but it was at one time."
He had never enjoyed leaving "his city," much preferring to stay in the area he knew so well, and while his three-year disappearance had shown him he could travel, he still rarely left London unless I went with him.
He huffed at me, feigning irritation, but turned to Mycroft instead of replying.
"I hear you have been offered knighthood again," he said with a faint grin.
"Who told you that?"
Holmes brushed off the question, completely immune to the near-growl Mycroft had used. "Someone high enough to listen but low enough to forget to keep his mouth shut. Are you going to take it this time?"
"Of course not. You know I have no more interest in the title than you do, Sherlock."
"Wait," I broke in before Holmes could respond, hearing more in that reply than I had expected. "You were offered knighthood?! When?"
Holmes squirmed, casting an irritated glance at Mycroft's smug look.
"The blueprint case last month was the most recent," he finally answered quietly.
"And you turned it down?" I replied. "Holmes!"
He tried to wave me off. "I can hardly accept the honor when I was not the one to solve it."
"I certainly did not solve it."
"You are the one that realized the chemistry equipment was to reveal invisible ink," he replied. "We would not have trapped Conwell without it."
"That was only one small part. You put the pieces together."
"A pivotal part," he corrected quickly, "and there was only one name on the offer. These are our cases, Watson, not mine. We have been over this."
I scowled at him, trying to hide the relief that washed over me every time he asserted that. There had been a time when I had thought he wanted me to keep my distance, when I thought he would be safer without me around. It had taken him many years to prove otherwise, and I was forever grateful that he had done so. There was nowhere else I would rather be.
"The food is delicious, Mrs. Hudson," Mycroft said into the resulting silence.
I tore my gaze away from Holmes to agree. A Christmas goose as well as almost every side dish I could name—and a few I could not—nearly covered the table, with several desserts on a side table for later. I had helped with some of it, but she had done most of the work. It truly was an amazing spread.
"Thank you," she replied, but movement caught my eye before she could continue.
"Holmes!"
He looked up guiltily, caught wrist-deep in the goose and apparently exploring the cavity.
"You better not have hidden another surprise in there this year," Mrs. Hudson told him sternly.
"This year?"
I turned away from scowling at Holmes to answer Mycroft. "Two years ago, Holmes decided that Christmas was boring, so last year he shoved a quail into the goose and tried to make us believe the bird had been carrying young when it was killed. He nearly had Lestrade convinced before I asked him where goslings came from."
Mycroft did not bother checking his chuckle, and Holmes removed his hand from the bird, wiping the juice on a nearby napkin.
"The Duchess lost a diamond last week," he said in explanation.
"You cannot seriously believe that would happen twice."
"You really need to work on your story-telling skills."
My gaze snapped over to where Mrs. Hudson stared at him, a grin trying to twitch her mouth. We had spoken at the same time, but it took me only a moment to realize what she had said—and what she meant.
"Holmes! Christmas presents do not belong in the goose!"
Surprise lit her expression that the diamond was hers, but Holmes' reply preempted conversation for several minutes. I thoroughly enjoyed bickering with Holmes, though I did wonder at the pleasure that crossed Mycroft's face as he listened.
I doubted he would tell me, even if I found the words to ask.
A bit later than usual, due to a user malfunction that deleted the entire chapter shortly after I finished the first draft. Ugh. I really hope that never happens again, but I hope you enjoyed, and don't forget to review! :)
Also, thank you to everyone who reviewed on previous chapter. I don't always have time to respond individually, but I appreciate every one of them!