Breaking Badly
Pairings: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, (past) Mary Morstan/John Watson
Summary:
Hold on when there is nothing in you except the will which says, 'Hold on!' ~Rudyard Kipling
In the aftermath of one of his most brutal drug binges up to date, Sherlock tries his best to put himself together as much as he wants to put his best friend together. In the aftermath of nearly beating his best friend to death, John tries his best to make up for being a sad excuse of a best friend and even sadder excuse of a father (although the jury is still out on which was actually the worse one). Then one of Mycroft's best-kept secrets come into the light and nothing is going to be the same for either of them anymore.
Author's notes:
On the title: I know that it's American slang but the more I read into its meaning the more realised how much it fit with what I was planning. It's a better title than the working title which was simply 'Hold On'.
There are many TFP theories out there, in fact, there are many season 4 theories and what it really was and while I find each of them interesting I wanted to try a different approach. In here TFP is nothing but a nightmare, an enlightening one but still a nightmare.
As for Euros... This story operates on a principle that Euros Holmes once existed but her existence isn't the cause of all their problems. If anything is anyone's fault at all then surely it's Mycroft's inability to share important things with concerned parties. Additionally, I played with Euros's age because I realised that the only way for Sherlock to forget ever having a sister was not having many memories of her in the first place.
We pull a plug from canon right after the boys leave to get Sherlock's birthday cake and rejoin them two days later on a very early morning of what turns out to be a hell of a day.
Hold on when there is nothing in you except the will which says, 'Hold on!'
Rudyard Kipling
Breaking Badly
Sherlock
He wakes up slowly. It's not one of those days when awareness of his surroundings comes quickly to him. Still, the first thing he registers is that he's tangled in the duvet as if he spent his night at wrestling with it rather than sleeping. Probably, he had. Everyone would.
He remembers the dream vividly as he stares at the familiar wallpaper. It started from finding the note that Faith Smith left behind and spiralled from there into some bondesque nightmare that kept getting worse and worse the longer it went on.
Secret government prison full of uncontainable psychopaths with his own secret sister at the helm. And said sister not only got to be an era defining genius but she also had to be… that. Like he needs to be reminded by his subconsciousness that John is straight and he would only flirt with him if he was a woman. So obviously he dreamed up that the faceless woman with whom John got into an emotional affair turned out to be… well, the worst version of himself in a female form.
And because his perception is still slightly skewered his subconscious mind decided that well, Sherlock Holmes you're dealing with all of this right now. Hence Redbeard, hence the whole thing with Molly and pretty much everything going from bad to worse.
Mindful of the baby monitor under the bed (which he knows about and just ignores) he sits up on the bed very slowly and leans against the headboard. It's Hudders turn to keep an eye on him this morning. In fact every morning since he returned home from the hospital three days ago and he doesn't want to rouse her too early. She can be really cranky before she has a first cup of a tea so strong that it could potentially raise the dead and he isn't technically at the risk of relapsing.
Well, he knows that and the rest… Out of all people involved into minding him during his recovery at home only Lestrade actually saw him going through withdrawal and detoxing after an extended binge so he's a very lax if slightly cautious minder. John saw him and kept him occupied after the aborted exile but that wasn't a binge just a meticulously planned suicide attempt via overdose and prior to that incident cocaine and heroin was replaced by morphine and he spent majority of the detox either knocked out or planning how to expose Mary.
This time around he spent the worst of it at the hospital cautiously monitored for kidney failure amongst the other things. Physically he isn't as strong as he would like to be but the worst symptoms wore off, his kidneys didn't fail and his ribs while still bruised are getting better. He misses smoking though but he manages.
But if agreeing to being essentially baby-sited is the only way to salvage his relationship with John then he will consent to being monitored for as long as it takes.
His relationship with John is still on a very shaky ground and he knows the cost of another relapse. He knew the dangers of following through with the plan to binge and he accepted the price he would have to pay for it.
Even now what keeps John around is the misplaced feeling of guilt for not seeing the signs and not stopping Sherlock from shooting up and then completely losing it in the morgue.
John is better but he still isn't fine. He started sleeping though which is a success, as were poorly disguised stains from baby food which he attempted to hide by rolling up his sleeves. From Molly he knows that Rosie is home with John for the nights and better part of the day now and rather than being handed over for extended periods of time to various sitters there are sitters that come to the flat when John is at work or at Baker Street.
The easiest on John would be bringing Rosie to Baker Street but getting there will take a very long time if it will happen at all. Sherlock isn't his top priority anymore and if John will decide that Sherlock isn't someone who can be trusted again to keep him around his daughter then he will eventually walk away.
It would break his heart in a way John's and Mary's wedding had failed to do so but as much as it pains him it's a price he's willing to pay for keeping John from falling into downward spiral of depression and alcoholism. But just because he's willing to pay it doesn't mean that he will give up without a fight.
So he will do his damnest best to stay sober from now on no matter how hard at times he itches to devise a way to summon Wiggins to him in order to get him something that would abate the itch. He will ignore the hallucinations and their mysteries and will remain clean. For John.
Maybe once he's deemed as healthy enough to leave the flat and stable enough to not require a minder he would go to John's and Mary's flat. Help with Rosie, bring a gift, maybe convince John to let him accompany them to a park. Rosie is at the age when babies actually get interesting by being interested in the world around them. It could be fun and it might help hon her aim by directing it at smaller targets, such as ducks.
Baby steps.
But there's still something about that dream that doesn't sit well with him for some reason. Something about Redbeard and Daddy's allergy to dogs. It has to be a lie, an obstacle his mind presented to make the nightmare worse.
Except…
Except, when he searches his mind for memories of Dad around dogs something comes up. It was prior to storming on Appledore. Per Mummy's request one of Mycroft's cars picked him from Baker Street two days before Christmas. Nothing interesting happened on the first day but on Christmas Eve he accompanied Daddy along with one of Mummy's cakes to Mr Allen, a somewhat recluse beekeeper who occasionally supplied the village stores with his own honey.
Daddy knew that he wouldn't be able to resist the lure of bees, just like he couldn't resist the lure of Mr Allen's border collies, a pair of the lousiest guard dogs in Sussex but excellent cuddlers. At the time he was so focused on what might eventually happen that he simply didn't pay too much attention to neither Mr Allen nor Daddy. No, back then all that mattered was the peaceful sight of hives and the feel of soft fur under his fingers and Magnussen.
And Daddy's sneezes, red eyes, slight troubles with breathing? At the time he wrote it off as the probable beginning of a seasonal cold that Mummy would and had dealt with even before John arrived.
Red eyes, sneezing, runny nose, slight trouble with breathing. Clear sings of allergy.
We never had a dog.
But Redbeard? Redbeard was real. Redbeard felt real. He remembered the feeling of his fur under his hands, the way his fur smelt and the warmth he emitted.
We never had a dog.
Then whose dog was it?
Because there was a dog. He remembers an Irish setter. Patient but also eager companion of various make believes which at the time more often than not were pirates.
The dog was real.
But so could have been Daddy's allergy.
So which one is it?
He tries to summon the image of Redbeard as a puppy because the dog in his memories is a grown one but not an old one. Sure Irish Setters as a breed could live up to fifteen years but nothing about Redbeard felt or looked old. He was always eager, playful, full of energy. That's not an old dog.
He has no memory of a puppy.
But there are other memories.
Playing in the forest. Probably with Daddy, definitely not with Mycroft because up until Mycroft went to university and managed to lose some weight he was never able to keep up with Sherlock's speed and whoever it was, they could.
The sound of a dog barking somewhere ahead.
He could never resist that sound and adored every dog that crossed his path. He could never resist petting one either if he was allowed. He always loved dogs of any kind and they mostly loved him back. Well, with the exception of dachshunds, they always hated his guts and his feelings towards them at their most considerate were ambivalent at best if not equally spiteful. Height challenged sausages with anger issues every single one of them.
Then comes a memory of the small clearing in the forest. Green grass around him and trees in the distance. Redbeard running towards him. Someone calling him by that name. Being tackled to the ground by an exuberant dog that proceeds to thoroughly lick his face. Someone calling Redbeard and the voice… it's not a voice of a grown up and through the years he always assumed that it was his own.
Someone pulls him up from the ground just as Redbeard turns around and starts running towards the voice. He can't hear even a single sneeze. Then someone hoists him even higher and over the dog's retreating form he can see a boy running towards them.
Strawberry blonde hair. Brownish eyes. He even has the same bandana like in the dream.
Victor. Was he real?
Before his eyes the memory plays on. Victor's grin, quite polite introduction for a prepubescent boy his age away from watchful eyes of the adults. And Sherlock answering.
But Sherlock is not the name that comes from his mouth.
It's Billy, Billy Holmes.
Billy Holm. He could practically hear his own voice, much older than back then but now it's not a time to go down that road. He stays with the earlier memory.
Billy. Not William, not Will, not Willy and under no circumstances Liam. Just Billy.
Billy.
If he concentrates hard enough Billy is a name he remembers being called almost interchangeably with Sherry. He has no memory of every being called Sherlock as a young child if Sherlock wasn't bracketed by William and Scott and followed with Holmes. Not that it happened often enough.
Or maybe it had.
Once he allows his mind to acknowledge the image of Victor more memories start to trickle in. Pebbled beach, a stream in the forest. Victor and Redbeard are both there.
Turning his head over his shoulder to watch Victor's retreating back and Redbeard accompanying him.
Someone touching his shoulder and saying, "Come on, Billy, you will see them tomorrow."
Male voice. Not Mycroft's. Probably not Daddy's too if the allergy is true. Probably a teacher.
No. That happened later. He was home-schooled for a while after he returned from the hospital and he has a memory of blowing eight candles in hospital bed.
Why was he at the hospital in the first place? It was an extended stay that dragged for months on end. Car accident? The one in which Redbeard died? He doesn't remember early days of his stay but he remembers casts. Both arms, both legs, being in lots of pain, pins and needles and the overwhelming boredom that never fully went away. Ugly pictures of bears on the walls. Surgeries. Mummy saying that there was an accident…
Come to think about it she never clarified what sort of accident it was and if she had he has no memory of it. He assumed that it was a car accident and that Redbeard died in it because Mummy got very sad when he managed to utter his name.
You were upset so you told yourself a better story.
That dream isn't real, it's too ridiculous to be real. Or can it be? Maybe not entirely but in certain parts…
Dad's allergy seemed real enough once he concentrated on it and once he focused on Redbeard as a dog that might have not been his he summoned the image of Victor.
What if the fire too was real?
He has no memory of the house in Sussex prior to leaving the hospital. A modest house with four bedrooms. Smaller and properly fenced garden than the one from the dream.
Then there are pictures from the photo albums. Sparse images from before hospital and far more from after. Mummy was always crazy about taking pictures. It stands to reason that there would have been a similar amount of older pictures of him and Mycroft from before the hospital.
A house fire could have destroyed pictures. Some permanently, some perhaps were copies that got recovered from various relatives.
And got edited too, some treacherous voice from the back of his mind supplies.
A fire would also explain the extended hospital stay. He could have gotten his injuries from a car accident as much as he could have gotten them from falling out of a window. Not too high though, first storey one maybe? And he would have to be thrown out of it, quite forcibly on that because if he jumped himself he wouldn't have gotten as badly injured as he had. Granted he could have broken an arm or leg or both but not all of them.
How did the fire start if it occurred at all?
Why he even bothers with examining this?
Because you can't resist a puzzle and a lot of things about that dream doesn't sit well with what you remember, a voice that sounds very much like John supplies softly.
And psychopathic pyromaniac sister locked up in a secret government prison explains it all?
How can you be sure that she doesn't exist?
Because I would have remembered having a sister.
Like you're remembering Daddy's allergy to dogs and him not sneezing around one. Baskerville, Norbury, stop being cocky and start thinking. In so far the only proof that you didn't have a sister is the lack of photographs of one from before the hospital. Did it occur to you that you could have had a sister and that she could have lost her life in a house fire you're willing to consider as real?
That wouldn't explain the lack of memories and photographs of her nor a the lack of even a single mention of her.
Not a single one? What about the east wind? And then there's your aversion to Rosie's name. You use it sparsely and given a choice you always address her or refer to her as Watson. If you went by Billy through quite a big part of your childhood then what kind of a nickname a girl called Euros could have gotten?
Rose.
Rose. Rosamund. Rosemary. Rosalie. A rose under a different name was still a rose even though rosemary was a completely different plant but as a name they all could be shortened to Rose.
Like he told Molly he deleted John's text with the choice of the name without reading it. Not because he didn't care but because he was convinced that John would be able to convince Mary to name the little girl Catherine or Katherine whichever one of them he preferred and since he already knew John's choice why should he bother.
But the sound of that name jarred him from his thoughts and his case during the christening. It wasn't as if a part of him didn't expect Mary to try and get an upper hand in naming baby Watson because he had. He just assumed that Mary loved John enough to be willing to compromise enough to allow John's chosen name to be one of the two which Watson got.
But that wasn't what happened.
At first, he assumed that he didn't like the name because Mary completely disregarded John's choice. So, in a low key spiteful retaliation for that he came up with a solution that allowed him to disregard Mary's choices for the name and he went with Watson.
Watson and I are going to test her aim. Watson and I are going to test her peripheral vision. Watson and I are going to change her nappy and this time were going to survive the ordeal with our dignity intact. Watson and I are going to take a kip at the sofa.
Not that his disregard for Mary's choices of the names registered with Mary because apparently Rosie won all the awards for being the fussiest infant on the planet. She had little to no regard to bed time routines, completely ignored the feeding schedule and defecated at the worst possible times and in the worst possible manner.
She managed to quiet down though by the time John temporarily moved in with her to Baker Street while he and John were waiting for Mary's tracker to settle down in one country for more than a day.
But the name still jarred so Watson she remained to him.
That was the thing that will have to change. Regardless of John not having a part in naming her she was still his daughter and he called her Rosie. He might not be a fan of the name but he will respect John's choice like he tried his best to do so since he returned.
I wonder why, John's voice presses.
Why what?
Why aren't you a fan of that name I mean. You're pretty ambivalent about other peoples' names in general if you bother to remember them at all if that information isn't somehow related to a current case. I should be grateful that you remember my name at all.
Of course I remember it and the other ones too…
Lestrade.
Lestrade knows very well why I call him anything but not Greg. It's a game we had been playing ever since Mycroft got his claws into him all these years ago.
Well, Greg aside let's come back to your issues with Rosie.
It's jarring.
And that's one of the mysteries. Why it jars you? You have no cousins with that name. The only Rose you went to primary school with was that timid little girl with whom you rarely crossed paths. Then you went to boys only boarding school and even during coeducational projects with that girls only school you never ran into a Rose. Then there was no offending Roses during that year and by the time you went to university you didn't care about any girls at all if they didn't have something interesting to share with you. There were no offending clients by that name either until Mary but you didn't know that she went by Rosamund until after Rosie's christening. So why it jars you?
Why not? Hammish annoys the living daylight out of you.
Because I hate it and it's my bloody middle name. It's mine to hate and Rose isn't your name to hate.
You're suggesting that I don't like the name Rose because my brain subconsciously connotates that name with a sister I cannot remember, who might be nothing but a product of my overactive imagination.
You have a better reason?
Mary.
You didn't know that Rosamund was one of the names Mary went by before Rosie's christening. You don't even know how many other names she went by. Mycroft was suspiciously tight-lipped on the subject and as far as you managed to establish Rosamund was with A.G.R.A. only for a couple of years. What kind of a name she went by before that? You don't know that, just like you don't know what was her actual birthname.
And that makes a figment of my imagination probable?
I didn't say probable. I just wouldn't exclude a sister you cannot remember as a possibility. There are many rational explanations why you wouldn't be able to remember ever having a sister.
Like putting my childhood best friend in a well and then burning the house down?
She didn't necessarily have to do that you know.
You're making no sense at all.
Because you're willing to accept that certain parts of that dream could happen let's assume that the key actors in that dream at one point or another existed. That they are real. Euros is real. Victor is real. Redbeard is real.
Then why I couldn't remember them or still cannot remember them.
Remember Henry Knight?
Childhood trauma masked by invented memory and just not one of them but…
… several? That's got to be some pretty traumatic memory. Or a few of them.
Ridiculous.
Keep an open mind because that's what got you into this mess and it might be what will get you out of it. The moment you allowed yourself to believe that your dad was allergic to dogs and that Redbeard might not have been your dog you saw Victor. Seeing him provided some memories of him, him and Redbeard together. Is it ridiculous to consider that something bad might have happened to him? I'm not saying that your secret psychopathic pyromaniac sister from your dream lured him into a well and left him there but…
A lot of bad things can happen to a child left unattended. Even as self-sufficient in finding their interests and things to do as first or second grader. Kidnappings, accidents, certain events that would require a sudden move…
To name a few. A loss of a friend, a best friend is a traumatic experience to anyone regardless of how it happened especially if the circumstances surrounding that loss were tragic. Like say taking a swan dive from the hospital's roof. Obviously, I'm not saying that Victor did that but like you said a lot of bad things can happen to a child left unattended. He could have been kidnapped, could have been ran over by a car… he could have even drowned in a bathtub. It happens. But right now the circumstances don't matter as long as you cannot verify them. What matters is that he was there and then he was not.
And that alone would have made me erase every single trace of him?
Not every single trace of him. You still got Redbeard.
Not exactly.
You're willing to consider the house fire as something that actually happened, even as something in which you got badly injured. To most children their house is their safe space and source of comfort that comes from their family. Losing that safe space at a young age can be pretty traumatic on its own. My guess that losing Victor and the house fire regardless of how it started occurred within a very short period of time. You were still grieving the loss of your friend when the fire happened and most likely you were injured when it happened. That's three traumas that occurred within a very close period of time. Each one of the is hard to overcome and make peace with when you're an adult let alone child.
And how Euros fits into that?
As another trauma obviously. In your dream she's a year younger than you and right now you don't have a way to verify that. Let's assume that's true or that she was younger than that. Your parents liked big age gaps, didn't they? Your mum had you when she was thirty-one and Mycroft when she was twenty-four, didn't she?
Yes.
Didn't you also say at some point when you were in hospital after Mary shot you that the only saving grace of being shot was that it prevented you from attending your parents' Golden Jubilee?
Yes.
So that means that they got married in what… late June or early July 1964 if my maths is correct? That also means that when they got married your mother was eighteen.
Yes. Your point?
It's a curious age gap, isn't it?
Why would it be?
Six years, then seven years and then who knows how many years between you and Euros.
Still…
It's not exactly normal, you know. The Holmeses were upper middle class, with some tittles attached to the male line and firstborn sons. Your mother was the youngest of four and it was traditional for women in the family to finish schooling before getting married even if they wanted to take a leaf out of your aunt's book and just get married. Why your mum rebelled? Why she got married first and finished her schooling later?
Because it's Mummy. She isn't the most logical person on the planet. If she was she would have pursued her academic career instead of staying at home with children.
You're still not seeing the obvious, are you?
Pray tell, what's the most obvious answer in there?
That most people don't get married at eighteen without a very good reason. Some chose the early marriage as an escape from difficult situation at home, especially women. But your mum's situation wasn't difficult. She had loving if slightly strict parents, she had no reason to escape.
You're forgetting that my parents are disgustingly devoted to each other, always had been. Daddy still thinks that Mummy is hot and to keep my sanity I don't ask her for her opinion on the matter because I know that she would overshare it in an even worse manner. Besides, pot, kettle, black. It appears that this single-minded devotion to one individual is a family trait.
Yeah. You should definitely talk about that at some point.
Not happening, I already know the answer so I will settle for what I can have.
Then on the other side of the equation you have the Vernets. Working class family that had more mouths to feed than money to do so. Your dad enlisted as soon as he finished schooling because the army was a stable source of income and he had responsibility to his family.
I'm still not seeing where it's going.
Oh, you do. You're just unwilling to consider the idea as anything but ridiculous.
Because it is, one secret sibling is ridiculous but two…
Makes sense to me.
Bollocks.
Your dad's maybe. Facts are, your parents got married when your mother was eighteen. You can't argue with that. Facts are, there's a seven years long age gap between you and Mycroft and a six years long one between your parents' wedding and Mycroft's birth. Why?
Because Mummy was at the university and Daddy was in the army. He also had to wait to advance his own schooling.
Why?
Because he had to support her.
Why?
Because why not? She was his wife.
Who had a trust fund to fall back on. As do you and as does Mycroft. She could have manage to support herself and your father well enough for both of them to finish schooling at the same time.
Cutting her from the access to the trust fund could be some form of punishment for committing a mésalliance. I don't know and I can't exactly ask because people who could have done that are dead and had been for some time.
There's still the family lawyer.
Who bends so hard in front of Mycroft that he's kissing his shoes. Not exactly an option.
I like my explanation better anyway. It explains quite a lot of missing pieces. The age gaps. The reason why your parents married that early. At eighteen she didn't need her parents' or courts permission to get married. Then there's the man you assumed was your dad in your memories with Redbeard but unlike your dad he wasn't allergic to dogs.
Why you assume that another secret sibling would have been a man?
Because in your dream Euros was locked in Sherrinford.
In my dream Sherrinford was a prison, not a person.
True. But you're forgetting Mycroft.
I wish I could.
Was he always overinvested in your life?
He grimaces. It's a loaded question and the answer to it is just as loaded.
At the hospital after the accident or the fire, whichever it was, Mycroft visited him. Not as often as Mummy and Daddy had and usually when he did he was quiet. Later on he was mostly absent due to preparing for exams and then he moved away. He didn't become very involved in his life until drugs started to become a problem and early on he was easy to deceive. Then that year when he was living on the streets happened and that's when Mycroft took upon himself controlling every aspect of Sherlock's life, with varying results.
East wind is coming, Sherlock. Do you remember Redbeard?
It didn't start back then. No, it started earlier. As early as when he was still at the hospital. Redbeard at the very least, east wind though… That definitely came later, after he finally started talking.
But someone was there? Weren't? You weren't alone on that clearing with Victor. Someone picked you up from the ground. Someone accompanied you to some outings with Victor. A man. Not your dad or Mycroft. Someone else.
I have male cousins on both sides.
Yes, all of them either your age or younger.
Why you're so adamant about secret brother?
Mycroft.
What about him?
Everything. Your complicated relationship in particular. You love to hate him. You can never resist a chance to get an upper hand. You never met a jab which you didn't use on him. You would happily throw him out of the window but you would also destroy anyone else who would dare to do so.
Your point?
You resent something about him. You make fun of his position and connections but when circumstances demand you use them quite eagerly. You can never resist having the last word in any discussion with him. You purposely ignore his reminders about things like your parents' birthdays or their wedding anniversary. You barter with him every single appearance at family functions. Yet, with the exception of the last binge you always kept the list since he asked you to do so. You resent that too.
I'm still not seeing what my relationship with Mycroft has to do with a secret older brother I might or might not have.
Maybe, on a deeply subconscious level, you resent him because there's a part of you that sees him as an usurper. Maybe because he always had been an arse or maybe because he wasn't the most invested older brother. Why should he be, he had his own interests, social circle, plans for the future and he didn't keep up with you because he didn't have to keep up with you.
It can't be that simple.
But what if it is. What if he didn't get invested in keeping up with you until he was the only one left who could.
You presume that Sherrinford or whatever his name was died with Euros during the fire.
It would have explained your injuries. You didn't have burns. You had broken bones and a concussion. Your injuries were too severe for it being a calculated jump. Odds are very high you were thrown out of the house because the alternative was far more graver than broken bones or the risk of a permanent injury.
Like death.
Obviously all of this is a pure speculation on your part. Both parts actually. The one who is willing to consider than in your past there's an unexplained damaging event and the one that tries to rebel against the idea.
And I don't know if all of this is a leftover hallucinogenic dream from my last binge…
… or deeply buried truth. In certain parts, obviously.
And I won't know for sure unless I verify it. Unless I won't find out whatever Victor Trevor was real or not. Unless I won't find whatever or not the fire was real too. Unless I won't verify the existence of siblings I could have erased because dealing with their deaths on the top of losing my best friend was too painful to handle at the time.
If it's true… I don't know if it's much of a consolation but… You didn't do it alone, Sherlock. Your mind invented new memories and misinterpreted the others but you were surrounded with people who could verify them for you.
And if it's true, they hadn't. They allowed me to believe in a lie.
So what now?
House-arrest. I'm not leaving the flat unless one very stubborn army doctor decides that I can return to work.
You could use said doctor, you know. Put that self-flagellation into actual work.
If I do that and he agrees then he would be out there and not here. Not an option.
Just bloody tell him.
Not an option either. There are more important things right now than digging for a corpse in the wardrobe. This can wait.
You're just resisting figuring out a puzzle?
One that involves me and I cannot do it alone. I'm an unreliable witness.
Suit yourself.
I'm going to, after relieving my bladder and having a cup of tea.
He untangles himself from the duvet as quietly as he can and he pads to the bathroom. He relives himself and while he washes his hands he examines his face. His left eye is still bloodshot but the subconjunctival haemorrhage looks minimally better than it did yesterday. It would still take at least another week for the blood to reabsorb, maybe even two. John has a very mean right hook for a lefty.
He inspects his beard. He always had ambivalent feelings about it. On one hand when he was young it made him look older than he was or at the very least he thought so until one client pointed out that it still looked like a teenager's beard. University saw him going through the cycle of 'I don't have time to shave' and 'now I can spare few minutes to do so'. The parts of summer vacation he was forced to spend either with Mycroft or in rehab saw him sporting a full on beard he shaved off as soon as he was left to his own devices away from a controlling environment. Years between graduation and getting the position of a consultant for NSY were spent pretty much the same except the periods when he bothered to shave lasted longer because one client who saw him both with a beard and without it commented that he looked more professional while he was clean shaven. With passing years shaving became a necessary routine and lack of it became an alarming sign for Mycroft that Sherlock possibly might be on drugs, not that assumption had always been correct.
His hands aren't shaking anymore, not as badly as they used to and he could brave shaving his beard with a razor (because it's the only right way to shave, as he pointed it out to John multiple times). It will definitely take him longer than it usually takes but…
To shave or not to shave.
Part of him feels inclined to shave because it would prove to his minders that he's getting better, enough to put some effort into maintaining the usual levels of his personal hygiene. Another, defiant, part of him, the part that associates the clean face with professionalism and work however stops him from reaching for a razor. He isn't working right now and won't be working at the very least for another week if not two (three even if John has some saying in that and he has).
So after deciding to shelve that internal debate until after the shower he leaves the bathroom and makes his way into the kitchen. He fills out the electric kettle with water, left by the sink for that purpose alone (it used to drive John nuts, at least until he figured out that if the kettle was left by the sink the night before then he didn't have to sanitize it).
Nowadays he keeps two electric kettles around and actually bothers to keep the one he uses for experiments on the shelf. That one even has a plaster on it on which written in a sharpie is a sign 'FOR EXPERIMENTS'.
The things he does for Watson's sake. Admittedly it wasn't a big gesture, he had money to spend and the kettle didn't cost a fortune. It was far more useful though than that fancy dress Molly bought for her, one which Rosie never wore because by the time she grew into it the weather outside was too hot for her to wear it without boiling herself in it.
Godfather: 1
Godmother no. 1 or is it no. 2: 0
Not that he keeps score.
Well, he does. He makes logical choices when they have to be made and he actually bothers to research things. When he bothered. Oh, who he's fooling, he still bothers but now he's so scared of crossing the invisible boundary of overstepping.
Baby steps.
He misses her. Not as badly as he misses John whom he still gets to see but he misses her. He misses putting her down in John's armchair, surrounded by her plushies and pillows and playing for her. He misses testing which melodies put her to sleep and which are waking her up instead. He misses having her put in his arms while John shoos him away from the cooker because he's a slow and easily distracted cook and John needs to eat breakfast before leaving for work. He misses having her around on his own for several hours because Watson's defiance decided to kick in and she fights against getting dressed and being taken into day care at the hospital so hard that John just gives up and asks if Sherlock could look after her until Mrs Hudson will return from the shops. It only happened twice during the weeks which John and Watson spent at Baker Street after Mary pulled a runner.
Maybe he can ask John later today about putting an actual date on his visit to John's and Mary's flat. John said yes to the visit but he knows that it won't happen until John decides that he's fit to leave the flat.
Maybe shaving is actually a good idea.
He places the kettle on the heating part and turns it on before he picks up a clean mug from the shelf and drops a bag into it. Unlike Mycroft who was pathologically obsessed with the proper ceremony for every single cup of tea (when he could get it) he's far more lax in following it. If Mrs Hudson brings him a proper cup of tea before he wakes it's great but if he wakes before her and has to make his own tea he doesn't really mind.
He pours the water into the mug and turns around to the table for the sugar bowl. He doesn't like his tea too sweet, unlike coffee but his…
While he turns around, over his right shoulder, his eyes sweep over the living-room automatically and suddenly he stops midturn.
In his armchair lies a colourful lump and even from the distance he's able to recognise the raised bulge of a nappy covered by trousers.
He lets out a breath and for a moment forgets to breath in because the sight before him is too shocking to believe that it isn't some drug induced hallucination. He draws a shaky breath as he closes his eyes and opens them again.
The lump is still there in his armchair and it didn't disappear when he closed his eyes.
Watson. Rosie. Just there, in his armchair, napping as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
He abandons the sugar bowl and the tea altogether because he simply cannot believe what he sees and steps into the living-room carefully allowing his gaze to sweep around the room.
Sure enough on the hook is hanging a small, pink winter jacket but that's all. His own Belstaff is downstairs on the hanger and John when he visits he leaves his jacket downstairs too.
There's no sign of John though, well except for Watson, Rosie, in Sherlock's chair. It's slightly disturbing though because one shouldn't be too far away from the other but…
Maybe it's a test of some sort.
There's tea in the kitchen and some bread in the bread holder but there isn't a lot. In the fridge are leftovers from yesterday's dinner, a lasagne that could be more than enough for one person but not enough for two. There are remains of a strawberry jam and a block of cheese as well as a few eggs and some milk but not a lot of it.
Well, that might explain the lack of John. He stepped out to do the shopping which they're going to need especially if John plans to stay as he was already scheduled, until dinner, or maybe even after dinner considering that Rosie is with him.
He carefully steps around John's chair and gently lowers himself to sit on the edge of the seat as he takes in the sight before him.
Rosie's hair are darker than he remembers them being but then again he hadn't seen her in nearly seven weeks with the exception of a brief glimpse when Molly stepped out of John's and Mary's flat with Rosie in her arms but Rosie had a hat on that day. John's hair before they gone grey were dirty blonde and Mary's… who knows which was her natural colour. Rosie's hair are curly too, like Mary's. But she has John's blue eyes and most likely will end up having his nose too.
She looks so peaceful and so… there, as if the chair was designed for her to nap in it.
They used to put her in John's chair in the past but mostly because John's chair was harder for her to fall from, thanks to the slight tilt of the seat.
She starts stirring in her sleep, slowly. At first her right leg stretches out slightly, then her right arm stretches and her hand swats the cushion of the chair. Then she opens her eyes and she raises her head as she attempts to sit up and he recognises that she might be in danger of falling off the chair so he scoops her up into his arms as soon as she manages to prop herself slightly.
It's an awkward hold. He didn't have a chance to hold her for a long time and she got bigger in the meantime. But soon enough muscle memory kicks in and he rearranges his hold on her to be more comfortable for both of them.
She blinks at him owlishly but she doesn't start screaming, which is good. She just watches him intently, as if she's trying to figure him out. At the same time as she watches him he watches her too and realizes that her eyes got lighter than they have been and rather than John's blue they're Mary's green.
It's a bit disappointing but it doesn't change that she's still John's daughter. Besides she's still small and pudgy like any baby so she might grow into Watson's features.
"I sincerely think that you do, Wa… Rosie," he tells her softly, correcting himself before he calls her Watson again.
In a response she swats his cheek with her right hand and gurgles at the contact with his beard. Then she does it again, patting it gently and moving her tiny fingers over the coarse hair.
"Itches," he says to her.
She probably finds the texture fascinating. He doesn't know who John uses as her sitter and how many of them had been men but John himself is always clean shaven and even when he cannot spare the time to shave properly he tries to use an electric razor. So most probably she didn't have a chance to come in contact with a bearded individual.
Rosie coos as she leans forward and runs both her hands over his beard.
"Glad you approve," he tells her, pausing when she runs her hand over his lip. He chases it with a small peck on it which makes her giggle before he adds. "Your Daddy might not be happy about it though," he pauses again. "We can use your opinion as a leverage in that discussion. I already have a reputation so I don't really need to shave to look professional. Plus, my beard would drive Uncle Mycroft nuts and everything that gives him a conniption is a good thing in my book."
Rosie coos in agreement.
"Great, that's settled," he says lightly. "Do you think I should grow a proper beard? I always wanted to be a pirate and they always had awesome beards."
Rosie grunts.
"Not a good idea?" he asks. "Perhaps you're right. Maintaining a proper beard would probably be more time consuming than shaving. Short beard then it is."
Rosie grunts again and her face scrunches in an expression familiar even to him. She's pooping. He almost groans, hoping that it isn't a messy one. She always liked doing that when John was otherwise occupied or when they agreed that Sherlock would change her next nappy.
At one memorable occasion she made such a mess that not only she needed to be hosed down while being held upright in the bathtub by her arms by Sherlock while John was doing the perfunctory cleaning up of the excess of her poo from her (somehow she even managed to get some of it into her hair) before they gave her a proper bath.
"It's my welcome back poo, isn't it?" he asks in resignation.
Rosie gurgles happily in an answer.
"You just wait," he tells her. "One day when you're grown and acting out your Daddy will punish you by making you clean my fridge and I will make sure that there will be some nasty and smelly spills for you to clean up. Completely safe obviously but gross by some peoples' standards."
Rosie coos as he shifts his hold on her to pat her bum. The bulge feels solid enough so he counts this as a small blessing before he heads back to the kitchen and proceeds to collect everything he needs to clean her up.
Rosie's bath towels were packed up with her when they handed her over to Molly before they went to Morocco so he spreads one of his own, a clean one, on the table after he empties the latter from the usual clutter.
He picks up a nappy from the box that was left behind in the sideboard and he hopes that she still fits into its size otherwise he will have to improvise. Then he returns to the bathroom to collect spare cream that was left behind, the washcloth and baby wipes.
Once he has everything he needs he lies her down on the table and gently removes her trousers and undoes the dirty nappy. As soon as he raises her legs to look at her bum he realizes that he had been deceived and it's a deception that's worthy of Mary's daughter.
Rosie's poo isn't technically a liquid one but it isn't as solid as he had been expecting it to be and the dirty trail spreads all the way beyond the edge of her nappy into her undershirt and now the other shirt she's wearing on the top of it.
"Why I'm not surprised," he tells her.
He turns around eyeing the sink which is blessedly empty and manoeuvring her as carefully as he can he takes her to the sink and places her in it. Once she's seated there he removes her upper layers and because that's his luck he manages to get some of the poo on her hair.
"You're a true criminal mastermind," he sighs. "Moriarty could have learned a thing or two from you," he adds with a grimace and then he smirks at the image. "He would have been far more easier to manage in that form though," he pauses. "James Moriarty criminal mastermind and pooer extraordinaire. Gets shit done at every hour, keeps his hands in every stinky business you can imagine and a few you cannot."
Gently he gives her a perfunctory clean up and holds her up with one arm while he waits for dirty water to disappear down the drain before he puts the plug in the sink and fills the sink with fresh water.
Blessedly someone left a bottle of liquid soap by the sink so he doesn't have to leave her unattended to pick hers from the sideboard or the bathroom. He squeezes some of it straight into the water to make bubbles. She used to be fond of bubbles. Then he steps away just enough to pick her washcloth from the table.
The bubbles keep her occupied while he washes her hair. Then he gets the brilliant idea to swipe a little of the foam from her head and he places it on her nose which makes her go cross-eyed for a moment before she slams both her hands into the water in a sign of protest.
Because his reflexes aren't up to their usual speed of reaction he jumps away but not fast enough to avoid getting splashed completely. There's a wet spot on his t-shirt and left leg of his pyjama pants but it could have been worse.
After that he rinses her gently, mindful to not get the soap into her eyes because he learned that lesson a bit too well in the past. Even at the thought of that he hears slight ringing in his left ear.
Once she's rinsed he holds her up for a moment before he takes a step back to make the transfer from the sink to the table easier without getting more water on himself. Then he places her on the towel on the table and proceeds to perfunctory dry her enough to put a fresh nappy on her.
And because that's apparently his luck the very moment he puts the fresh nappy under her back, lowers her legs and starts moving the front of the nappy towards her tummy to strap it she starts peeing.
"You couldn't have done that while you were in the sink, could you?" he asks her rhetorically.
Rosie coos in an answer.
"Pure evil," he sighs before he reaches for the wipes.
He removes soiled nappy and drops it into the bag with the other one then wipes her before he makes a beeline to the sideboard for a new one.
This time nothing happens when he puts it on her and he finishes towelling her without much of a fuss. Once done with that he wraps her in a towel while he tries to figure out how to handle the next obstacle which is changing her into fresh clothes because all of the old ones with the exception of socks are dirty.
He examines the living-room quickly but there's no diaper-bag in sight. It's weird but he doesn't have time to ponder that problem for too long because he remembers the simple correlation between babies being cold and them peeing themselves.
It might count as overstepping but if John will call him on that he will simply tell him that he couldn't find the bag.
He takes her to his bedroom and places her on the bed while he searches the drawer for what he wants. It was way too big for her when he bought it in the summer but he just couldn't resist the image of cheesy bee sewn on the front of the overalls and yellow shirt with another bee etched on it along with the word 'nice'.
It's cheesy and while God, in which he doesn't believe, forbid he wouldn't buy such a thing for himself doing it for Rosie is a completely different matter. They both have been washed already because knowing that they were too big he simply planned to introduce them into Rosie's wardrobe at the right time. Like he always did whenever he was buying clothes for her. He never liked making much of a fuss out of it so he just made sure that they somehow found their way into diaper bag or Rosie's wardrobe.
He manages to put overalls on her without a fuss and with only minimal kicking. They're still tad too big for her but will only require minimal turning up of the excess material to fit her. The shirt however isn't as easy to put on her. She tries to roll away on the first attempt and keeps flailing her arms until he finally loses patience with bending over her.
So he scoops her up, sits down on the bed and finally manages to wrestle the shirt on her while he's able to restrict her movements with his own body. Once he's done he puts her back on the bed, checks if the shirt didn't roll up in the overalls and fastens the straps. After moving her towards the middle of the bed he goes back to the kitchen to pick up her socks from the pile of the dirty clothing.
Wrestling socks on her takes another few minutes until he distracts her with tickles and finally he straightens and stretches up marvelling at the sight before him.
He feels accomplished and ridiculously pleased with himself.
It shouldn't feel as satisfying as it does. After all it was only changing and bathing his goddaughter but he feels as pleased with himself as he would have been if he just managed to catch a serial killer.
Now he sees another problem. Rosie is dressed and he's not. He also needs a shower, not very badly but he does have some standards. Except hopping into a shower would mean leaving her unattended because the bathroom is too small and too hazardous to put her there to keep an eye on her.
In the end he builds a small wall out of the pillows and rolled up duvet around her and he takes the fastest shower he had in at least a decade before he's back in the bedroom and towelling himself. It's not 'I overslept and I need to shower before going to work' Watson's kind of speed but it's still pretty damn fast.
At the very least Rosie only managed to sit up and throw one pillow on the floor without falling off the bed while he was gone. Which is definitely a plus. Instead she watches him intently as he zigs and zags around the room while he dresses because it occurs to him while he's almost dressed up in his usual attire that with Rosie here his chances of getting himself dirty without intention had improved drastically. On a very bad day in the past she was more than capable of getting a variety of goo on two sets of trousers, three shirts (one of them even before he managed to finish buttoning it up) and two dressing gowns and all of that within a single afternoon.
It's not that he cannot afford dry-cleaning or that Mrs Hudson is incapable of getting the most stubborn stains out of his shirts because they both can but…
The pair of black jeans he picks from the wardrobe is an old one. It's not the oldest one he owns but it's the only one that fits him because they were supposed to be too big when he bought them (as a part of some disguise). They're snug, not as much as some of his trousers but just enough to not require a belt like they did the last time.
He opts out of his normal shirts too and picks a long sleeved cotton shirt he keeps around for sleeping in on very cold winter nights. He doesn't use it often so the black colour didn't have a chance to wash out and it still looks relatively new even though it's not. He foregoes his dressing gowns and replaces them with one of the oldest button ups he owns. Technically speaking it's not even his own shirt but Daddy's and it's a relic from the times when Dad was slightly more bulkier than he's now. The shirt just came back with him from a visit in Sussex once and it just simply didn't make it back there since then.
It's not his usual attire and the entire thing looks like something that came out of John's wardrobe rather than his own but it's practical and it won't bother him overly if it gets dirty. Plus, knowing his luck the odds of him getting dirty drastically decreased just by wearing something he doesn't mind getting dirty.
If today goes well and the Watson contingent visits will gain some permanence he might even stock up similar attires. That might come later but first he needs to get through the day.
He finishes dressing up at the right time for Rosie to start fussing. It's also when he glances at the clock and the hour registers with him. Sure, he's more than capable of telling the hour by the sun's position over Baker Street even in wintertime but it's something he has to concentrate on and sometimes when he wakes up he can't bring himself to bother with it.
It's half past six. Way too early for him because he usually sleeps at the minimum until seven, more often until eight when he can but his entire sleep schedule had been thrown off the course by his recent drug binge. The nightmare didn't help him either and with all the pondering he spent on it he probably woke up between half past five or a quarter to six.
On the top of that he wasn't exactly silent with all the racket he was making and as he tries to strain his ears over Rosie's distressed snuffles he cannot hear any sound coming from Mrs Hudson's flat.
Maybe she stepped out to the shops. She's an early riser even though she needs strong cup of tea to wake up properly.
Or maybe something happened. She isn't as old as his mother, a couple years younger in fact but she has a bad hip and could have fallen down or had a heart-attack.
He's out of the flat and hurrying down the stairs before he even finishes that thought. In seconds he reaches the door, finds it closed and as soon as his hand settles on the knob he also realises that it's locked. Which is weird.
Sure, early on after he moved and for a little while after he returned she used to keep the door to her flat locked, just like he did but soon enough they both grown lax with locking the doors to the individual flats because the front door had quite a good deadbolt and they always locked it. Additionally more often than not the individual door to the flats were either open or at the very least left ajar.
The door being closed is weird because Hudders grown so lax that even when she steps out to the shops she leaves the door to her flat open unless he's with a client when she leaves.
He turns around searching for any note she might have left behind but he finds nothing in the immediate vicinity. He even checks the pocket of his coat on his way upstairs because Rosie is starting to get really fussy.
"Did Daddy drop you here without breakfast," he tells her as he makes his way upstairs.
He examines the sideboard again. Sure enough, it houses a box of Aptamil that was left behind and when he shakes it slightly it appears to be full enough but the jars of baby food that had been left there with it are gone.
Probably he ate them at some point during the binge, though he has no memory of doing that so it might mean that as well as him it could've also been Wiggins. Either way he has no food other than formula.
He picks up Aptamil, places it on the sideboard and using the sideboard as an anchor point he hoists himself upright before he brings it to the counter. He rummages through the upper cupboards for Rosie's bottle because he knows that it's there somewhere.
It isn't. He finds it tucked in the left pocket of his blue dressing-gown in which he went to bed but removed when he went to the bathroom and he can practically hear Mycroft saying 'caring is not an advantage' when he pulls it up from the pocket.
Fuck off, Mycroft.
He allows that thought to pass through his mind as he makes his way back to the kitchen and as he enters it he spots a bowl of fruits which had been steadily filling up since he returned from the hospital. Every single one of his minders either bring one or two with them when they arrive or at the very least try to force one into him.
John is the most lax one of them when it comes to that. Unlike Molly he remembers that Sherlock is picky about his apples and indifferent to pears unless John comments that they're really sweet. Also as a doctor he recommends bananas but at the moment Sherlock has more than enough of bananas to not touch one for at least a week and they keep pilling.
He picks the most ripe banana from the bowl and brings it to the counter then he goes through the motions of cleaning up and sanitising the bottle. He had enough presence of mind to pour recommended dosage of warm water into a clean mug before he boiled the kettle again to sanitise the bottle.
It's a struggle and it drags on which Rosie doesn't like very much. The whole process would be much faster if he had both of his hands free. He could of course pick Rosie's highchair from upstairs but doing so would require either leaving her unattended or going there with her and then lunging it back downstairs while still holding her which wouldn't be exactly an easy task.
He should have gotten a carrier to keep for emergencies like that. He could have wrap her in his scarf in a makeshift sling carrier but it would have been too short for her, the knot would have to be very ti…
Then it comes to him.
Mummy's Christmas present, well part of it anyway. One that didn't make it to the package he sent to Sussex because he bought it in Morocco and during his drug binge he completely forgot about it. It's a cashmere shawl and it's longer than his own scarf, it probably won't be as secure as a proper wrap carrier like the one he found Mary watching when she and John were deliberating over the subject.
He tuned out most of the discussion back then and the only thing that registered with him was that John wasn't a fan of the idea of wrapping.
So the idea has some potential of being not good but if John will raise some objections then well, he didn't leave Rosie's carrier behind and besides it will be for just a few minutes.
So he leaves the water to cool down and once again makes his way into the bedroom. He plops Rosie in the middle of the bed and starts rummaging through the drawers for the shawl. He finds it pretty easily in the same drawer in which he keeps the stuff he buys for Rosie but tucked in the deep end of it.
It smells of fabric softener so he guesses that's clean enough for Rosie.
Tying it properly possesses some problem but from the memories from India, Nepal and Tibet he remembers that the whole thing should be adjustable by pulling at the tails of the sling so he tries various knots until he gets one that tightens and lessens the fabric by pulling on the tail.
Rosie gets into the sling without protests and allows him to pull the fabric until it's pulled over her knees and her back. The sling pinches a bit at the neck but once he adjust it it's perfect. One perfectly snuggled baby in and two free hands out.
He makes his way back to the kitchen and returns to preparing the bottle for Rosie. Once done and checked for temperature he hands it to her. While she's occupied with the bottle he washes and peels of the banana before he drops it into a bowl and proceeds to mash it into a pulp with a fork.
She's halfway through the bottle when he offers her the first spoon of banana mush. She accepts it eagerly and mashes her lips together when he tries to gently pull the spoon out of her mouth.
He smiles at her and waits for her to swallow before he gives her another. When he's waiting for her to swallow this time he walks over to the fruit bowl and picks another banana. Between another spoon he pours out his cold tea and washes and peels off the banana. Between another he turns on the kettle and prepares tea for himself. By the time she munches on the next one he decides to prepare a pot of tea. Because even if John had the worst luck ever at the shops he should be coming back by now and a cup of warm tea might put him in a good mood.
He feeds Rosie with another spoon of the banana mush before he refills the kettle and starts preparing the pot. He's quite loud, puttering around the kitchen, switching smaller pot that would be able to fill four cups of tea he picked first for the bigger one that would fill four mugs instead. Then he ponders upon the actual tea. His preferred choice for morning tea is Earl Grey but John prefers English Breakfast or Yorkshire Gold.
While the kettle begins to boil he goes to the fridge hunting for remains of milk because he remembers that there should be enough of it for tea. He picks the milk from the fridge, bangs the door shut while he's turning around and manages to put the last spoon of banana mush in Rosie's mouth before he pours the water into the pot.
He's pondering whatever or not he should warm up the mugs with boiled water when he hears the distinctive sound of John cleaning his throat coming from behind his back. He puts the kettle down on the counter and finds himself smiling as he's turning away from the counter over his right shoulder.
John is standing in the doorway with a diaper bag slung over his right shoulder and a shopping bag and keys in his right hand, a very surprised look on his face and – that's when Sherlock's smile turns first into a frown and then into a mirror of John's surprised face – on his left hip John is holding a pink fluffy bundle that reaches out and pulls the tiny cap from its head just enough to reveal a hint of dark blonde curls.
He blinks and tries to process what just happened.
John is right before him and he's holding a child that from the distance looks like Rosie he remembers. On the other hand the weight on his left side and hip is solid, as is the hand that comes to swat him on the nose and then pat him on the beard as the not-Rosie in his arms tries to reach for the bottle over his back.
Mechanically he steps away to the right and turns slightly to the left to pick it up and offer it to not-Rosie. She picks it up and raises it to chug at the remains of milk happily. He watches her do it, she's smiling around the teat.
Dark curls, green eyes. Definitely real.
"Sherlock," says John finally which makes Sherlock turn his head back to him. "Would you mind…" he pauses and clears his throat. "Who's that?" he asks finally.
Sherlock looks from John to not Rosie and then back to John again before he answers blankly, "I can honestly say that I don't have even the faintest idea."
Next: John