Today's great word comes from TheCrazyFool1995. Like with my "bed" drabble, I wanted to try to go in a less obvious direction.
If you had told Sherlock a year ago that he would become completely spellbound by one specific person, he'd have scoffed and likely called you some unkind name. People, yes. People could be interesting as a unit - average expected behaviours, deviations, it was all intriguing from a remote distance. However, one solitary human, capturing his attention for hours on end, the idea seemed preposterous
John, though, is not like everyone else. He is a source of eternal fascination for Sherlock. Below the surface, hidden under layers of jeans, jumpers, and sport-shirts, simmers an incredibly complicated man. A man who would kill for a virtual stranger, a man with a strong moral code, a man conflicted by past trauma. Sherlock tests him, tests his loyalty. He interrupts dates, he experiments on John without consent. And yet John remains devoutly loyal. He may yell and stomp off, but he always returns. Sherlock would find this sort of unsurprising behaviour infuriating from nearly anyone else in the world, and yet when John reacts exactly the way he'd anticipated, it's not boring - it's confirmation of a theory. If he does something unexpected, it's not a reason to get irritated, it's an excuse for further study.
John is steadfast, solid, and trustworthy. He may sometimes be predictable. Never, however, is he tiresome or banal.