AN: first of all, thank you! Thank you to everyone who's following this story, who has favourited it, who's liking it! Lately I've received some very lovely comments about it and they have definitely warmed my heart! You are all great and I love you all :)

Enjoy the chapter!

It was Christmas Eve. A very solitary and boring Christmas Eve for John. He was sitting on his armchair watching a crap TV show he really didn't want to watch. But he had nothing more interesting to do. His sister had called him at least four times during the last twenty-four hours to invite him for dinner and he had refused.

It was not that John didn't like his sister, he just couldn't…approve her past. They had never really got on with each other and, as time passed, John had found himself more and more distant from her. The breaking point had been his departure for Afghanistan and both her and his divorce. Now she was living with another woman and John didn't like her choice. Hence the conclusion: no Christmas Eve's dinner for John Watson.

Plus he really wasn't in the mood to fake Christmas happiness.

It had passed a week since he had last seen Sherlock. Well, since he had last heard about him too. There had been no messages anymore between them. Partially because John was still angry, partially because he was rather broken too. The 'I don't have friends' sentence was still burning in his heart like nothing else. If he indulged in the thought of it for a while, John could feel his whole body tense and his heart burst into flames until he couldn't feel it inside of his chest anymore.

More than once he had tried to reconsider the nature of his attraction to Sherlock, desperately trying to persuade himself that he had been just confused, that he didn't like Sherlock in a romantic way, that there was still a perfect logical explanation for those emotions. Except that, obviously, there wasn't. Except that he failed to not think about Sherlock every five minutes.

The young man hadn't even apologised for what he had done that day. Not that John had really hoped for that to happen, but deep inside he had wished for it. But a dehumanised man like Sherlock would have never apologised for such trivial matters. All he cared for was his exceptional brain and his overwhelming ego. And John had even believed that a kind, gentle Sherlock Holmes had existed. Such a fool. He was such a fool.

He dropped his head on the back of the armchair and stared at the ceiling. Midnight bells rang in that precise moment from the darkness outside. They echoed loud in John's small flat. So it was another Christmas, John thought while moving to the kitchen's cupboard. He took out a very old bottle of whiskey (oddly enough it had been his sister who had given it to him when he had returned from Afghanistan) and took a sip directly from it.

The warm liquor went down his chest straight to his almost empty stomach, making him feel immediately unstable on his legs. He dropped on the armchair once again, finally switching the crap television programme off.

Now the room was almost completely dark. There were no Christmas decorations in the flat, for he found them depressing, being him the only person who would have enjoyed them. He took another sip of whiskey. It was good. The alcohol was comfortable and he was starting to become a little tipsy. He didn't mind that much. He took another sip, closing his eyes and following the path of the drink down to his stomach. There were flickering lights coming from the streets. Red. White. Green. Green. White. Red. They danced on John's walls and John lost himself into them. It was a stupid way to distract himself from his thoughts, but worked rather nicely. He took another sip and eventually put the bottle down.

He continued to stare at the lights, until the white ones somehow turned into Sherlock's alabaster skin and the darkness around turned into Sherlock black curls. He felt extremely drowsy, but the image in front of his eyes became more vivid, to the point that Sherlock appeared in all his magnificence. John smiled wearily and picked up the bottle once again and, as to toast, he stretched his arm to the dreamy figure of the young man.

"I know you're just a reflection of my stupid brain, Sherlock.", he said in a low voice "Anyway: merry Christmas to you, bastard, selfish, infuriating and…gorgeous man."

And he took the last sip from the bottle, put it back in the cupboard and finally dragged himself to bed.

He woke up on Christmas morning with a light headache and no will to get up from the bed. Frankly, in his own loneliness, Christmas was just a day like any other, but somehow sadder, for outside the whole world cheered around a Christmas table with their beloved ones and he…well, he was alone. Unless he wanted to spend the day with his sister, which was the least thing that could've happened right now. Instead he would have loved to spend the day with…Sherlock. Obviously. It was a random thought, he was still cross at the young man, but he couldn't deny that he was thinking about how it could have been. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine it.

He found himself in the same flat he was in, but it was completely different. There was a cosy and homey atmosphere. There was a fireplace where a warm fire was crackling slowly. There was a Christmas tree in a corner and Christmas light at the windows. There was the scent of spices: cinnamon, myrrh and bergamot. There was snow outside and the light of the day was dim. And there was Sherlock obviously, with his violin, playing a melody John couldn't quite catch. The pale face a mixture slightly orange from the fire, the black hair burning red, the eyes like dancing flames.

He opened his eyes to find himself back to reality. He repeated to himself that he shouldn't indulge in such thoughts for they were impossible dreams and would have only made him suffer more and more.

He eventually got up and, after a while, decided to go for a long walk.

Despite being Christmas day, the streets were packed with tourists enjoying the spectacle that the city gave to his guests. And it was certainly a scenery to admire even for John who hadn't seen London on Christmas for three years, being stationed in Afghanistan. The day was cloudy and there wasn't much light around, so, although it was mid-morning, the illuminations of the streets shone brighter in the soft darkness. Christmas music came from the open shops along the roads and the smell of hot chocolate, smoking chimneys and Christmas teas filled the air around. Everyone walked with a bright smile hand in hand with the people they loved, cheerfully chatting together: the perfect picture of a Christmas day. Except, maybe, for a single out-of-place man who walked silently through the flow of people, with his grey-blonde hair and his still slightly tanned skin: John Watson.

He stopped near a busker who was playing a festive tune on a violin. He looked at the man, whose fingers run on the violin strings with some sort of roughness. He found himself smiling while he mentally compared the delicacy of Sherlock's marble lithe fingers to the ones of the street musician. There was no comparison even in the music. The man was playing his own version of "Silent Night" with great mastery, but everything faded as compared with the music that had come out from Sherlock's instrument. As the young man was different from any other man around so was his music. For his way of playing was like Sherlock himself: shallow and deep, mysterious and luminous, bitter and sweet, egocentric and brilliant. God, he was still thinking about Sherlock. He huffed in the cold December air, creating a small white cloud in front of his nose. He took a five pound note from his wallet and threw it into the busker's hat. The man smiled at John, slightly nodding in gratitude.

He went on walking for some other time. As he was crossing a small park, his phone buzzed. It took it out. His sister still insisting that he should join her at least for Christmas. He immediately tapped his umpteenth negative answer, yet he wished her a merry and joyful day. Seconds later it buzzed again. Unknown number, which, anyway, looked quite familiar.

Merry Christmas, Laura.

John had to look twice at the message to connect. Laura. There was no doubt that it was an impersonal message, but it made him think nevertheless. He had almost forgot about her and he felt very sorry about how she had treated her back then. She had been nice with him and he had been a total asshole. He slightly chuckled at the sudden realisation that she had been the first to suggest that there was something between him and Sherlock, even before John himself had understood it. Anyway she had been wrong. There was nothing between Sherlock and him. Only a hopeless one-sided love. He answered the message with a courteous 'Merry Christmas to you too, John' and deleted both the messages.

Then he stopped, fiddling with the mobile in his hands, wondering whether to send a message to Sherlock or not. As always, he couldn't make up his mind. He desperately wanted to do that, but with what purpose? The young man would have probably answered courteously, without even caring about it, and stop. No point at all.

He eventually decided to go back to his flat to eat lunch. He had bought some packed appetizers and had some turkey left-overs from two days before. He had even got some wine to go with his, he had to admit, quite poor Christmas lunch.

As soon as John entered his flat, he noticed a small packet on the kitchen table. It was wrapped in a perfectly folded metallic red paper with a golden ribbon around. He suspiciously looked at it and glanced at the four corners of the room, then moved to the bedroom and to the bathroom. Nobody. Not a single trace of a possible intruder. The door had been locked, there was no different smell and nothing had been moved. But the packet, obviously, couldn't have just appeared out of nowhere.

He returned to the table and gave it a closer look. It was of a medium dimension and, when he took it in his hands, John noticed it was quite heavy. He stroked the wrapping paper and smelt it to see if he could trace any familiar scent. Nothing. He put it down and stared at it one more time. Two minutes later he eventually decided to open it. He gently took away the ribbon and unwrapped it from the red paper. It appeared to be a red leather box with something heavy inside. He opened it. What he found was beyond any possible idea he had had until that precise moment.

In front of his eyes there was a gun. It wasn't any other gun but a SIG Sauer P226 itself, the one gun which was the standard equipment of the British Army, practically identical to the one John had owned during his three years stay in Afghanistan. Obviously it wasn't the same weapon. This one was shining new, not a single scratch on it. The cold black metal glittered in the light of day and John's heart started to race inside his chest. Was it a threat of some sort? He feared it and picked it up very carefully from his box. Nothing happened. It was just a cold piece of metal.

As he had it in his right hand, it immediately brought him back to his days and nights in the desert, where he could only breathe dust and were life was a mere illusion. It brought him back to the harsh smell of gunpowder, to the metal sweat coming down from the helmet, to the stink of the blood drying in the open air. It brought him back to the starry sky in the dead silence of his patrol nights, to the noise of the far away mortar shots, to the hands crusted with dirt. But they weren't painful memories. He would have never admitted it openly, but he somehow missed that risky life, the adrenaline pumping in his veins, the well-known smell of peril. Sometimes he had wondered whether he were more of a soldier rather than of a doctor. And all of a sudden he understood another piece of his attraction to Sherlock Holmes. That man smelt of danger himself. As Sherlock had said once 'It's always the danger'. And it was the goddamn truth.

He looked at it again. While the right side of the stock was perfectly clear, the left side of it had something that John had least expected to find. It took him a few seconds to realise that there was something engraved on it. A writing. No, not a writing. A name.

John H. Watson

On the L105A1 there was his own name carved. The chosen font was graceful and elegant, like it was a piece of jewellery instead of a weapon. He caressed it with his trembling fingers, tracing the smooth surface of every single letter.

It was in that precise moment that he noticed a piece of paper on the bottom of the box, under the place where the gun had been. It was of an old creamy colour and it came from a music score page. There were some notes on it and a pure, refined calligraphy. He had already seen that writing, a long time before on a note left on his bedroom sill. Sherlock's handwriting. Two single words.

Sorry.
Sherlock

John stared at them, lost in both amazement and perplexity.

So it was Sherlock's Christmas present for him. He should have deduced it. Who the hell on the whole Earth would chose a gun as for a present? He smiled at the idea. Most of the people in the world would have found it highly inappropriate, but John found it…appropriate. He liked it. He had somehow missed his gun since they had requested him to give it back when he had been invalided home from Afghanistan. And he would have sworn that Sherlock knew it too well. He smiled a bit brighter.

'Sorry'. That left him rather puzzled. It was like the other times when the young man had said the same exact word. It didn't look like a sorry for something specific, it looked like an apology for things that were beyond John's comprehension. Whether he was saying sorry for what he had said one week before or for some other unknown reasons, John couldn't guess. Yet he accepted the apology for everything: for the accident of the previous week, for the disappearance of the last month, for the fact that Sherlock couldn't love him back. He forgave him wholeheartedly. No matter how much he could be mad at the young man: a 'sorry' from him almost meant a 'please, forgive me because I am not capable of being a normal human'. It was his own plea, and John, sincerely, couldn't just not forgive him on Christmas day. Especially after that present. He smiled again and ate the poor Christmas lunch a little happier than before.

When he finished, he picked up his phone and eventually decided to send the message he hadn't had the courage to earlier that morning.

Thank you and merry Christmas, Sherlock
John

The answer didn't arrive for a long time. It was four o'clock and a pale sun behind the clouds was setting down, when the mobile buzzed, making an asleep John Watson jump on his armchair. He looked at the screen.

Merry Christmas to you too, John
Sherlock

John couldn't help but smiling at the message and he reread it a dozen of times, before taking the second awkward decision of that day. He decided to pay a visit to Sherlock at his flat. He had been there when he had been drunk. He had to focus to remember the address. At first his memories were completely vague and blurry. He hardly remembered anything important. He had a very imprecise idea of the streets where they had walked and it took him his greatest efforts to extract a vivid image. A blue door with a golden doorknocker. Three numbers and a letter over it: 221B. Now the street. He needed the street. He could have looked it up on his laptop, but he was sure he could have retrieved it from his mind if only he focused on the matter. He remembered his unsure steps, clinging on to the young man's arm. He remembered looking up when they had arrived in front of the door. A signpost on the building at the corner of the street. Baker Street. 221B Baker Street.

He clapped his hands together in satisfaction and went out, hailing a taxi to the place. He arrived thirty minutes later.

London was already in the darkness of the incoming night and the Christmas illuminations in the streets shone brighter. Baker Street was no exception. A carnival of flame-like lights was filling the obscurity, giving the street a cosy and warm air. And, even if a freezing wind had started to blow, John felt reassured and warmed by those lights.

As he stepped out of the taxi, the door welcomed him. However, now that he was there, he began to think it hadn't been a great idea. What would he was supposed to say? Well, a 'Merry Christmas' would have certainly worked. But after that? He paced for a while to and fro in the street. When he had finally managed to calm himself down, he plucked all his courage up and rang the bell. He was sweating cold. He would have sworn that centuries passed while he waited. He heard footsteps behind the door, but they weren't Sherlock. Oh my!, he thought, what if Sherlock wasn't alone? What if there were other people with him? He was about to turn away, when the door opened.

An old lady gave him a puzzled look.

"Good evening.", she said, still looking perplexed.

"Ahem.", he cleared his throat "Good evening. I am…", he found it difficult to speak, head gone numb and mouth cotton dry "…looking for Sherlock Holmes. Is he in?"

The old lady expression changed into an apologising one.

"Sorry, dear.", she said "Sherlock hasn't been home since this morning. I'm really sorry."

"Not a problem.", he managed to answer.

"Did you need him for a particular reason?"

"Not really. I was just…passing by and stopped to say hello."

The old lady's face returned perplexed and then changed into a soft, caringly smile.

"Would you like some tea, dear? It's cold outside and maybe he'll return soon."

John thought it would have been a great idea if he had been in the conditions to wait for Sherlock's return, but he was already feeling all his courage disappearing in a bunch of seconds.

"No, thanks. I've got to go. It's quite late and…I have to return home."

"Oh, ok. I'll tell him you've come when he's back. What's the name?"

John thought about whether to say his name or not.

"I'm just…a friend. A friend.", he said in the end.

The old lady gave him an odd look, like she was surprised about the word 'friend', but said nothing on that.

"Ok,", she replied "I'll tell him. Good evening and merry Christmas!"

"Merry Christmas!", John answered.

And he walked away. Small snowflakes started to fall from the sky. He rubbed his palms together to gain some warmth and hailed a taxi home.

One week later it was New Year's Eve. As always, John was alone in his flat waiting for another year to finish and for a new one to begin. He found himself thinking about what had happened to him during the year that was about to end. It was very hard to sum up everything.

In January he had had the worst surgeries of his whole military career to do. A bomb had exploded in a village nearby and he had had to amputate a good deal of limbs from men, women and children. Then a friend of his had took a bullet right in the leg while they had been on patrol and he had had to extract it in the middle of the night when they were kilometres away from the nearest settlement. He had had to tore off part of his uniform to restrain the seepage. He had had to walk all the kilometres back holding his friend up. They had luckily managed to reach the camp, both safe.

In March he had almost got himself killed. A bomb had exploded a dozen of metres away from where he was standing and, to see what was happening, he had moved from his safe position. Then there had been the shot. The loud bang of it still echoed in his ears. It was nothing like anything he had ever proven before. He had felt like his left shoulder had been ripped from his chest, like all his blood had been pulled out and pushed back in in a matter of seconds, like his heart had suddenly exploded together with the bomb. He had survived. With his shoulder soaked in blood, he had started to run, almost breaking his right leg during the escape. He had survived.

But he had spent two months in a hospital. The wound had been pretty bad and it had taken him two months to regain the full use of the left arm. But he had been left with a very evident scar and a limp. Psychosomatic, as firstly his psychotherapist and secondly Sherlock had told him. Nevertheless, for three months he hadn't been able to walk without a cane.

Then in June, when he had been finally discharged from the hospital, he had been completely at loss with himself. He hadn't got any job, any family, any friend. The army had granted him an accommodation and a pension, but John had felt useless. But one day he had met his old friend Mike Stamford who was desperately looking for a new organic chemistry professor, since he had been appointed vice-chancellor the previous week and he hadn't been able to find a decent replacement. He had thus asked John a big favour. John had refused at first, only to accept three weeks later, after Mike's insistence.

In September he had started his new job and he had met Sherlock Holmes. He remembered their first half-meeting at the park, when the young man had stumbled upon him, making him losing his balance and almost fall on the ground. Then he had met him in his classroom and had been fascinated by his cleverness. Then he had gone on a crime scene with him, solved cases with him, fell in love with him.

He really could not have said that it had been a normal, tranquil year.

While he was still lost in his thoughts, bells began to chime and fireworks exploded outside John's flat, lighting up the dark room. He moved to the window to enjoy the sight. Flashes of red, green, blue, yellow and pink cut through the sky, drops of gold blasted in the air to fall down in a cascade, sparkles of silver shone in the starless coloured night.

He picked up his phone.

Happy New Year, Sherlock.
John

He didn't expect the young man to answer, but he did. Seconds later the screen flashed.

Fireworks are certainly an unbeatable show from your living room window. Enjoy them.
Happy New Year, John.
Sherlock

John smiled at the message. As always, Sherlock knew. He didn't even question himself anymore on how he did it. Sherlock simply knew. He turned his head to the window.

"Goodbye to John Watson's weirdest year and welcome to a surely new odd one.", he said with a smirk.

What now?

AN pt.2 :

A small note about the gun: our lovely Jim Moriarty in The Great Game says that Sherlock is holding a L9A1, which is wrong.
Sherlock is actually holding a Sig Sauer P226R, also known under the name of L105A1.

Hence my idea of using the L105A1 in the chapter as the present.
About the engraving on it: I haven't done any research about it, but I do think that, since it's made of metal, it's actually possible.
On how Sherlock acquired the gun: well, he probably has got his ways!

(I don't know how I would react if someone gave me a gun as present o.o, John takes it lovely ^^)