Happy Birthday:
John and Sherlock's first Valentine's Day as parents drew to a close and brought with it the daunting task of celebrating their daughter's first birthday. They planned to have a small celebration in their flat with their landlady, Mrs. Hudson, Sherlock's brother, Mycroft, and John's sister, Harriet, who has never met Dora, but preparing for a party and trying to keep an eye on a mobile child was proving to be quite a challenging task for John, especially since this child was Sherlock's.
Dora was extremely curious and into anything she could get her hands on, and her Father, of course, was nowhere to be found.
"Dora, I thought I told you to stay out of the cabinets." John sighed, rushing over to pick her up. "Where's your Father?"
Dora shook her head and struggled against his grip. "No!" She cried.
John set her down in the living room and turned on the television. "Stay put, Dora. Daddy's trying to clean."
Sherlock swore he would help him, but he was nowhere to be found leaving John responsible for an almost one year old and planning a party.
Cleaning and keeping Dora out of trouble was a nightmare. Whenever John's back was turned, she took off making more messes than what they started with.
"Alright, you win. I give up." John scooped her up and marched to the bedroom. "Sherlock Holmes, Where the hell have you been?" John yelled, setting Dora on the bed.
"You promised to help me with Dora and you are sleeping." John continued shaking Sherlock awake.
"Wh-wha? What's wrong?" Sherlock jumped and looked around.
"Watch her. Don't let her make any more trouble. You do remember we are having company tomorrow don't you?" John left without waiting for a reply and busied himself cleaning and decorating as the guests were arriving kind of early.
"Daddy's in a mood isn't he?" Sherlock mumbled to Dora. "Let's take a nap." He added, laying down and falling back asleep.
"Sherlock Holmes!" Sherlock jumped once more to the sound of John's voice.
"Look at this! You were supposed to be watching her!" John yelled gesturing to the mess Dora had made in the bedroom while Sherlock was asleep.
Drawers had been emptied and clothes had been thrown in various locations throughout the room, and John wasn't happy. "I'm going to give Dora a bath and then I'm going to put Dora to bed, and if this isn't cleaned up by then, Sherlock, you are going to regret the day you were born. Come on Dora say goodnight to Father." Dora waved and toddled beside John to go get ready for bed leaving Sherlock to deal with the mess she made.
The Next Morning:
The party was quickly approaching, and John and Sherlock were running seriously behind. The food had yet to be prepared, the decorations were not finished, and Dora was still asleep in her crib. John was frantic trying to finish everything before the guests arrived, and Sherlock, well Sherlock was Sherlock. Sherlock was trying to be helpful, but in reality he was standing off to the side criticizing John on his work.
"That's crooked you know." Sherlock pointed to a banner John had just hung. "John? John, are you listening?"
"Would you like to do it yourself, then?" John asked, annoyed.
"I was simply pointing out a fact." Sherlock said, fiddling with different things John had bought for the party. "And honestly John why do we need all of this? She's not going to remember this when she's older. We could've saved ourselves some money and not bought all of these decorations."
"Money is not the point, Sherlock. It's for celebration. It makes it festive. Besides, once she's older and asks about her childhood do you really want to explain we didn't do anything special for her first birthday because her Father wanted to save some money." John argued hanging up more decorations.
Sherlock rolled his eyes and moved to the couch.
"Are you really just going to sit there?" John asked.
"Yes." Sherlock replied flopping onto his back and watching him. "It's more fun this way." He smirked.
John sighed and finished decorating just as the first guest knocked on the door.
John opened the door as it was obvious Sherlock was unwilling to get it and welcomed Mrs. Hudson into the flat. "Hello, Mrs. Hudson."
"Hello, dear. You did a fabulous job decorating the flat looks great." Mrs. Hudson gushed smiling at John. She knew better than to think Sherlock had anything to do with the way things looked. "And where is the birthday girl?" Mrs. Hudson asked.
John paled. In his rush to get the food put together and to finish decorating, he had forgotten to wake his daughter and get her ready for the day. "She's just, uh, taking her morning nap. I'll go get her. Sherlock, behave." John said, rushing to Dora's room.
"Dora, time to get up." John picked her up and changed the still sleeping child into a cute blue dress he had bought her for the party. He searched frantically for her brush and quickly tried to tame her wild hair.
How could she have hair worse than Sherlock's when she didn't share his DNA? John thought. Her hair was impossible, and after a few minutes of struggling he gave up and walked back into the living room where he saw that Mycroft had arrived. Mrs. Hudson was doing her best to keep the mood light, but John noticed that everyone relaxed a bit when he entered the room with Dora.
"There she is." Mrs. Hudson cried.
John passed Dora to her and said hello to Mycroft before excusing himself, his sister was late and he wasn't happy. John stepped into the bedroom and pulled out his mobile and dialed Harriet's number. No answer. John decided to send her text and head back into the living room.
Where are you? Call me.-JW
John heard nothing for another hour. Everyone had finished eating and were about to prepare cake when John's phone beeped.
I'm pulling up.-HW
John excused himself and rushed downstairs hoping to intercept his sister at the door. She was just stepping out of her cab when he got outside.
"Hello, John." Harriet said, smiling.
John frowned. She was almost two hours late without informing him why and she thought everything was okay. John was pissed. "Where the hell have you been?"
"Excuse me?" Harriet asked confused. What did it matter she was here?
"Where were you, Harriet? You were supposed to be here ages ago. You couldn't be bothered to call?" John fumed.
"I'm sorry, John. I'll make sure I call next time. Do you plan on standing out here all day? It's cold out." Harriet moved to enter the flat, but was once again cut off by John.
"I can't let you go up if I can't trust you. Look, that's my family up there, and I don't want you messing it up. I can't have you coming back into my life, into my daughter's life, if you are still drinking or are in any way unreliable. I don't want to bring someone into my daughter's life that can't count on, Harriet, and I'm not sure she can count on you."
Harriet was speechless. Sure, she knew John didn't like her drinking, but she didn't expect him to yell at her in the streets just because she was late to a party. "John, I'm sorry, okay. I'll do better. I promise. Let's just go up."
"I'm not sure I can just take your word on it. I want Dora to have her aunt, I truly do, but I need more than you than just a promise. You've promised me before and you went back on it. Until you can prove you are sober and reliable, I can't allow you to meet Dora. Just go home, Harriet." John turned and headed back into the flat.
"John, wait!" Harriet called, but it was too late. John was already inside.
"It's about time you got back up here. We were about to do cake without you. What took so long?" Sherlock asked once John returned to the flat.
"Oh, just had to return a work call. Sorry. Come on, let's do cake."
Sherlock lit the candle on the tiny cake they got for Dora and carried it to her highchair at the table, and everyone sang.
"Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday dear Dora. Happy Birthday to you."
Sherlock helped her blow out her candle and she immediately dug in.
Dora ate quickly and was soon covered in cake. It was all over her face and had managed to get in her hair.
"Ok, I think her Father gets to give her a bath don't you guys?" John asked his guests.
"Most definitely." Mycroft said.
"Oh, yes." Mrs. Hudson agreed laughing.
Sherlock groaned. "Fine, but only because she is quite adorable when she's covered in cake." He picked her up without thinking to wipe her hands or face, and she wrapped one of her fists tightly around Sherlock's hair causing everyone to burst out laughing.
Sherlock was shocked for a moment once he realized what was happening, then he glared at John. He reached down to the leftover cake on Dora's highchair and smashed it onto John's head causing Mrs. Hudson and Mycroft to laugh again.
John seemed astonished, but Sherlock didn't wait for his reaction. He raced to the bathroom and washed the cake off of Dora and himself and got them both fresh clothes.
He came back in time to say goodbye to Mycroft and Mrs. Hudson. "Thank you for coming. It's been a pleasure really." Sherlock said, mostly to Mrs. Hudson.
"Say goodbye, Dora" John said, taking her from Sherlock.
Dora waved and the guests left successfully ending the first of any childhood birthday parties.
Sherlock left Dora's bedroom and put his violin away before heading to bed. He had just finished putting Dora to bed and he was longing for sleep. He flopped face first onto the bed nearly causing John to fall.
"Somebody's tired." John laughed. "Busy day?"
Sherlock glared at him. "Shut up." John was mocking him as Sherlock didn't do much to help him preparation wise for the party.
"Good day, then? I think it went rather well." John said.
"Yes. I happen to recall we were one person short. Am I right?"
John nodded.
"What happened to your sister?" Sherlock asked, turning on his side to look at John.
"She couldn't make it." John said bluntly, and Sherlock got the point that he didn't want to talk about her right now. "So, what a year."
"What a year, indeed." Sherlock agreed.
"And you thought you couldn't be a Father." John laughed. "You seem to be doing a fantastic job if you ask me. And if Dora could understand the question, I think she'd agree. She really does love you." John grinned at Sherlock.
"You're not so bad yourself." Sherlock replied half-smiling. "And I'm glad I trusted you. We do make a great little family, don't we?" He laughed and gave John a quick kiss before rolling over. "Goodnight, John."
John smiled. "Goodnight, Sherlock."
Author's Note: Thank you to anyone who has followed and favorited this. I'm glad to see people are liking this. Also, I'd like to give special thanks to SmilesSaveLives and RainyDays-and-DayDreams for reviewing. Your reviews made me super happy and keep me motivated to keep up with this. Thank you all for reading. ~AlieCat