The Sweet Taste of Defeat
Mrs. Hudson has already closed shop by the time they returned to Baker Street. Sherlock and Hermione are greeted with a boastful welcome; the air smelled of food, people were already drinking and there was a huge banner that read: Congratulations, Hermione!
Hermione smiles and thanked everyone, as she makes rounds with hugs and kisses. Neville, Luna, Dean, Seamus, Angelina, Lee, Susan and the Patil twins are all there; as well as all the Weasley children. Hermione appears properly surprised to the all but Harry who shoots her a knowing look before giving her a quick peck and hug.
Mycroft is the only one there that belonged to Sherlock and while he smiles his fake smile and pats her gently on the back Hermione can only smirk. The man was trying too hard to make nice with her and it was incredibly amusing.
Ron is the first to state the obvious when he gets a hug, "Why are you wet, 'Mione? First in class don't you know how to stay dry?" He earns a good swat on the back of the head by George.
Harry is quick to interject juggling his drink in one hand and his fiancé who is hanging on the other.. "Sod it, Ron, looks as if Hermione forgot her umbrella, is all. This morning was beautiful." Harry and Hermione look at each other again, unspoken words conveyed, then they both look to their friend irritated. A silent message is exchanged between the three of them and Ron's ears go pink before he looks sheepishly to Sherlock.
"Come on now, let's get you dried off before you catch a cold." Ginny offers, cutting into the quiet, stepping away from her betrothed to usher Hermione up stairs.
"We'll help." Parvati and Padma say in unison following the girls up the stairs.
"Well I want another drink!" Susan declares, Ron is quick in obliging her.
Mycroft is busy making inquiries to a group in the corner. "What exactly are we congratulating, Miss Granger on?" He asks snootily. Neville looks to Dean who looks to Seamus all three seem at a loss of how to answer the muggle man's question.
"Hermione's work with her elves. Her bill for humane treatment, and her safe house has all gone through." Luna's dreamy voice carries across the room and the crowd goes quiet.
"Her orphans. She is a humanitarian, then?" Mycroft is the first to speak sounding pleased by this discovery, it was always in good taste to help those less fortune.
"Excuse me." Harry says, his piercing green eyes on Mycroft as he makes his way to the stairs.
"Think I'll check in on our guest of honor."
Harry knocks once before letting himself into her room. Hermione is changed her hair still damp as she braids it. Parvati and Padma are chatting about the bill and what it means to the wizarding community when Harry enters.
"Girl talk why wasn't I invited?" He teases and Ginny's face lights up. The twins blush. "Could I have a few words with the woman of the hour?" He requests. They file out Ginny gets a quick kiss before Harry shuts the door behind them.
"You text earlier and said you needed a favor?"
Hermione stands walking over to get the envelope Winky had delivered. "Yes. I need two favors actually. These are just pictures of me, from mobile phones. I need you to cross reference them with the phones we found on the murder victims from Sherlock's homeless network and set up a time line. Something is not adding up. Also I need a full background check done on a Joseph Morris."
"The newspaper man. The one that murdered all those people?" Harry asked.
"Yes... Well there is an element to this case that I am not seeing. Everything was just too tidy." Hermione rationalizes. "Another thing I can't get out of my head is that they were all poisoned, including Bear. But why didn't he just Apperate away?" Hermione wonders pacing.
"Caught by surprise, puncture wound was in the back of his head." Harry reasons.
"Yes, but the poison wouldn't have killed him instantly. So why did he stay in that alley way to die? Why not pop off somewhere else, somewhere he knew he could get an anti-venom?" Hermione logically works out.
"He was an elf, they are not the brightest. Perhaps he hadn't known he was poisoned." Harry suggests.
Hermione is already shaking her head. "No, you can't lump all elves into a category of ignorance. It is not their fault they are uneducated and just like people, some are smarter than others. Bear, was smart, clever even. He knew what he was getting himself into, he knew the stakes and he chose to die. Why?" Hermione asks, not wanting an answer just trying to work it all out. "He stayed in that alley way so I would find him. All of it means something more, I need more facts."
She declares facing Harry who pulls out his note book to take notes.
"Alright one background check coming up, so a Rita Skeeter or Voltemort?" Harry asks and Hermione tilts her head like considering his question. "Better go Old Voldi. Don't trust anyone. This stays between us."
"Like always." Harry states, standing. "Already keeping secrets from your new man...tis tis...let me know how that works out." He follows with a smirk.
Hermione smiles, "Sherlock is not my man and I'm sure you'll see the flames from Grimmald Place." Hermione assures her friend with an eye roll.
"Does he know that?" Harry asks, continuing with a warning. "You don't see the way he watches you, his eyes consume you, Hermione."
"He doesn't trust me, and he never will." She sounds so final about her words unpersuaded, that anything such a logical man does could mean more than the core of his nature.
"Because you won't let him see the real you." Harry explains.
"Yes and when has that ever worked in my favor? As Ron likes to remind me, I'm scary, insane and a know-it-all." Hermione shares leading Harry back down to the party.
"I'm still here, so is Ron in a manner, he doesn't mean any of it; not in the insulting way. You knew who he was when you chose him. Ron has always been the jealous sort."
"I had thought he would mature with age." Hermione reasons.
Harry looks at her with disbelief out of the corner of his eye. "If you thought that Ronald Weasley was a fine wine, then perhaps we should add delusional to your list of virtues."
Hermione swats Harry on the shoulder.
"People change, they grow and learn from their mistakes." Hermione argues.
Harry laughs. "Yep definitely delusional."
Hermione is ambushed the moment she makes it down the stairs by two identical faces leering at her as they block her path. "Fred, George." Hermione greets looking at each twin when she says their name.
"He's Fred, I'm George." Fred claims his ornery smirk in place.
Harry smiles walking around the group, leaving Hermione at their mercy.
"Then I get to be Harry Potter, tosser that abandon's his best friend!" Hermione says loud enough to earn a casual wave from a retreating Harry. "Now if you will excuse me I am already late for my party, pop off the both of you." Hermione demands in that bossy tone of hers, moving to walk around the pair of trouble makers.
"She always knows, Fred. There is no fooling our brilliant girl." George says, as both twins once more blocks her path.
"We have something for you." Fred states pulling out a gift bag with pink tissue paper.
Hermione looks at the bag suspiciously weary of their pranks. "If I get a black eye..." her warning is met with a playful smile from Fred and a look of concern from George.
"Come now, after all these years you still don't trust us? That hurts, Hermione Granger." Fred puts his hand over his heart, faking emotional turmoil.
Hermione gives them one more warning glare before unwrapping her present. It is a red plastic squirt gun, with bright yellow accents, filled with something purple. "What exactly am I looking at?" Hermione asks holding the muggle toy up and pointing it at the twins.
"It is filled with grape jelly!" George sound positively gleeful.
"Why grape jelly?" Hermione asks.
"Why not?" the twins answer in unison.
"Harry said we couldn't bring fireworks..." George says with a shrug.
"Because of the muggles." Fred reasoned.
"So Fred had the brilliant idea of muggle squirt guns!"
"And since it is your special day..." Fred does a silent air drum roll.
"You get to be on our team!" George announces.
"No!" Hermione shouts, making the twins' smile fall before a mischievous glen sparks back to life and Fred continues as if Hermione had not spoken.
"You get first dibs, but I would really like a chance at the overstuffed peacock in the pinstriped suit. Do you think he smells something funny?" Fred asks not expecting an answer. But Sherlock Holmes slides around the corner no doubt having been eavesdropping for longer than what is polite.
"No afraid that is just the way my brother always holds himself. What are you up to? Why are you hiding out in the stair well, while your friends consume Mrs. Hudson's kitchen?" Sherlock asks. While Hermione tries not to glare as threatening at her nosy flat mate as she is at the Weasley bookends.
"Hello, Sherlock." She greets, nailing casually expertly. "We are just arming ourselves." Hermione explains, holding up her red squirt gun with a nod.
Sherlock's eyes widen as he looks at the object intrigued. "Whatever, is it filled with?!" Sherlock inquires.
Hermione shoots him in the face, sticky grape jelly all over his mouth and nose. He flinches instinctively before his tongue darts out licking his lips. "Ah grape jelly. Nobel choice. Where is mine?" Sherlock purrs, pulling out a handkerchief and wiping his face off before holding out his hand expectantly.
"You want to be in?" George asks surprised.
"No one invited you." Fred states, looking upset.
Sherlock looks very serious as he declares, "Yes well if anyone gets to squirt Mycroft with grape jelly then I have more right than anyone here. Except perhaps Miss Granger. Did he take you to Palace for lunch? Of course he did; the food is blain and the atmosphere boring, you're more likely to get food poisoning than service. Which would be enough reason to ruin Mycroft's newest tailor suit with something sticky, though I usually envision brain matter..."
Hermione is smiling up at him the whole situation was completely absurd, when she cuts him off, "Alright Sherlock." Hermione says, holding her gun behind her back and doing a quick duplication spell pulling out its twin to hand to the detective.
The look on Sherlock's face is like a child on Christmas morning. "Battle plans." Sherlock leans in his plastic weapon loaded as he takes command.
"Point." George says with a goofy smile.
"Shoot." Fred finishes.
Sherlock rolls his eyes. "Element of surprise is good, but..."
"Hermione should go first." Fred interrupts and George nods.
"They will never expect Madame Rulearethereforareason to crash her own party." The name they gave her is always said with a horrible Russian accent. Hermione swats at George as the twins cackles at her expense.
"This one never breaks a rule. She is a stickler for them." Fred informs the detective and Sherlock is looking at them like their data does not compute with his own findings.
"She broke into my flat and stole sensitive information." Sherlock's accusation is met with approval by the red heads.
"They grow up so fast!" Fred mournfully declares reaching over to pull affectionately on Hermione's braid, teasingly. She swats at him glaring.
"We taught her everything she knows." Fred boasts.
"Well Harry helped." George interjects. Hermione shakes her head at them remaining silent.
"But we set Harry on the road of the Marauders, therefore..." Fred argues.
"Mathematically, we are the reason Hermione is so compromised!" George agrees.
"You want to see compromised." Hermione asks, reaching over and taking Sherlock gun from him pointing both toys at the twins.
They smirk at her and she shoots grape jelly all over the front of their sweaters. "Looks like you are out. Sherlock and I will handle things from here on." She smartly declares still glaring at them.
"Double crosser!" Fred shouts.
"Are we really out?" George whines.
"Its' her day, we better do as she says. She did just murder us in cold blood." Fred reasons pulling his shirt off. "I hope you have club soda!" the twins make their way to the kitchen.
Sherlock waits until they are out of ear shout. "Everyone else has gone out to the garden to admire Mrs. Hudson's flower beds." He informs Hermione.
Hermione holds out one of the red plastic guns to Sherlock. There is something tempting in the way he is looking at her as he takes it. It is like he can hardly comprehend what he reads on her at that very moment. "Come Sherlock, you can have my back." Hermione offers a smile blossoming as she leads the way out the back door knowing he will follow.
Sherlock tilts his head, her smile contagious as one forms on his own face. "You and me against the world?" His question is more a statement of pleasure, like the idea was a simplicity of life's greatest facts. So agreeable that all he could do was follow her into battle; their victory the flavor of grape jelly.
Everyone helps Mrs. Hudson clean up, well everyone but the Holmes brothers. Mycroft bows out the moment his suit is stained and Sherlock ducks upstairs when chores are mentioned. It is as much fun cleaning up as the party had been. The Weasley's throwing dishes around in the air as they wash and put them away. Neville and Luna have brooms and Parvati and Padma trash bags as they play a game of tossing trash into the bags with the brooms. Everyone finds an element of fun in the job, and Lee finds an old stereo putting on music, as they all dance and sing getting the place cleaned up. Hermione is not allowed to lift a finger and so she takes Mrs. Hudson by the hand and reassures the woman as she pulls her around and urges the land lady to sway her fake hips to the beat. Mrs. Hudson is laughing and in no time at all the whole house is spotless. When the last guest has said their fair wells Mrs. Hudson is still smiling swaying her body to a song in her head as she retires to her room.
Hermione goes up stairs to put away left overs in her and Sherlock's fridge. Sherlock is at his desk sitting at his lap top. He spares her at glance when she walks in. "The hooligans have all gone then?" he asks and she nods.
"Hooligans? I believe that description fits you just as accurately. Where'd you learn to handle a gun?"
"Cambridge." He answers aloof, "You have excellent aim, but I would suspect you have never actually held a real gun."
Hermione twirls around pointing at him, "Nope never, you are right! A gun is not my weapon of choice." She tells him mysteriously, walking over to pick up the book she had been reading and settling herself on the couch.
"Aren't you tired?" Sherlock inquires closing the top of his computer looking at her with that piercing stare.
She is in such a good mood that decides to put him off kilter, "I am, but I have to read before bed otherwise I have nightmares." She shares and she can tell by his expression that Sherlock finds this information a bit personal. He looks startled and she forces herself not to smile.
This was what unhinged him, humanizing an advisory.
"What have you seen that would give you nightmares?" Sherlock wants to know. He stands his eyes fixated on her expecting an answer.
She returns the stare, her own challenge as she chooses her next words with care. "I just offered you a piece of myself and in return you interrogate me. That is not how this works. You want more, you have to offer a piece of yourself in return." She lectures dismissing him, her attention on the book in her hand. She curls her legs underneath her and leans against the arm rest.
Sherlock remains standing in the middle of the room watching her every move. It is not hard to slow her breathing to focus on her book and pretend that she is alone, that nothing else mattered. She did, after all, have lots of practice. Hermione can see him out of the corner of her eye as she reads, she has always been an accomplished multitasked.
He seems to be arguing with himself there is an internal war going on in his eyes his body motionless his face stone. Then he makes a decision. His movement's fluid as he marches over and plops down on the couch resting his head on her lap his legs dangle over the other arm rest. He closes his eyes and puts his hands together, palms facing, over his mouth. "Shut up." He tells her, though she has not spoken a word.
She is shocked staring down at him wanting an explanation to a question she has no idea on how to word.
"I need to think and you are on my thinking couch. You were reading, I have no intention of interrupting you. We discussed sharing. So this is me sharing." He tells her and logically it makes sense.
Hermione readjusts herself so his head is not blocking her book holding it one handed. She has no other placement for her other hand so she rests it beside his head turning her attention back to her book tuning him out.
They sit like that for hours.
A comfortable rhythm emerges.
With Hermione turning pages, to Sherlock waving his hands silently about like orchestrating a silent symphony. It evolves into Hermione stroking Sherlock's hair as she reads silently and him blurting out words as he works through a problem in his head. Time passes and Hermione's book grows heavy. Sherlock's muttering dies down into a silence and it appears the detective has fallen asleep on her lap. One more chapter she thinks, next thing she knows Mrs. Hudson is walking in with a tray of tea and biscuits waking them.
"You two fell asleep on the couch again? Young people, you both have beds, you could take your pick. No need to be uncomfortable. You are going to have a crick in your neck young lady. As I've told Sherlock there are all sorts around here, live and let live!" Mrs. Hudson places the tea on the table as Sherlock sits up and Hermione stands to stretch.
"If you are so concerned why didn't you wake us earlier?" Sherlock asks grouchily clearly not a morning person.
"Had to get a picture to send to John! He was sorry he couldn't make it last night but things ran over at the office. You did invite him rather late." Mrs. Hudson declares brandishing her phone to show them the picture she took of them asleep curled up together.
Sherlock glares at the phone, no doubt already working out a way to have the picture expunged from the cyber world. "Is it to be black mail, then, Mrs. Hudson?"
"Oh Lord no, Sherlock." Mrs. Hudson reassures the man bustling over to the kitchen to make coffee for Hermione as she did every morning.
"That really isn't necessary, Mrs. Hudson, I can make my own." Hermione insist chasing after the woman, who shoos the witch back out of the kitchen. "You could, I have no doubts. Now go shower while I get breakfast started, and a little lipstick never hurt anyone." Mrs. Hudson kindly informs Hermione.
"Tell that to the whales." Is Hermione's reply. Sherlock throws an arm around Hermione ushering her towards the stairs to her room. "This, Miss Granger, is a battle you will always loose. Let her be, know when you have been beat." He commands.
"She doesn't have to take care of me. I don't need her to, I am a grown woman. I can clean up after myself." Hermione says not grasping the reason behind Mrs. Hudson's coddling.
Sherlock again looks at her and his expression is one of great patience. "Perhaps you can't love as purely as you claim, Miss Granger." He deduces. "You can see the person, the whole person but you miss the simplicity of a single truth. You know why people are the way they are, you can accept it, but you still try to change them. Make them better. Yes you can make your own coffee, and I can make my own tea. But Mrs. Hudson is a caregiver without child or husband. How does a mother love?" He whispers in her ear, like an expert on a subject that he disdains. His touch is soft and Hermione doesn't understand why there are tears in her eyes.
"Actions." She whispers back, leaning against him for second before righting herself ready to accepting her own error.
"Actions are always louder than words." Sherlock reaffirms letting her go.
Hermione nods stiffly, he was right. She had a hard time seeing it, the good will of others as acts of love opposed to acts of subordinate. Her campaign to liberate elves, and Bear's sacrifice had skewed her outlook on such things.
Hermione nods again. "You're right, Sherlock." She admits aloud turning towards the kitchen. "Thank you, Mrs. Hudson." Hermione whole heartily says, letting the landlady have her way as Hermione does as the older woman advised gathering her things and heading for the shower.
A.N: I took the liberty of keeping Fred alive per request from another story.