John sighed as he closed his locker door and turned the key. Another twelve-hour shift, done and dusted. He'd been up since three and working in the A&E since five, and a decent meal was calling his name, but there was something else he had to do at the hospital before he went home.
He took the lifts to the ward upstairs, where Siobhan Frost was still being treated after her suicide attempt. He found her on rather than in her hospital bed. She was wearing her ordinary clothes, a green knit dress over a white blouse, and her hair was clean and combed. She smiled when she saw John in the doorway.
"Dr. Watson-" She struggled to her feet, leaning heavily on her husband's arm. "Sorry," she said ruefully. "Bit… wobbly still."
"Doing much better than when I last saw you," John said, giving her a weak smile. "You look like you're about ready to go home."
"Tomorrow, the doctor thinks," Adrian said, looking relaxed for the first time since John had met him. "Have you heard anything about…"
Somehow, John Watson had become the liaison between the Frosts and Sadie Holland, even though he hadn't seen Sadie or Maisie in person in the week since they'd been rescued. Both had developed pneumonia, and were still recovering in the hospital in St Ives, Sadie more rapidly than her small daughter.
"Not since this morning," John said. "Sadie's still a bit out of it, having her medication adjusted all over the place, but her lungs are clearing up."
"Maisie?"
"They think she'll likely get worse before she gets better," he admitted. "But that's pretty common with childhood pneumonia. The good thing is, I doubt she'll remember any of this when she's older."
So far as the police could piece together from Sherlock's deductions and the little they'd been able to get out of Sadie, Sherlock had picked both the means and the motive of Brett Holland's death. Derrick had been helping Sadie and Maisie from the Marie Celeste onto his own boat as part of their plans to scuttle the yacht for insurance when Brett, who had been increasingly vigilant of Derrick's interactions with his wife for some time, had taken issue with the way the latter's hand had come to rest on Sadie's back as he helped her across. A fight had broken out. Derrick had struck Brett with an oar. Sadie had gone into screaming hysterics, and Derrick, to stop her, had hit her. Then he had gagged and tied her and her daughter up in the hull while he worked up above them to conceal evidence of his crime. It was the last Sadie had ever seen of her husband, but held captive in the hull for the next few days in waning consciousness, she had guessed much of the rest. A large part of both her recovery process and Siobhan's would be dealing with what had happened. Maisie had been spared this, but she would now, as Molly had reminded John sadly, grow up with no memory at all of the man she knew as Daddy.
Judging from Siobhan's pensive expression, she had also just considered this. She eased her grip on Adrian's arm and sank down to sit on the bed again, hands folded into her lap. John wondered if she was still in contact with her parents, but decided not to ask.
"Anyway," he said, embarrassed at being witness to all this. "If you're still here I'll come up and see you this time tomorrow, okay? If not, I'll be in touch."
"Thank you," Siobhan said listlessly, though she sought out John's gaze until he gave it to her. "For all your help. And will you please thank Sherlock Holmes for us?"
John paused on his way out to nod his agreement.
Thanks to London's public transport system, it often took John an hour to get home from work. It was close to six o'clock, and a cold rain was lashing up Baker Street in gusts, when he finally reached the doorway of 221 that evening. The lights were on in the foyer and in the flat upstairs, but on trying the handle, he found the street door locked.
Well, he couldn't complain about that one. Safety first. He dipped into his jacket pocket for his keys, then stopped as he heard a shrill little voice from within:
"Fish, Mummy! FISH!"
He paused, key still suspended in the lock. This did not sound like Charlie's usual performance when anything resembling a fish appeared on the telly. This sounded like…
Oh, God. No. Don't you dare…
He opened the street door in record time, barely pausing to shut the door and collect the pile of mail on the foyer carpet before going through to 221A. There was nobody in the kitchen, so he followed the sound of Charlie's voice until he reached the living room.
It was exactly as he'd feared. Molly sat in the floral-print armchair, both arms occupied in restraining Charlie from the little octagonal fish tank on the coffee table. In it was a host of seaweed, an oxygen pump in the guise of a deep-sea diver, a large number of pink and blue pebbles, and three shimmering goldfish.
After a second's mistrust, John knew this wasn't Molly's doing. Ever ready to indulge Charlie's whims, she still had the common sense to not want any more pets to look after. No, someone else was responsible for this. Someone else who was standing in the corner, coat on, scarf off, looking incredibly pleased with himself.
"Oh," Molly laughed, brushing her hair out of her face with one hand and gently prying Charlie's sticky fingers off the fish tank glass with the other. "John, hello, I promise this is not what it looks like…"
"Daddy!" Charlie squealed, breaking away from Molly and pulling John by the leg of his jeans toward the fish tank, waving wildly with one chubby fist. "Look, Daddy!"
"Yes, I see," John said, offering a very forced smile.
"Fish!"
"Yes, they're definitely fish, aren't they? Real… live… fish." John gave the new members of his family a cursory look, then gave Sherlock Holmes a much longer one. He gestured for Sherlock to follow him into the kitchen and closed the connecting door to the living room.
"You traitor," he muttered. "You knew I didn't want-"
"John," Sherlock said, "I've already consulted several sources on this. It's an uncle's job to give his niece things she wants, and it's a responsible father's job to say no to them. It's not my fault I'm better at my job than you are at yours."
"That sounds suspiciously like something Harry would say. This is her doing, isn't it?"
"I never reveal my sources."
"I'm going to kill her. You're responsible for those fish now," John said. "And I'm serious about that, Sherlock. You can feed them, and you can clean out their tank. And if they die, you can explain to my heartbroken toddler what happened to them."
"Oh, come on," Sherlock said. "She's far too young to understand abstract concepts like death. And too young to notice if I just keep replacing her fish. She won't even know which one is hers."
"Which one…? Oh, God, Sherlock, you did not. You did not buy goldfish for twins that aren't even born yet-"
"Besides," Sherlock continued, "if a severed human arm didn't bother her, I can't see how she'd be put out by a dead goldfish."
"Yeah, speaking of," John said, eager to veer the subject from Sherlock's excellent point. "Greg called when I was on the way home. Derrick Rice has a committal hearing set for early next year. I'll be interested to see if they go for manslaughter or murder."
"What about Beryl and Chris?"
"No charges laid." John sounded disappointed. "They didn't leave a paper trail of their demands, so it's all hearsay right now. Oh, guess, though."
"You know I don't guess."
"Fine. Deduce, then, what they just found out about Chris and Beryl."
"They have money."
"They're not broke, anyway. Ex teachers – they're both in a Defined Benefit scheme. There was no financial need for them to chase Brett and Sadie for the money, or live with Adrian and Siobhan. God, I'd love to throttle Beryl Holland."
"I'm told there's a queue for that," Sherlock commented. "How is Maisie?'
"Doing okay, but she's got a struggle ahead of her." John fidgeted. "Actually," he said, as if he were making a sudden confession, "there's something else I've been meaning to ask you for a while. No time like the present. Um."
Sherlock raised one eyebrow, as well he might at the request. John Watson had always asked so little of him...
"When Molly goes into hospital," John was saying. "Could you look after Charlie for us?"'
Sherlock did not answer immediately. He looked at John blankly for a few moments, as if the question hadn't sunk in properly. "You…" He swallowed. "You want me to babysit Charlie? On my own?'
John nodded. "You won't break her."
"I might," Sherlock protested. He swiped one hand over his chin, thinking hard. "Can't Harry do it?" he finally asked.
"Probably, but Harry was the one who suggested you do it," John said. "I'm sure she'll be over to lend a hand if you need it. You live here with us anyway, so this way will be a lot more convenient than leaving things to her, no matter what happens."
"No matter 'what happens'?"
John shrugged. "No telling at this stage," he said, trying to sound matter-of-fact and failing. "It might be a scheduled caesarean, or it might be a 4am rush to hospital. We're all going to be on high alert pretty much from, say, the middle of January."
"Yes."
"Which means you won't be able to take any cases from then. It's a big ask, Sherlock; I know it is. You might need to have Charlie for a couple of days, on and off. If you're not up to it, I won't mind-"
"Yes."
It was then that John realised Sherlock was agreeing to the challenge, though he was doing so in much the same tone John imagined he'd agree to donate a kidney. He wondered how long it would take for the shock to wear off. Well, with a bit of luck, there was still a good seven or eight weeks to hammer out the details of Sherlock's first major babysitting job.
"Oh. And…" John fumbled in his jeans pocket and pulled out a crumpled envelope. "This was in the door when I got in," he said, holding it out in the empty space between them. "Postmarked from Germany."
Sherlock frowned and took it, staring at it as if he'd never seen an envelope before.
"Looks like she takes after Mycroft, writing actual letters to people. I'll leave you to open it in your own time," John said, noting his expression and glancing away. "Maybe don't throw it in the bin if you can help it. She might just want to apologise."
"Probably."
"Probably." As a way of filling the silence, John opened the fridge, pretending to be absorbed in the contents for a few seconds. Finally he made a sound of disgust and shut the door. "I'm ordering in," he announced, picking up a pile of fliers and menus from where they were tucked in next to the phone. "And you're naming the bloody goldfish."
Half an hour later, Chinese food arrived at 221 Baker Street; by that time, Charlotte Watson's three goldfish had been named Plato, Aristotle and Epictetus.
A/N – Thanks, again, for supporting this fic, and particular love to Magentacr and everyone else who's stopped by to leave a review!
The next fic in this series is The Red Wedding. It's available from my profile. xx