Author's note: Because family can mean many things and I was inspired.
Enjoy!
He should start looking for a significant other, he decided. The holiday season would be much more fun if there was someone to look forward to.
As it was, he spent the second week of December, just like innumerable ones before, mostly in his office. Before Christmas, people usually got anxious to buy – well, anything, and therefore he finally could sell shares that would normally lie around forever. He told people that they weren't going to make them any money, but he didn't keep them from buying. He had to live somehow, didn't he? And the boss demanded results.
On Wednesday on this completely normal week, he was writing a report when he decided to take a break and read the newest headlines. It always relaxed him.
He hadn't expected to read Amateur detective returns from the dead.
He stared at the screen for a few minutes before he began reading the article.
Sherlock was alive.
Seb had thought about him often in the last two years. He hadn't meant to do it, in fact before it all happened he would have been certain that he'd barely notice the consulting detective was gone. He had barely noticed he was alive, after all.
And yet –
Sherlock Holmes had simply not seemed the type to die. He hadn't seemed like he would ever die. He had made his way through uni without caring what the others, including Seb, thought of him and had created his own career without any of those connections he had cultivated from a young age.
He couldn't say why he had felt guilty not to have stayed in contact after Sherlock had saved his job. Because he had saved it – his boss had wanted answers and it would have been Seb who'd have to take the blame if the culprit wasn't found.
But he was. Sherlock found him and had even declined the money. He was glad now that his friend-partner-in-crime-whatever had taken the check.
Seb had treated him badly during the case.
He had been afraid to lose his job, and it wasn't like they had been friends. He'd laughed with the others when they had called him "freak", he had told him to "Piss Off" when he'd looked at him and known Seb had had sex the previous night; but –
But.
He had been one of the students that Sherlock had tolerated. True, that didn't amount to much; he wasn't insulted on a regular basis, though.
And even then, Sherlock had impressed him. Seb's life had been planned carefully from the day he was born; Sherlock went his own way. He was unpredictable.
Seb had found himself one of the few who listened to his ramblings when they had nothing better to do. He had to admit it was even interesting, how Sherlock could be fascinated by such little things like a pen that didn't sit at its usual place on the professor's desk and just know that his marriage was in trouble. How he could get lost in his mind and not realize that someone was standing right in front of him unless one shook him by the shoulders.
He had often thought that they had all hated him, but he later admitted to himself that he had never truly hated Sherlock.
And when he heard about his suicide –
All he could think about was that he had sent an e-mail, rather pathetically trying to pretend that they had been friends, hadn't even told Sherlock what had happened, although he made it clear on his homepage that he only wanted cases that were worth his while, and that Sherlock had come.
He had followed the story about Richard Brook, of course. And from the beginning, he had considered it ridiculous. It was impossible that Sherlock invented all the crimes. Everything would get cleared up.
But it didn't and then Sherlock Holmes was dead.
For two years.
He never raised his voice, like other clients of Sherlock's. One man from Dartmoor, Henry Knight, was the principal spokesman, declaring that the consulting detective saved his sanity and his father's memory.
He never visited his grave.
He never called at 221B to give his condolences.
And yet he was incredibly happy that Sherlock was alive.
Somehow, he was glad that this strange man he had never really known was alive.
When he asked his secretary to get him coffee, he noticed the strange looks she was shooting him. Either he was smiling too much – and that was a possibility, considering he wore the first genuine smile he had worn in God knew how long – or she remembered.
He didn't doubt that the country would talk about this for a long time.
He turned out to be right. Within an hour, several colleagues had called and a few had even shown up in his office.
Seb tried to explain that they weren't friend, that he had never been in regular contact with Sherlock since uni, but after the third time, he gave up and simply replied, "Yes, he's back".
He didn't doubt the truth of the article. If anyone would return from the dead, it would be Sherlock Holmes.
The next week was filled with work and more articles and news reports. Seb couldn't explain to himself why he kept coming back to them, but he did.
Somehow, Sherlock Holmes being alive seemed more important than the market. Not that he'd ever tell anyone. He would very much like to keep his job.
He read the apologies of several journalists, and he still didn't understand why he felt so chipper.
Maybe it was because the consulting detective might be the only good person he knew, and how ironic their former unimates would think this statement was.
Aside from rejoicing, he had no plans whatsoever to acknowledge Sherlock Holmes' return.
As he had found out, nothing went as planned with Sherlock Holmes.
And so he found himself in front of 221B in the third week of December.
A few houses down, a store was playing loud music. Christmas music. He suddenly realized that it was indeed only a few more days until Christmas. He should call his parents. They hadn't spent the holiday together for a long time. He was usually too busy. And his parents, living out there retirement in Florida, had never expressed a desire to see him.
He was too busy for this visit, he suddenly remembered. He should be working.
And yet he knocked.
The old lady he remembered from pictures in newspapers opened, and he was shocked at the difference in her appearance.
Most of the pictures had been from the funeral or the investigation in Sherlock's career; she had been dressed in black, her face haggard. She had looked old, much older than the age announced in the articles that Seb had decided to forget because he was a gentleman after all.
Now, she was wearing a dress that, while colourful, fit her well, she was smiling and he would easily have thought she was fifty.
"Yes?" she asked.
"Is Sherlock home?" he inquired, feeling like a schoolboy who was asking the mother of his friend if he could come out to play.
She nodded. "He has quite a few cases at the moment, though – "
"No" he interrupted her, for the first time in years feeling unsure when talking to someone who wasn't his superior. "I am Sebastian Wilkes – Sherlock helped me out a few years back".
Her eyes lit up. He wondered if she knew about the case. Probably.
"Come in".
She led him up the stairs with a vitality that once more belied her age, knocked and entered immediately.
"Sherlock? There's a friend of yours come to see you".
Sherlock grumbled something in reply that sounded suspiciously like "Go away" and Seb, who'd stayed on the landing, couldn't suppress a smile. He sounded exactly like the young student who had occasionally snarled at those who didn't knew and decided to speak to him.
"Don't be like that" Mrs. Hudson chided him. "You only just came back. Sebastian wants to – "
"Sebastian?"
He knew he shouldn't have felt guilty at the confusion in Sherlock's voice, but he did.
He stepped in.
"Hi, buddy" he greeted him, more self-conscious than he could ever remember feeling.
Sherlock was lying on the sofa, dressed in a suit. He knew better than to think the consulting detective hadn't been doing anything, though.
He had probably been lost in his mind, doing his thing.
The same thing he was doing to Seb now. For the first time, it occurred to him that Sherlock might not know he made people uncomfortable with his stares. Maybe he thought that since they wore their secrets on their sleeves anyway, they wouldn't be ashamed of them.
"You are considered for a promotion" he told him matter-of-factly. Seb nodded. His boss had been talking about it for months. He was cautiously optimistic.
Sherlock's eyes wandered up and down his body a few times more. Seb realized that he was trying to find out why he was here and that not even Sherlock Holmes could read his thoughts.
He was convinced he was here because he wanted Sherlock to solve a case.
He couldn't blame him.
"Well..." he began. "I read you were back and I thought I would drop by".
This was far from the smart and popular personality he had built for himself. His one consolation was that, for the first time in their long acquaintance, he had surprised Sherlock Holmes. He even got up from the sofa.
At least he had accomplished something.
He wanted to ask where John was, but it wasn't his place, and he had no idea where they stood after Sherlock had been gone for a year. He didn't know if the doctor had known he was alive. He didn't know what Sherlock had done during this time. He didn't know what he was thinking of his visit.
He shouldn't have come.
He looked around the flat. After he had read so much about Sherlock and gone over John's blog more than once in the last week, the realization that he had never been here felt almost surreal.
It was... homely. He couldn't find a better word for it. But something was missing.
He suspected that something was a rather small former soldier.
"This is the part where I offer you tea, I am told" Sherlock drawled, sounding bored.
He turned around.
"I remember the sounds coming from your room" he answered, referring to explosions that had kept up the whole floor. "I'd rather not drink anything you touched".
He only realized that he was teasing him good-naturedly when Sherlock smiled.
"I didn't touch it. Mrs. Hudson is sure to bring it in –"
Before he could finish the sentence, his landlady came in; she didn't bring only tea, but cake as well, since "it is the season after all" and left them with a smile.
"The season" Seb murmured absent-mindedly to himself while he accepted the cup Sherlock offered him.
Sherlock looked at him. "You are not going to visit your parents" he stated, and Seb found to his surprise that his ability to know everything at a glance didn't irritate him anymore. Maybe it never truly had.
"We are not exactly the celebrating type" he informed him.
"You would be surprised" Sherlock replied. "Mrs. Hudson is forcing me to host a Christmas party for my friends again".
If the word "again" hadn't been enough to surprise Seb, Sherlock's careless use of the words "friends" would. He had never had any friends except for the doctor, he believed.
"Oh?" was all he answered, trying to sound sympathetic.
"You should come".
Sherlock wasn't asking. Nor was he stating his opinion that Seb should come.
He was leaving him a choice.
He wondered if he had ever really known Sherlock Holmes.
A surprise visit and a few stuttered words didn't make them friends, but maybe he could get to know him.
He nodded. It was answer enough.
Author's note: I will make you like Sebastian one day muahahahaha