A/N: I don't drink nearly enough tea to qualify me to write these stories.
Still not British, a writer, or anything other than myself. -csf
4.
The teapot's spout releases a steady wisp of fragrance as it brews under the morning light, beaming through dusty window panes that create one more layer between 221B and the world outside. Two men sit peacefully, with a Viking board game between them, laid out on the table, among the scones, the butter and the jam. One is taller, with a mop of dark hair burning auburn tones under the morning sun, reading the newspaper with the pretence of full, undivided attention. The other has short dirty blond hair tainted with precocious greys and frowns expressively at the small wooden figures with a wealth of military strategy.
'Give me tea,' Sherlock says, without lifting his piercing eyes from the paper.
'No, still steeping.'
'You said that when you last moved your high priest.'
'Do you want nice tea or the type of tea you make yourself?' John asks with good humoured ease. Sherlock growls inwards, but he also waits. John calls that a victory. Another victory would be to insist on the consulting detective having a nice morning meal and his doctor knows a sweet tooth is often Sherlock's weakness. So he moves a piece on the board and starts buttering a scone, then adding a healthy portion of jam. He lays his offering on a mismatched plate and drags it across the table. 'Your turn, mate.'
Sherlock's long fingers wrap around the scone like a cat whisks off its prey, with barely a glance. It disappears just as swiftly, in two bites. Sherlock's eyes turn to the board, he hums, and flicks one of his pieces forward.
He makes no jesting comment. He may read the paper to pass the near infinite time John takes between turns, but he's happy with the quality of play in his opponent. At least when it's not chess (only Mycroft ever bears him at chess) or pointless games like Cluedo and Who Dunnit. At strategy games, John is half-decent, generally inventive and always full of avenging wrath as if the little figurines were soldiers in a real battalion.
John pours the tea – at last! – into two different mugs, mixing sugar and milk in Sherlock's as if he personally knew Sherlock's taste buds' preferences. The first mug, Sherlock's, it too crosses the scared table top towards the detective.
Sherlock hums and scoots his dressing gown closed shut as the morning sun fades outside, obscured by a passing cloud. It's a quiet Sunday morning in Baker Street. The lavender pot John brought from the supermarket on a whim and that stands outside the window pane on the narrow balcony buzzes with a couple of bees, attracted by the silvery lilac pips. Sherlock notices their flight patterns in the back if his mind as he reads about the wars in foreign but not so exotic lands. He thinks of discussing wars with the former soldier sipping his morning tea, but immediately dismisses the thought. The war is still embedded in the wrinkles of his friend's face and the heavy set of his shoulders, like a third presence at the table.
Sometimes there are other ghostly presences too. Cases that linger in Sherlock's mind, either by bitter successes or resolutions that are probable but never provable in the justice system. They linger like heavy clouds and the slow pace of a board game helps dissipate them, with its set rules and narrow definitions of right and wrong. John knows this, and Sherlock is never want for company he cannot find in John.
'Your lessons in Deduction, Sherlock. It's been a week or so. Have you given up?'
Sherlock lowers the newspaper at once.
'John, we just caught a triple killer for Lestrade. That took priority. You agreed it should be so.'
'I told you it should take priority myself. But Lestrade's got his man, now. I mean, his woman.'
'Correct. We can resume your education now, John. It would be remiss of me not to do so with haste... Tomorrow. I have not prepared a lesson yet.'
'Oh, I see... Can't you... wing it?'
'John!'
The detective splutters tea and crumbs in his exaltation. John ponders the board game's squares with a thoughtful, guarded expression.
'Are you giving me only the easy ones?' he asks at last, a bit under his breath, but definitely there, because John Watson is not a man that eschews a challenge, ever.
Sherlock knows how to deal with John's moods. 'Only if you want me to,' he states simply, picking up the newspaper once again. John grins.
The warm sunlight is still absent, filtered through heavy clouds, when John makes an extraordinary move with his remaining knight piece, and simultaneously the door bells rings. Just the right amount of pressure and time length for—
'A client!' Sherlock congratulates unknown deities and gets up, away from the board game he's three obvious moves from losing, leaving behind a frustrated soldier with a competitive streak. Four footsteps from those gangly long legs and Sherlock is at the flat's door, deducing some stranger's life and destiny from his footsteps in the old, worn steps.
'Welcome, come in. Do hurry up, your neighbour's life might be at risk, after all. Unless,' he adds as an afterthought, 'last week's garden party into the late hours has convinced you that you can bear new neighbours moving in.'
'Sherlock...'
'Too late, we've been overheard by my assistant and full-time moralist. We must do what we can to save the old man's life, even if he did run over your dog. Yes, I'm fairly certain he did.'
'Sherlock!'
'Clearly the dog survived, John. Can you not see the man's left trouser leg is covered in dog hairs? A small dog, of nervous disposition, noticeably, and too friendly in the mornings. Obviously the type you favour, so your choice, not your sister's meddling interference. I, myself, much rather have John's company, but I sympathise.'
'Sherlock?'
'Rather less hair being shed, though luckily John will skip the Watson's early recessing hairline.'
'Sh— Oh, never mind.'
'Do have a sit, Mr Client.'
The man smiles bravely, if waveringly. 'I'm Chandler.'
'You can call yourself what you like, it's irrelevant.'
'Irrelevant? It's my name!'
'Do you always state the obvious?'
'Do you charge more if I do?' the man bites back.
Much to the doctor's surprise, Sherlock grins at him. Then he walks right up to the unsure client, backing him to John's armchair, and pushes him so the back of his calves hit the chair and he's falling to the seat. Intimating behaviour it may be, but the client only carefully eyes the flat door ajar, as if assuring himself that he can leave at will.
'Tea?' John asks, in the finest politeness and with a winning smile. Chandler relaxes gradually to the armchair, and prepares to tell the two men his case.
'It's an odd one,' he starts. Sherlock leans forward, at once earnestly engaged.
'Do not disappoint me.'
'My neighbour is a foreign spy. No, don't be doubtful, doctor Watson, I know these things.'
'Intriguing,' says Sherlock, returning to his backrest and uniting his fingertips and pressing them to his lips. 'Do enlighten my assistant on how you came to this conclusion.'
'You're doubting me, Mr Holmes?'
'I think you're right. However, I'm educating John as an apprentice of sorts. Elaborate, Mr Chandler.'
'Well, it's obvious, innit? From the colour of his socks when he puts his washing out to dry in the conservatory, instead of getting the dryer on. That devaluates the neighbouring properties, by the way. And I shouldn't have to see his wife's private undergarments either. But naturally I'm a gentleman and I don't look.'
'Naturally.'
John interrupts, holding out a fresh cuppa. 'What about the socks?'
'He only has black socks. Who would only want black socks, but a man with something to hide? State secrets, I tell you.'
John glances at Sherlock, looking for his reaction. The detective sighs dramatically and protests: 'Of course that's not logical, John! This idiot stumbled onto a real case by pure chance!'
'I don't know, it sounded— Sorry, Sherlock, it sounded like something you'd say in one of your deductive rants.'
Sherlock hiccups in his haste to look affronted, pride hurt and so misunderstood. John scratches the back of his neck, turning beetroot red. At this point, however, the client is looking rather deflated.
'My neighbour is not a foreign spy?'
'No, he's a British spy. Easy mistake. It's alright, though, I am on familiar terms with the British Spymaster.'
'Then how do you know he's a British spy?'
'John?' Sherlock passes the question to the doctor, suddenly looking rather smug about himself.
The blond doctor blinks, and looks thoughtfully at the mug in his hands. Sherlock recognises that expression from the strategic game of earlier. John is plotting the best way to dig up the data that the consulting detective deduced from the first glance at their client. This may take a while.
'Come back tomorrow and we will have your case solved for you.'
'But I didn't present you my case!'
'You came prepared with a load of tosh, that I'm supposed to hear politely and ignore for its prejudiced bias. Then I will solve you the real case and explain why your best silk tie was found up your neighbour's tree on a stormy night within the last week, and also provide you with a good story to tell your mates at the cricket club. At which point you will attempt to pay me for my services and I will direct you to John. Have you met my assistant John?'
'Yes, you just saw him give me this tea.'
'John is much too generous and you are leaving. Have a nice day. See you tomorrow. Give my love to your dog.'
'You mean my wife, surely?'
'No, I mean your dog, I'm far better with dogs than people, goodbye.'
'G-goodbye, Mr Holmes, doctor Watson.'
John smiles pleasantly and walks the confused client to the front door. Sherlock doesn't get up from his armchair. He does, however, lean over and nicks John's mug, resting back and softly sipping the perfect tea.
.
TBC
