#pandabob1

After a year and a half of living with the man, John likes to think he’s now become somewhat attuned to Sherlock’s moods. It’s almost a sixth sense, really, and had become increasingly useful over time when dealing with problematic witnesses. Or, more accurately, witnesses Sherlock had an alarmingly tendency to ‘interview’ to tears.

It’s this sense that helpfully let’s him know something’s up the second he steps into 221B. Every upward step he takes only serves to reassure him of this, what with the loud growls and occasional sound of something smashing.

John tries not to hurry up the stairs, he really does, but he just can’t help it. It’s almost an instinctive reaction, really, when sounds of destruction are present. And John isn’t wrong about his instinct, either.

It’s abundantly clear that Sherlock’s in something of a tizzy. The big hint to his mood is the fact that, when John enters the room lugged down with groceries, he’s in the process of throwing what seems to be the whole contents of the kitchen at the wall. Among the victims are all the cutlery they have, three of John’s mugs, five of Sherlock’s own and even one of Mrs. Hudson’s teapots.

“What the hell are you doing?” John exclaims, fighting the urge to drop his groceries and wrestle the cutlery out of Sherlock’s hands. He gingerly puts the shopping down before he does end up accidentally dropping them.

“Experiment,” Sherlock grunts in reply, punctuating his answer by throwing the set of sharp knives into the wall one by one. All but two of them dig in and stay upright.

"Like hell," John comments.

He gives it about half an hour before Sherlock gives up on the china and goes digging around for his Sig. Which he wouldn’t find, John noted with a sense of self assurance. He’d hidden it someplace Sherlock hopefully wouldn’t think to look.

“I don’t know why you bother hiding your gun at all,” Sherlock says, intruding his thoughts in the same, precise manner that he really should have gotten used to by now.

Yeah, he saw that coming from a mile away. “There’s no way you could make me believe that any of this could be for an experiment,” he says with a frown.

Sherlock glances at him, and scowls. “Bored, then!” He picks up a plate, flips it in the air with one hand, and catches it with the other. “The criminal class of London has suddenly become exceedingly dull. You’d think they all moved to the country by the state of things around here,” he complains, then looks meaningfully at the open window facing the street.

John follows Sherlock’s gaze and frowns heavily. “You bloody well better not be throwing that thing out the window.”

“Not right this second, I’m not.” He pauses for a beat, then flicks his wrist and the plate sails out the window. “Oh dear. There it goes.”

John immediately rushes to the window and winces as the plate smashes a few steps ahead of a passing by elderly couple. They don’t seem overly startled, which almost has John wondering what their daily lives are like, but a woman pushing a pram looks up, sees him, and sends him the most withering glare he’s ever received that isn’t from Sherlock.

He tries to shout his apologies from the window, but she’s having none of it. Instead, she pointedly looks away and marches off with her stroller ahead of her.

When he turns back to face Sherlock he’s stretched out on the couch, staring up at the ceiling and spinning another plate in his hands.

“That could have hit someone, you know,” John growls, trying very hard not to yell.

Sherlock just hums noncommittally and sits up on the couch, back facing John.

John pinches the bridge of his nose. A five year old. He’s dealing with a five year old. “I hope your tantrum includes buying new china in the near future.”

Despite the fact that John can’t see him, he knows that Sherlock’s scowling again. Something to do with how his back is hunched up, facing away from him petulantly. “I never throw tantrums, John. Those are for children and adults with mental deficiencies, and I am neither of those.”

John rolls his eyes. “Of course you aren’t. How silly of me to ever imply such a thing,”

And to prove that he was, in no way, throwing a temper tantrum, Sherlock snatches up another plate and launches it out the window, quickly followed by a mug. John’s ready for him this time, though, and moves fast to intercept them before they can sail outside.

He manages to catch the plate with ease but hadn’t actually seen Sherlock throw the mug. It’s to no one’s surprise but John’s when it hits him square in the forehead, making him bellow in pain and drop the plate on his foot.

On the plus side, he does end up catching the mug. Not that John lingers on that thought for long, since he drops it immediately afterwards in order to press his hands to his forehead.

“Bloody fucking ow!” John yells, squeezing his eyes shut against the pain. He slowly breathes through it, gritting his teeth while he waited for the pain to dim to a dull ache. When it finally does, he rounds on Sherlock, who doesn’t look apologetic in the slightest.

“You threw a mug at my head,” John grinds out through his teeth.

Sherlock’s not even looking at him now, looking for all the world like he was bored with the conversation already. “Wrong. You put yourself in the trajectory of my mug. How was I supposed to know you’d be stupid enough to do that?”

“I was bloody trying to catch your plate before it landed on someone and became part of a crime scene!”

“You did catch it,” Sherlock points out. “You just happened to intercept it with your head in the process, is all.”

John takes a deep breath in and clenches his hands into fists. “That really hurt, you know. You do realise that?”

Sherlock scowls and waves his hand in an absentminded pattern as though trying to wave John’s complaints away. “What would you like me to do, kiss it better?”

John’s grimace turns to a somewhat confused frown. “Well, you don’t have to be like that-”

“Because I wouldn’t mind,” Sherlock cuts across him, speaking fast.

John almost misses it completely, but it’s enough to turn his rapidly rising anger into confused disbelief instead. “Sorry, what?”

There’s no hesitation in Sherlock’s reply, but he speaks so fast that John can barely keep up with him. “Honestly, John,” he starts, pushing himself up off the couch and making his way through the flat in a flurry of movement. “One would think your ears were painted on, considering how poorly you utilise them.”

John follows his path around the living room and through the kitchen, but comes to a stop when Sherlock dashes into his room and slams the door shut behind him. “Wait, hang on, don’t shut yourself in there and ignore me - tell me what you said, you giant pillock!”

The pillock in question emerges a few minutes later, completely dressed and miraculously managing to look like he wasn’t sulking in his PJs just a moment before. He looks down at John as he wraps his scarf around his neck. “No time to be dawdling in the past, John - I’m off to see Lestrade. Don’t wait up for me!” he adds as he skips around John and out the door before he can stop him.

“I’ll get it out of you when you get back!” John threatens, though he doesn’t feel very threatening yelling at a closed door.

A few seconds later, he receives a text.

I look forward to it. SH

John doesn’t laugh, but it’s a close thing. By now, much of his anger’s faded to a mild irritation - the kind a mother might get when indulging in a recklessly determined child. Even so, he still taps out a reply.

And clean up your bloody mess when you get back! JW

Of course, John. SH

You’re not going to do it, are you? JW

Of course not, John. SH

John shakes his head and composes a message to Lestrade.

Incoming. You have anything for him? JW

Neck deep in paperwork. Couldn’t give him anything if I wanted to, which I don’t. GL

John has to stop himself from wincing, considering all that paperwork was almost undoubtedly a souvenir from Sherlock’s last case. It had been one that had the three of them standing in a dirty alley pressed up against the wall - in the rain, no less - for four hours and almost gave them all pneumonia. He doesn’t blame the man his animosity one bit.

Better prepare yourself, then. JW

Noted, ta. Why not give him some of those cold cases? GL

For emergencies only! JW

What, and this isn’t? GL

Point taken. JW

John gives it two hours, three at most, before Sherlock storms back into 221B in a huff. He makes himself a cup of tea and pointedly does not tidy up Sherlock’s mess while he’s out.

He does end up cleaning it up, but only because he can’t stand having to tiptoe around the porcelain everywhere whenever he gets up. When he’s done, he dumps the whole pile on Sherlock’s bed.

Afterwards, John sits in the lounge, reads a book, and feels rather pleased with himself.

His prediction of three hours is off by half an hour, since Sherlock stops by the morgue on his way home. He receives a stern warning from both Molly and another morgue technician for his efforts, and before long he’s back in his dressing gown, pacing fast circles around the two armchairs.

John watches him for a while, thinking it might help to pass the time a little, but all it ends up doing is make him feel a little dizzy. And if John feels dizzy just from watching him, he could hardly imagine what Sherlock felt like.

Sherlock’s just starting to widen his track to the whole living room when John sets down his book and gets up. Sherlock looks at him suspiciously. “Where are you going?”

“Just getting something from my room - no, don’t follow me!” John answers, having to bat Sherlock off as the man tries to follow him up the stairs.

John ends up having to physically sit Sherlock down on the couch himself before he gets space and time enough to go upstairs. He comes back with an overlarge envelope a minute later and Sherlock’s stretched himself over the couch, eyes closed with his fingers steepled under his chin.

“I see you assumed the position, then,” John can’t help but comment before he drops the envelope right on Sherlock’s face.

Sherlock grunts and doesn’t make any notions towards moving. Instead he lies there for a good while, envelope slowly sliding off his face, and asks, “What’s this?”

“Something to get your mind off destroying the contents of our kitchen,” John answers.

Sherlock’s eyes snap open and he spins himself around to sit up so quickly that John’s surprised he doesn’t get whiplash. He rips into the envelope without ceremony and, upon pulling out the first file, looks up at John almost reverently. “Oh, John, how did you know?”

“Don’t look at me like that,” John says, trying to conceal a laugh and failing rather miserably. “You don’t deserve any of my cold cases, but it’s this or risk you all but knocking our walls down completely.”

John doesn’t receive a reply, which doesn’t surprise him in the least. Sherlock’s already gutted the envelope of its contents and laid it out on the coffee table in front of him, eyes flickering quickly over all of it.

Well, at least that solved one thing John had always wondered - apparently Sherlock was aware that coffee tables existed for a reason other than stepping stools. If only he could get him to make that connection with the rest of the furniture in the flat.

John watches Sherlock puzzling it all out for a long while without even realising he’s doing it. In fact, he only notices when Sherlock calls him out on it.

He absolutely does not flush in embarrassment. “Sorry, I’ll just stop then, shall I?”

Sherlock doesn’t look up at him, too invested in the papers in front of him. “Oh, I don’t mind. I just thought you’d like to know.”

John gets up anyway and makes himself another cup of tea, then settles back down with his book.

“You’re doing it again.”

John shakes his head and realises that, yep, he’s doing it again. “How can you tell? You haven’t looked up this entire time,” John points out.

Sherlock sighs, a long-suffering sound usually reserved for the more idiotic members of society. “Peripheral vision remains, as it always has been, a thing that exists.”

John bristles and stands up. “Right, then. I’ll just take myself to bed. Goodnight, Sherlock.”

He receives a noncommittal grunt for his troubles and takes it as his cue to leave, which he does. He’s halfway up the stairs when he hears Sherlock’s gasp of revelation and, seconds later, feels Sherlock grabbing his wrist to stop him from ascending any higher.

“John, wait! Where did you put the others?”

John furrows his brows. “The other what?”

“The other cold cases, of course, do keep up John,” Sherlock says. If anyone could portray rolling their eyes with their voice, Sherlock could.

John laughs and shakes his wrist free from Sherlock’s grip. “Oh, you’re not getting those. They’re for emergencies only!”

“Ah, so there are others. Thank you very much, John, that’s all I needed to know,” he says, then hops down the stairs and back into the living room.

“You won’t find them,” John shouts after him. Sherlock’s laugh is the only response he gets.

That night, John dreams of Sherlock as a Hydra. Instead of fire, one head spits insults, another smothers him in files and paperwork, and the last recites every embarrassing moment he’s had since he was eight.

He wakes up just after he’s cut off the first head, which critiques his performance and gives him a 4/10. John has to make himself promise not to get up and make sure that Sherlock hasn’t somehow transformed into a mythical dragon.

When John does get up, he finds Sherlock’s not transformed into anything at all. If there’s anything that’s been transformed it’s the lounge, which Sherlock’s sitting cross legged in the middle of. He’s still in his dressing gown, and is completely surrounded in sheets of paper.

Not just papers and files, John notices, and not just on the floor. He’s pushed everything, including their chairs, to the side to make more room and still has to tack things to the wall. Everything that was previously on the floor is now piled up in the corner.

John picks up the piece of paper closest to him, sitting on the bottom stair. Amy Halifax, missing persons report.

“I see you found the others, then,” John comments, drops the page where he found it, and shuffles into the kitchen in search of some breakfast.

“Was there ever any doubt?” Sherlock answers him, stretching across the floor to grab a file and set it in his lap.

John shrugs in lieu of answering because there really hadn’t been. Instead he looks through the cupboards comes up completely empty except for a packet of unopened chocolate digestives squirreled away behind the sugar. “I hope you didn’t bother Mrs. Hudson last night.”

“You gave me no other choice, since you hid these in her fridge,” Sherlock replies.

John thinks about his hiding place and grins. “Thought you would have appreciated that. Literal cold cases,” he says before taking a biscuit and taking a bite. Hardly the healthiest breakfast but then, there wasn’t exactly anything else. He’d have to go out and get something.

“Mm, yes,” Sherlock says, frowning slightly as he takes another file in hand. “Mrs. Hudson certainly seemed to.”

“Well she would, wouldn’t she? It was half her idea, after all,” John says, popping another biscuit into his mouth. He swallows puts the packet down afterwards and gets up. “Anyway, I’m off to the shops. Need anything?”

Sherlock shakes his head, and John skips out without him.

John’s not been long gone when he gets back with a handful of groceries. Just a few until he can do a proper job of it, enough for dinner at least.

Sherlock almost runs into him on his way out. He’s

“John! You’re finally back!”

“‘Finally’? I was barely gone two hours.”

“Oh, never mind that,” Sherlock says, waving his comment aside. He grabs John by the shoulders in excitement. “You, my friend, are brilliant.”

John’s taken aback at that, frowning as he tries to recall what brought this on. “I always thought so myself, but what makes you say it?”

“The cold cases, John! Oh, you were hardly doing it intentionally, but it’s perfect, brilliant, oh!” Sherlock lets go of his shoulders and dashes back into the flat for his scarf. “They’re linked, John. Not all of them, of course, but a few - namely, the kidnapping cases. Bee allergies, all taken from home-- What kind of kidnapper takes souvenirs? No, no, not kidnapping at all, but...”

Realisation dawns on John. “Murder,” he says. “You think they were murdered?”

“Yes, exactly!” Sherlock exclaims, eyes bright with excitement. “Hardly the most stimulating of cases, but it’s better than anything we’ve had all week. Oh, I could kiss you right now!”

“Okay.”

Sherlock cuts off his train of thought midstream, looks at John, and frowns. “What do you mean, ‘okay’?”

John rolls his eyes, grabs him by the scarf and pulls him down into a kiss. Sherlock’s eyes widen in surprise and he doesn’t have the time to react before John’s pulling away again.

“Oh,” is all Sherlock says.

John looks away and suddenly feels incredibly silly. “Okay?” he asks, a little sheepishly.

Sherlock breaks into a huge grin. “Definitely okay,” he answers, then takes John by the hand. “Come on, John, we’ve a criminal to catch!”

Things move quickly after that, in regards to the case. Lestrade has more information for them than he’d originally thought, and it soon becomes a case of putting the last remaining dots together.

If Lestrade notices that Sherlock is a little flushed throughout their conversations, or that John stands a little closer and looks at Sherlock a little longer, he doesn’t mention it.

Later, after everything’s said and done and they’ve returned home, Sherlock stops John before he climbs the stairs to his room.

“Hm? Everything okay?” John asks.

“Yes. Well, no,” Sherlock starts to say, then scowls. “Sleep with me.”

“Well, that was a little forward,” John says, laughing in surprise. “Are you propositioning me, Sherlock Holmes?”

Sherlock’s scowl just deepens. “Not if that’s how you’re going to be. Never mind, I’ll just-”

“Oh, shut up, you giant idiot,” John cuts over him. “Come on, then. Yours or mine?”

It’s almost scary how quickly Sherock’s scowl turns into a grin.

"Yours."

John’s dreaming.

At least, he’s fairly certain he’s dreaming, considering that the likelihood of Sherlock voluntarily making him pancakes and feeding them to him with chopsticks was so low that John would have better odds of standing out in a field and waiting for a meteor to land on him.

“Stop distracting yourself and think,” possibly-dream-Sherlock snaps at him as he shoves another portion of pancake into John’s mouth. “You know my methods. Frankly, I’d be astonished - and somewhat insulted - if you can’t figure this one out.”

John chews on his mouthful of food while he tries to remember what it was that Sherlock said all the time. “Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth,” wasn’t it?

He does a series of quick calculations in his head.

The first was the most obvious: Sherlock never makes him pancakes. In fact, the number of times he’d set foot in the kitchen for its intended purpose could be counted on one hand, and the result would be a closed fist. Never, in all the time they’d lived together, has John ever seen Sherlock cook a thing.

The second was also quite obvious, and it surprises John to realise how slow he’s been on the uptake.

“I’m lucid dreaming, aren’t I? John proposes. By the way Sherlock’s whole face lights up at the suggest, he’d guess that he’s right.

“Brilliant, John!” Sherlock exclaims, rewarding him with another bite of pancake. “I mean, you were so slow on the uptake that I could hear your brain sluggishly trying to work away from here, but you eventually came to the correct conclusion.”

John sighs, leaning back on his chair. “How is it that you still manage to be abusive to me in my own dream?”

Sherlock tilts his head to the side a little, which is about as close to a shrug as John was likely to ever see. “As you said, this is your dream. I can hardly be at fault for the actions your own subconscious decides to present you with.” He tilts his head again. “Perhaps you’re attracted to my abrasive nature.”

John snorts, a sound that surprises them both and makes John inwardly vow never to make again. “Yeah, you would say that, wouldn’t you.”

Ah, but it’s so nice to have Sherlock do something vaguely normal for once that John tries hard not to mind that the pancakes are an alternating blue and green colour.

And it’s with this thought still fresh in his mind that Sherlock gets up and punches him in the stomach.

John doubles over and clutches his stomach in surprise. “What the hell was that?” he manages to heave out as he stumbles to his feet.

Sherlock grins, not perturbed in the least. “No idea! My, isn’t that new? John, I do believe you’ve conjured me as an idiot,” he says, right before taking another step towards John and kicking him in the knee.

“Ow! Would you stop that already?” John grumbles, slapping Sherlock’s body away from him.

This prompts Sherlock to do the exact opposite of what John wants and crowd him up against the wall. “But isn’t this fun?” he says with a coy grin decorating his face.

John swallows, looks up at Sherlock, and notices that his arms are effectively pinned to his side. Sherlock’s face is mere inches from his own, and it’s that fact that has John realising he has very little idea what’s happening anymore - but he doesn’t altogether mind where this is heading.

Sherlock leans down, as though privy to what John’s thinking - and, honestly, he would no longer be surprised if that were the case - and says, with his lips brushing against John’s, “I suggest you take a hold of something.”

“What?” John answers, somewhat automatically. He’s far too distracted by the breath on his lips to pay much attention to what Sherlock’s saying.

“Now, John!”

John is jolted into action by the sudden raise in almost-definitely-a-dream-Sherlock’s voice and he grabs a hold of Sherlock’s arms. He does it just in time for the wall behind him to disappear, and he starts to fall.

There’s no slow motion transition for John - no easing into reality that, if he’s entirely honest with himself, he stopped expecting a long time ago. One second he’s standing in the kitchen, not quite kissing Sherlock Holmes, and staring up at a darkened ceiling with an armful of flailing limbs the next..

It takes a moment for John to register what happened, but realisation comes quickly enough.

Apparently, Sherlock kicks in his sleep. Enough to push someone out of the bed, even. What’s also apparent is the fact that John has a strong enough grip in his sleep to pull Sherlock out of bed after him. Thus, their current situation: lying on the floor of Sherlock’s bedroom, with John taking the brunt of the fall.

“John, what have you done?” comes Sherlock’s voice, gravelly with sleep and irritation.

John can’t help himself. He bursts out laughing. The absurdity of it all is getting to him, even as the recollection of his dream starts fading away. Sherlock, in all his just woken grogginess, is accusing him of pulling them both out of bed.

He laughs despite the fact that one of Sherlock’s elbows is digging painfully into his shoulder while the other’s taking care of his ribs.

Sherlock is frowning sternly at him, John just knows it. Most likely wondering how he’d missed this any notions of a manic personality in him.

“I fail to see what’s so funny about this situation.”

Ah, yes. There it is - rational, grumpy, “I’ve just been woken up and I don’t like it” Sherlock. It does absolutely nothing to calm him down - rather the opposite, in fact, as John begins to laugh harder.

“Green and blue pancakes!” is all John manages to bark out by way of explanation.

Unsurprisingly, it explains absolutely nothing. Sherlock continues to frown at him and starts to extricate himself away from John, considering that the other man probably wasn’t going to any time soon. Unfortunately, it meant that he dug his elbows in even deeper in the process, making John give a strange, strangled noise that loosely translated into pained sounds.

“Ow, ow-- Christ, what are you doing, stabbing me with sawn off bits of bone?” John grunts out just as Sherlock manages to separate them both.

“I’m certainly considering it,” is all Sherlock says before leaving John on the floor and climbing back into bed.

When John finally stops laughing enough to collect himself together and get up from the ground, he finds that Sherlock’s taken the whole duvet and all but wrapped himself up in a cocoon, his head only just sticking out on one end and his toes from the other.

“You planning on metamorphosing into a butterfly overnight?” John teases light heartedly, but it only causes Sherlock to pull the duvet tighter around himself.

He laughs, rolls his eyes, and climbs back on the bed anyway. He shuffles over to where Sherlock’s curled himself up and plants a kiss on his cheek. “Goodnight then, little caterpillar.”

Sherlock goes a subtle shade of red and loosens his grip on the blanket ever so slightly. In fact, he loosens it just enough for John to grab an end and pull it out from underneath him.

And he absolutely does not squawk in surprise. Not at all. Nor does he grin like a fool when John settles the blanket over them both and kisses him on the cheek again. That would be preposterous.

“I hate you,” Sherlock grumbles instead.

“No, you don’t,” John replies, altogether far too pleased with himself for that statement.

Sherlock doesn’t reply, and John knows it’s because he’s right.

It almost surprises John how quickly he falls into a routine that involves getting into bed with Sherlock Holmes, but the fact that it doesn’t hardly surprises him either. It takes Sherlock a while to get used to not kicking out in his sleep, but when he finally does, well. John can’t remember a time when he ever slept better.

They don’t do it every night, of course - Sherlock doesn’t keep a sleep schedule that allows it. Besides, sometimes John likes to crawl back into his own bed to restore whatever delusions of normalcy he once had.

Of course, it’s always shattered the next morning when Sherlock bursts through the door with whatever insane plan he’s cooked up now, gesturing wildly for John to get up already, we’ve murderers to catch, no never mind your clothes just hurry up and come already!

John’s become especially familiar with that last phrase. In two different ways.

In fact, John muses as he watches Sherlock munch on a slice of toast over his laptop, this is likely the happiest he’s been in a long time.

Sherlock’s eyes flicker up at him, then back down to the laptop. “You’re staring at me. Why?” he asks, somehow making it seem more like a demand than a question. Even after all this time, John still doesn’t know how he does that.

“Nothing, really,” he replies, shaking his head a little as he bites at his own piece of toast. “Just thinking.”

Sherlock looks up at that, and watches John intently. John’s somewhat accustomed to Sherlock studying him by now, and they maintain eye contact for half a minute before Sherlock looks back down.

Silence stretches between them for a few minutes afterwards, broken only by the crunching of toast and Sherlock’s furious typing. It’s nice, companionable, and it makes John come to a realisation that makes him grin.

“You have no idea what I’m thinking, do you?” John accuses, poking his toast in Sherlock’s direction.

Sherlock neither looks up nor responds for so long that John starts to think he’s been ignored, until he says, “You’re thinking ‘I wonder if I can get Sherlock to eat another piece of toast before we go out.’”

“Nope!” John says gleefully. Well, alright, yes I am,” He adds when Sherlock quirks an eyebrow in his direction. “But that’s not what I meant and you know it.”

Sherlock sighs and shuts the laptop down. “No, you were being sentimental and considering how your life has vastly improved since you met me. This past month, especially. Am I wrong?”

John frowns, eating the last of his toast as Sherlock stands. “No, you’re right, as always.”

Sherlock grins, moving to John’s side of the table to grab his hand and pull him up. He curls one arm around John’s waist, pulling him close while the other tilts his chin up towards him. “Of course I am. I’m always right,” he says, right before he ducks down to kiss him.

Sherlock kisses like he’ll never get the chance to do it again - like he still can’t quite believe that he’s allowed - and it leaves them both feeling wonderfully dizzy. John kisses back like he has all the time in the world - like he’d gladly spend the rest of his seconds with Sherlock, just like this.

“We’ve a case,” Sherlock eventually murmurs against John’s lips.

John hums in reply. “Better get moving, then.”

Sherlock grins, takes John by the hand, and they run.

Sixteen hours later and it’s 4am and they’re this close to closing the case and catching their arsonist. John doesn’t have any memories of 4am that don’t include either chasing after a suspect or yelling at Sherlock to stop torturing his violin, and this one didn’t seem to being going any differently.

John’s the first to see her legging it from the crime scene, unsurprisingly sprightly for someone who’d looked so nervous earlier. “Sherlock!” he yells, getting his attention, and starts running after her immediately.

He’s ahead of Sherlock for once, and it comes in handy when their suspect turns sharply into an alleyway he would have otherwise missed. It’s a novelty he doesn’t get much time to enjoy when he turns into the small space and something collides into his body with a loud shriek, making him lose his footing and stumble backwards.

Later, he blames surprise for the fact that he hadn’t expected nor seen what happened next. Something smashes into the side of his forehead, then again into his ribs, and finally, two hands plant themselves on his chest and push him backwards.

He would have fallen to the ground like a sack of potatoes, too, if it wasn’t for Sherlock all but running into his back and inadvertently catching him.

Dazed and heavily confused, John looks up at him, but Sherlock isn’t looking back. Instead, he’s looking ahead, no doubt calculating where, exactly, their perp would go.

“Sher-” John tries to speak, but somehow it isn’t quite coming out properly, and it frustrates him.

Sherlock glances at him briefly, but says nothing. Then he drops John and runs.

John’s sure there’s some kind of rational thought process that should follow - an explanation, or something like that - but in that moment, all he feels is anger, tinged with confusion and hurt.

He picks himself up and hobbles to the end of the alley, trying with varying degrees of success to block out the pain in his head and chest. Maybe there’s a chance that Sherlock had caught her quickly and was just around the corner--

Apparently not.

John grits his teeth against the pain and starts making his way back to the flat. Evidently, Sherlock didn’t need his help anyway.

God, he could do with a cup of tea.

It’s just gone five in the morning when John finally makes it back to 221B. He unlocks the door and walks the steps, hoping fervently that Sherlock isn’t back yet, lest he go right ahead and punch him the second he sees him.

An empty flat greets him, and John finds himself surprisingly disappointed. Maybe he’d been looking forward to clocking him one more than he realised.

Instead, he takes off his coat, puts the kettle on and shuts himself in the bathroom to clean himself up. The first thing he does is tend to his forehead. The bleeding had stopped ages ago and, as it turned out, was mostly a superficial surface wound. Oh, sure, there’s a lot of bruising around it, but more than anything it just looked like he’d gotten into a fight with a brick wall and lost.

John puts a little bandage on it all the same. It’s a little messy since it’s in an awkward position, but it’ll do. He spends a few moments contemplating whether or not to take some painkillers, but ends up leaving them. He’s been through worse.

After he’s done all that, he shuffles back into the kitchen to make himself a cup of tea. He’s sitting at the kitchen table, halfway through his drink and trying to figure out what to do, when Sherlock bursts into the flat in a flurry of movement and spots him immediately.

“Ah, good, you’re here! Don’t go to sleep yet, John - there’s still a few things I require your assistance for,” he says, delicately plucking the mug out of John’s grip and setting it on the table so he can grab John’s hand and pull him along.

“She wasn’t alone, and I was too stupid, too slow to realise she had accomplices, but we’re not too late,” he continues to ramble, all but completely ignoring John. “We still have time to get them if we just-”

“No,” John cuts across him, pulling his hand out of Sherlock’s grip and taking a step back.

Sherlock frowns, turning around to face him properly. “No? What do you mean, ‘no’?”

“You dropped me there, on my own, with a bleeding head wound, Sherlock. And you ask why I don’t want to go with you?” John explains with a calmness that he sure doesn’t feel.

“I knew you’d be fine,” Sherlock counters. “Even I could see from where I’d been standing that she hadn’t hit you that hard.”

John pinches the bridge of his nose in thinly veiled frustration. “You don’t know that. There’s no way you could know the extent of any injury from one tiny glance.”

“Do stop being so dramatic, John, it doesn’t suit you,” Sherlock says with a frown. “The day you met me, you learned that the tiny glances are the most important.”

“Not when it comes to this!” John finally yells, throwing his arms up angrily. “I was all but attacked, and you didn’t even stop to check if I was alright!”

Sherlock looks at him sharply. “And let her get away? She’s a tricky one - who knows when the next opportunity to catch her would show up if I’d stopped chasing her.”

John deflates, shoulders sagging as he dispels his anger. What’s left behind is a dull ache he isn’t particularly keen on identifying and he laughs bitterly. “No, no, you know what, I don’t think I should have been so surprised. You’re just--” he takes a deep breath in and emits another laugh on the exhale. “You’re just wired wrong, aren’t you? Wired in a way that leaves no room for me.”

Sherlock goes still at that. “Is that what you think?”

John shakes his head and immediately wishes he hadn’t. The lack of sleep and tense conversation combined with the movement made him dizzy. “I don’t know, alright? It’s past five in the morning, and I’m exhausted. I’m going to bed.”

And he does just that, half expecting Sherlock to follow him up the stairs.

Sherlock doesn’t, and John sleeps alone.

It’s almost noon when John wakes, feeling like he spent all of yesterday lying down and repeatedly allowing a steamroller to drive over him. It takes a moment for his memory to come back to him, and in the meantime he can hear Sherlock going at it with his violin downstairs.

John groans, rolls over, and briefly considers going down and telling him off. Then he remembers exactly what happened, and allows the dull disappointment he’d been staving off last night to finally sink in.

He pulls the blanket further around himself and tries not to think about how it’s not just Sherlock he’s disappointed in.

The next day is Sunday and John doesn’t see Sherlock until late at night, when he returns soaked to the bone.

John frowns and checks the window. It isn’t raining and, as far as he remembers, hadn’t done so all day.

“What happened to you?” John asks, perturbed.

Sherlock spares him a withering glance. “A mistake,” he spits out bitterly. “Won’t happen again.”

“Oh,” John replies. “Er. You need any help with that?”

“No,” is all Sherlock says before shutting himself in the bathroom.

John rolls his eyes as he hears the shower turn on and takes himself up to bed.

He goes back to work on Monday, and Sarah pointedly does not look at his forehead. Instead, she asks meaningless things like how he’s finding the weather and the price of fish these days and hey, how about that rugby match the other day?

John nods and smiles and laughs and, in going through the motions with her, finds himself visibly relaxing.

“Look, never you mind that berk of a flatmate of yours. He’ll come around eventually,” she says, once, completely out of the blue.

John looks at her sheepishly. “How’d you know? About... Well, how’d you know?”

Sarah hits him playfully in the shoulder. “Please don’t insult me, John, when isn’t it ever something he’s done?”

John lets out a surprised laugh that sounds more like a bark, and that sets the both of them off. It feels so good to laugh after being wound up for the past two days, that he doesn’t mind it all too much when his other patients stare openly at the wound on his head.

John dithers in front of 221B for a long time, contemplating the pros and cons of going up and talking to Sherlock. It’s been two days since then, two days in which they’ve barely spoken to each other.

He’s still standing there when Mrs. Hudson returns, laden down with shopping bags. “Oh, hello John,” she greets. “Forget your key?”

“No, it’s...” John rubs the back of his head, not entirely sure what to say next. “Do you need some help with those?” he offers instead.

Mrs. Hudson tsks, but lets him take half the load anyway and leads them both inside. She motions for John to put the bags on the table and asks, “What’s he done now, then?”

John jolts in surprise. “What makes you say he’s done anything?”

Mrs. Hudson pats him on the arm. “Oh, please. You don’t live around you two for as long as I have and not pick up a thing or two.”

“I suppose you’re right about that,” John admits.

“Of course I am!” Mrs. Hudson admonishes him. “Besides, he was down here earlier, looking much the same as you do.”

John tries not to look to interested in that and has a feeling he failed miserably. “Was he? Did he tell you anything?”

Mrs. Hudson laughs as she goes about putting her groceries away. “Not a thing, dear! He just moped around ranting to himself for a while, then dashed off. I think I managed to catch the gist of it somewhere in between all those words.”

John sits down at her table and rests his head in his hands. “The more I think about it all, the sillier it seems. But it’s not unreasonable, is it? Getting angry because he left me behind?”

The groceries all packed away and accounted for, Mrs. Hudson joins John at the table, sitting across from him. “Well, you know him, dear. If he changed for you, then he wouldn’t be Sherlock, would he?”

John frowns. “So you think I should just accept the fact that he’s a dick and move on?”

“I’m not telling you to forgive him, dear. Just to take into account that you are two very different people, with two very different perceptions of the world,” she points out.

John groans and buries his face in his hands. “Stop having sensible opinions. It’s making me feel stupid,” he says, his voice muffled slightly.

“You know I love you both dearly, but you two are idiots,” Mrs. Hudson teases him with a wink. “Now get out of my kitchen, I’ve got a dinner to cook.”

John laughs, gets up, and gives Mrs. Hudson a hug. She laughs as well and hugs him back, then gives him a little whack on the back when he stays there. “Alright, alright, I’m going,” he says.

He leaves just as Mrs. Hudson starts shooing him out with a newspaper.

“Where have you been? You were supposed to be back hours ago!” Sherlock demands the moment he steps through the door.

John arches an eyebrow at him as he closes the door behind himself. “You couldn’t hear? I was downstairs with Mrs. Hudson.”

“What on earth were you doing that for? No, don’t answer that, I don’t care,” Sherlock adds when John opens his mouth. Then he pauses, and frowns. “This is going terribly. Can I start again?”

“Start what again? Insulting me?”

Sherlock makes a noise of frustration and foregoes words in order to grab John by the shoulders and push him into his armchair. Then he stands in front of him and says, “What I did, the other night, it was...” He swallows. “It wasn’t good.”

John sighs and gets up off the chair, which makes Sherlock speak faster. “Injuries are often more complicated than they first appeared and I should’ve made absolutely sure you were fine. I could have lost you that night, and it’s that realisation that terrifies me.”

John nods. “Okay. Alright then. You... have anything else to say?”

Sherlock narrows his eyes ever so slightly. “I’m a berk and I apologise, but I won’t say what I did was wrong. You did end up being fine, and she would have gotten away if I hadn’t-”

John huffs, crosses the short distance between them and shuts him up with a kiss. When he pulls away, Sherlock’s eyes are wide and he’s staring at him.

“You’re shit at apologies,” is all John says.

“I know,” Sherlock replies.

“I forgive you.”

Sherlock grins, entirely too smug for John’s liking. “I know.”

“And, well, I’m sorry, too. Mind you, I’m not absolving you of what you did, but I should have stopped and thought about it from your point of view as well. And I... well, I probably shouldn’t have said those things about you.”

Sherlock’s brow furrowed. “You were right, though. About everything. I’m hardly the easiest person to relate to.”

“Doesn’t make it any better,” John says. “If there’s anything you’ve been constantly reminding me of, it’s that your work is important. If this is going to work,” he says, taking Sherlock’s hand, “then we’re going to have to come to a compromise. A lot, probably.”

Sherlock pretends to think about it. “I could make some allowances with work.”

“That’s what I like to hear,” John says with a smile. “Now come on, I’m bored with this conversation. Let’s go to bed.”

Sherlock’s grin returns in full force as John leads him to the bedroom. “Well now, Doctor Watson, are you propositioning me?”

John pulls him inside, shuts the door behind him and pushes him up against the wall, sliding their bodies together. “You know what,” he says, tongue flicking out along his lips, “I rather think I am.”

They take Mrs. Hudson out to Angelo’s the following night. John protests, wants to take her somewhere nicer, which leads to Sherlock spending the next six minutes describing to him exactly why Angelo’s is the perfect place to go.

Mrs. Hudson squeezes her way between them just as Sherlock launches into the seventh minute and takes both of their arms in hers. Sherlock promptly shuts up, making the other two laugh heartily.

Angelo ushers them in immediately when they get there, sitting them down in his favourite seat by the window. John nudges Sherlock with his shoulder when Angelo flusters and pulls Mrs. Hudson’s seat out for her. Mrs. Hudson pats his arm in appreciation and maybe leaves it there a little longer than necessary.

“Think there’s a spark of romance in the air, don’t you?” John whispers to Sherlock with a grin.

Sherlock scoffs and passes him a menu. “They would be terrible together,” is all he offers.

“You’re only saying that because they’d gang up on you,” John accuses.

“That’s exactly the point.”

Dinner goes by without a hitch, and Angelo comes by another four times before they tell him to just down already. He makes a fuss about it and scurries off but he’s back before long, toting a bottle of wine.

John starts humming Can You Feel the Love Tonight just loud enough for Mrs. Hudson to notice and whack him with her menu. John laughs, and Mrs. Hudson joins in when she notices Sherlock looking between them and frowning heavily.

They drink and eat and by the end of it everyone’s full to bursting and ready to leave. Except, of course, for Angelo, who keeps trying to ply them with more wine or more candles or more of anything, really, to get them to stay a little longer. John and Sherlock end up having to shove their money into his hands and all but push him back into the kitchen.

In between all of this, Mrs. Hudson still manages to kiss him on the cheek and promise to come back later.

“You shouldn’t encourage him,” Sherlock says as they leave. “He’ll never leave you alone otherwise.”

“Oh hush,” Mrs. Hudson replies. “I think he’s a perfectly lovely man.”

“That much is obvious,” Sherlock grumbles under his breath.

John kicks him in the shin for that, and that’s when he notices that his shoelaces are undone. He leans down to do it back up, waving the other two on when they stop for him. “Keep walking, I’ll catch up.”

As it turns out, it’s a good thing that he’d shooed them on, considering what happened next.

What happens is this:

A car, trying its luck, runs the red light behind them. Unfortunately for this car, someone else had apparently been having the same thought. All this culminates in them meeting unhappily in the middle of the intersection. The second car crashes into the first, shunting it to the side and causing it to ram into another, third car.

It’s the third car hurtles uncertainly in John’s direction, the woman inside slamming desperately on the breaks and trying to steady her car. It’s preceded and followed by the ear splitting sound of tires squealing and car horns going off.

The car hits John in his side, sending him crashing to the ground with a cry of pain. He groans and rolls himself over and decides that ‘third time lucky’ is a bitch of a phrase.

Sherlock’s by his side immediately, hands frantically pawing over his body, trying to check for damage.

John manages to huff out a laugh. “Hello to you too, Sherlock. I hope you’re not planning on ripping off my clothes in the middle of the street.”

Sherlock glares at him for that and says, frankly, “Shut up, John.” A pause, then, “I refuse to let something as pedestrian as a car crash take you from me.”

Something warm runs through John at those words, and makes him grin stupidly. Then he says, because it’s probably important to tell him, “Sherlock, I’m not dying. The car didn’t hit me quite that hard, you realise.”

Sherlock’s hands on him still immediately and he frowns. “Of course, I was perfectly aware of that.”

If anything, John’s grin widens at that, and he says. “Yeah, yeah, I love you too.”

“I never said that,” Sherlock rebuts, his frown deepening as he looks away.

“Yes, you did,” John replies. “Now help me up already - the concrete isn’t nearly as comfortable as it looks.”

Sherlock offers him a hand and pulls John up. The action causes John to wince and fall against Sherlock. “Still bloody hurts, though.”

“Mm, yes, I rather thought it would,” is all Sherlock says.

It’s only then that John realises they’re missing a member of their team. “Where’s Mrs. Hudson?” he asks, trying not to let panic or doubt settle in.

Sherlock shoots him a grin and turns him around to see that Mrs. Hudson speaking to the woman in the car that rammed him. And giving her a piece of her mind, too, if the woman’s expression was anything to go by.

John laughs, and Sherlock joins in. “Come on, then. We’d better go rescue her.”

“Mrs. Hudson?” Sherlock asks, incredulous.