Work Text:
The telegram is waiting in his box when he comes out of the workroom. It’s buried under half a dozen other slips of paper meant to impart important information such as mealtimes, schedules, and requests for assistance. Sherlock gets more notes than any other person at Bletchley Park, since it’s generally accepted that leaving Sherlock Holmes a message is better for one’s health and reputation than to ask him outright when people can hear what he says to you. Not that he is any more likely to offer his help with a note, but at least he is less likely to bite your head off and tell the entire world whose knees you were knocking in the middle of the night.
Sherlock rifles through the messages, throws the schedules in the nearby bin, the hand-written notes on the table, and then pockets the telegram. He wanders to the kitchens, fixes himself a sandwich from the leftovers from dinner, and then heads up to his room in the East Wing, which has the lovely view of absolutely nothing, though there’d been the girls’ feeble attempts at a Victory Garden in the spring. Due to inattention (mostly because no one had the time), it had only produced a bumper crop of spring onions, grown to gargantuan portions. They’d been the only source of flavor in dinner for two months running, and Sherlock would have happily stopped eating altogether if it meant he never had to taste an onion again.
The bedroom is small and cozy: a cot, a desk, a window, a wardrobe, just as everyone else’s – but better than theirs because he also had a fireplace, which is useful on occasion, particularly in the cold. Except…
Sherlock leaves the telegram on the desk and heads across the hall to knock on the neighboring door. Most of the fellows in the East Wing are obnoxious, toffee-nosed idiots.
Molly Hooper is quite different, and not because she’s the only girl in the entire East Wing.
“Oh, hello, Sher—“
“Matches,” he says briskly, fingers already drumming impatiently on his leg. “In exchange for five minutes.”
It was meant to be a practical joke, putting Molly in the room directly across from Sherlock’s, though it was unclear if the joke was on Molly or Sherlock. She was such a timid thing when it came to work – always the last to speak up, the last to catch the joke, the last to join the laughter.
It had been widely assumed that Sherlock would have eaten her alive before lunch. Instead, Molly had lived across from him for four months without complaint. The longest of Sherlock’s neighbors had lasted two days, and he’d had to take leave for his mental health before returning.
Molly would have made an excellent man, or so the other fellows say, sometimes right to Molly’s face. Sherlock thought they were idiots. Most people were.
“Six minutes,” Molly replied in that firm way she had, and Sherlock shrugged acquiescence.
It takes a few tries before Molly is able to get the fireplace in his room going, and she unashamedly hangs her knickers and other curvy unmentionables on the little string before the fireplace, close enough to catch the heat but not enough to catch the flames. The first time, she had tried to hide them under her blouses, until he pointed out the fallacy in the arrangement. Once she realized that he wasn’t bothered by knickers any more than he was her presence in the first place, she became quite blatant about them.
The other girls use the heat from Colossus to dry their unmentionables. Either Molly is too shy to put them on display – or she’s too shy to put them on display for all and sundry to see. Sherlock isn’t sure, hasn’t asked, and doesn’t want to hear the answer.
The fire is burning merrily when Molly stretches her fingers out to warm them.
“There’s plenty of room if you want to sit,” she offers.
Sherlock glances at the fire, the unopened telegram still in his hands. “No.”
“Oh,” says Molly, blushing a bit pink. “I suppose… well. Think of them as pretty flags, instead of knickers?”
Sherlock’s mouth quirks a bit.
“No,” he says again, and opens the telegram.
IN LONDON CHRISTMAS WEEK STOP GREG SAYS YOU’RE STAYING UP THERE STOP GET YOUR ARSE DOWN HERE YOU BASTARD STOP JOHN FULL STOP
“Good news, then,” says Molly, sounding oddly relieved, and Sherlock looks up from his third read.
“Eh?”
“You’re smiling.”
He touches the corners of his mouth – they could be turned up. Tricky to tell without the mirror.
“I don’t like to leave people alone with telegrams,” continues Molly. “Even the plain ones – somehow they’re almost worse than the black-rimmed, because at least with the black-rimmed, you know what’s in them, it’s only learning who. Plain ones – it could be anything.”
“Yes, well. This one is good.” Sherlock folds the telegram back up again. He’d like to burn it – but somehow, can’t. Instead he pulls the knife from the desk drawer and uses it to pin the paper to the mantle, with an elaborate show of force that may or may not be intended to frighten Molly away.
Molly’s eyes go wide, but her fingers don’t shake or twitch. “That’s a lovely thing. Shame there’s no steak to cut with it.”
“Rather wasted on boiled cabbage,” Sherlock replies, it’s only when Molly smiles shyly at him that he realizes he might joking with her, which could be interpreted as flirting. It rubs his skin the wrong way. He doesn’t flirt. Isn’t even sure how. “Five minutes,” he says curtly, to cover his discomfort, and turns away to fling himself down on the bed, fingers steepled under his chin, thinking.
“All right,” says Molly, as if nothing had passed between them at all. “Mind if I come back for these later?”
“Mmm.”
She closes the door gently behind her, leaving Sherlock alone with the telegram and his thoughts.
*
Easy enough to get leave for four days – no more, no one ever gets more, and the only reason he has the four is because he’s never asked for a single one before. It’s also possible that his minor experiment in his off-hours the day before caused a minor explosion below Turing and Knox’s bedroom windows, resulting in a cloud of black smoke that has rendered their living spaces unusable, and the pair of them are so royally angry with Sherlock that they would rather be a man down than have to look at his face for a few days.
Entirely accidental, of course, but Sherlock notes the chemical composition for possible later use.
He raids the kitchen before he goes – the cooks like him, if no one else does – and after some thought, leaves one prize from his bounty in Molly’s room, under the pile of the underthings she left in his room the day before. It’s as much a Christmas present as a favor for borrowing the carpet bag under her bed. She’s pulling a double shift, so it’s unlikely he’ll see her again before he goes to catch his train, and even if his door is unlocked, she’d never think of going in without him being there.
Luckily for her – and her knickers – he has no such compunction about going into hers.
The train is late to arrive and late to leave and ridiculously slow and crowded. Sherlock doesn’t wear a uniform and therefore stands most of the way, which doesn’t bother him any more than the looks he receives from some of the civilians, who eye his clothes before they look him up and down, as though trying to determine his medical eligibility to be shot to pieces on the battlefield. He stares into the middle distance, his mind still back at work, still untangling the latest encryption and noting what connections and revelations he uncovers.
No one is ever truly off the clock. He won’t completely puzzle it out before his return, which is just as well – it’s not as though he could send a telegram back to tell them the code.
King’s Cross is packed to the gills with people. The station is cheery and friendly and bright with the mid-afternoon light that streams in through the high windows. The sound of laughter and talk fills the air, bounces off the walls and rooftop, and Sherlock’s head is already thick with the humidity on the train, the thickness of the same cigarette smoke and unfriendly looks endured for three hours. He might be getting a headache; it’s hard to tell without a gulp of fresh air, which may be all he needs, and so he weaves through the masses of people (easy with only the single carpet bag) and makes his way to the street to get his first gulp of London air in far too long.
London tastes exactly the same and exactly not as he remembers. Dirt and muck and ash and fire and masses of humanity all rolled into one, and Sherlock breathes it for a few minutes, lets it fill his lungs and then pushes it all back out again, before he sets off for 15 Montague Street.
*
The house appears empty when he lets himself in, but there’s a coat dripping on the hooks in the hall, and a pair of boots still damp with mud under it. The air smells faintly of tea and slightly burned toast, and Sherlock has barely hung up his long winter coat before the light switches on upstairs.
“Sherlock, you utter bastard,” says Greg Lestrade delightedly from the second story landing. He leans on the railing and grins down at him. “You said you weren’t coming home for Christmas.”
“I’m not,” says Sherlock. Home isn’t Montague Street; hasn’t been for years, and Greg knows it. Home is 221B Baker, but Mrs Hudson has gone to Cornwall with her sister for the duration and the flat’s been subleased to God knew who. Except for a little room in Bletchley, Sherlock thinks of himself as homeless. Better than reclaiming Montague Street, anyway.
“I didn’t believe him when he said you’d come,” continues Greg, and he comes down the stairs. His shirt is undone at the neck and sleeves; his socks are missing, as is his tie, and it’s only when he’s closer that Sherlock notes the dark circles under his eyes.
“You’re just off-shift,” he says, and Greg rolls his eyes – bloodshot, a bit. “Double-shift.”
“Not quite,” says Greg. “Shift until about an hour ago, and my air-warden duties last night. I went straight from one to the other.”
And then he doesn’t say another word, just gathers Sherlock in a hug.
“God,” says Greg, his voice muffled by Sherlock’s jacket, as if the word pains him, as if holding onto Sherlock is the only thing keeping him on his feet at all.
The house is quiet, except for the ticking clock in the sitting room on the right; family portraits of people who will never be glad to see Sherlock again still rest on the shelves, smiling down at him now.
Sherlock closes his eyes, and his heart hurts in exactly the way that Greg’s voice sounds. Almost without thought, he relaxes into the hug, letting the sure strength in Greg’s arms pull him close and hold him tight.
“Come on,” says Greg after a few minutes, and he pulls away too soon for Sherlock’s liking, the grin still on his crooked face. “That’s enough, then, I know you hate shows of affection. Tea, and you can avoid telling me everything going on with you the last six months.”
It’s half an hour and three cups of terrible tea later when the front door slams. “Honey, I’m home!” calls out John Watson, and then there’s a pause before he says with utter delight, “Sherlock, you sodding prick.”
Greg grins. His eyes are even more bloodshot now, if such a thing is possible, and they’ve been solidly at half-mast for the past ten minutes, tea notwithstanding. “Behave, we’ve got company!”
John appears in the doorway a minute later, still in his coat and carrying his hat and an umbrella, along with the string bag, bulging with an assortment of cans and apples. His hair is regulation length; his civilian clothes fit a bit loosely and he’s grown a moustache of all things. It looks ridiculous, but he holds the bag aloft as if none of that matters.
“Tinned salmon,” he announces with a certain amount of pride. “And tinned peas, and if we want symmetry, we can put the apples in tins before we eat them, too.”
Sherlock points to the carpet bag, now sitting on the counter. “Tinned peaches.”
“That beats my apples any day,” says John, and dumps the entire lot next to the carpet bag and leans against the counter. “You utter and complete bastard. Left it a bit late; Christmas is tomorrow and the shops close in an hour, so you’ll have to make do with apples as a present.”
“Well, if that’s all you have for me,” scoffs Sherlock. “There’s an eight o’clock train, I’ll go back on that.”
“Damn fool operation you’ve got, can’t even keep military time,” says John.
It’s up to Greg to be the adult, and he takes the role so naturally he probably doesn’t even realize he’s done it. “So do we eat them now or save them for Christmas dinner?”
“Now,” says John immediately. “If I’m going to die in a raid tonight, it’ll be with a full stomach.”
It’s not much of a feast, but they make do. Greg unearths a jar of mince from the cupboard and even better, half a bar of chocolate so white with age that they’re not entirely sure it was brown to start.
“I’m sure it’s from Mycroft’s secret stash,” he says. “But as he’s not here—“ And Greg throws it onto the pile.
“Fine flatmate you are,” laughs John, and doesn’t see the shadow pass over Greg’s face for a moment, the thin grin that hides the sudden longing in his eyes.
Sherlock notices, and for a brief moment, almost envies it. He comes to his senses a moment later when John steals the chocolate from his plate.
“If you’re just going to stare at it,” he says, and takes a bite. Sherlock has to wrestle the rest out of his hand, and John yelps when Sherlock shoves his elbow into John’s ribs. “Oi!”
Then they’re kicking each other’s chairs like schoolboys. All that’s missing is Mycroft to question their ages.
It’s probably what spurs Greg to standing and stretching with a yawn. “Well, that’s it for me, boys. Warden or not, I’m staying put until morning, I don’t care if the sirens go and whoever wakes me will lose an eye.”
“Proper role model, aren’t you?” says John, amused.
“You’re hardly children, the lot of you,” says Greg, but the joke falls flat, somehow, and he stands in the kitchen, embarrassed for a moment. Sherlock doesn’t look at him – doesn’t look at John either. They’re too warm and too close and too alive, and he stares at the pale tea in his mug, swirling it gently and then rough, the liquid getting closer and closer to the edge where it could spill.
Don’t do that, darling, you shan’t have any more if you spill it.
“Well,” says Greg finally. “Good-night. Happy Christmas.”
“Happy Christmas, Greg,” says John, gentle and warm, and then it’s just the two of them in the quiet, cold kitchen.
John lets Sherlock brood for exactly two more minutes, and then he gets up from his chair.
“Is there still brandy in the sitting room?”
Sherlock looks up from his tea. “Greg doesn’t show signs of having turned into a secret alcoholic.”
“Brilliant,” says John. “Let’s go rescue the tea.”
Sherlock stands. His knees are shaking; he’s not entirely sure why.
“On second thought,” says John, “leave the fucking tea.”
*
They get ridiculously, gloriously drunk on the brandy John finds in the drinks cabinet, and they play a game in which they try to stack books higher than the other, and then they run out of books and try to guess which ones are in each other’s piles, and somewhere near the bottom of the bottle, they end up sprawled on various chairs staring at the ceiling and talking.
“I don’t know where she is,” says John, squinting at the ceiling as if there’s a map painted there.
“Mary,” says Sherlock, because he doesn’t know what other she John could mean, and they haven’t been talking about her at all, so it stands to reason John would bring her up at some point in the evening.
“I think she’s in France, but I think everyone’s in France eventually.”
“Not me.”
John points with his drinking hand; it’s a wavy sort of gesture, though that’s either the weight of the glass or the alcohol in his bloodstream. “You never want to go anywhere.”
“Not true. I want to visit the tribe in the Amazon where they perform human sacrifices to bring back the sun.”
John snorts and takes another drink. “I’m still in shock you left London at all.”
“Do you hear from her?” Sherlock doesn’t know why he cares, except that John cares, and therefore he ought to care, and it’s all one great big caring sort of thing to ask.
“Like clockwork.” John sighs and rests his head back. “Exactly like clockwork, and her letters always sound the same, that reassuring nonsense that’s meant to make me feel better. It doesn’t work, either. I think she wrote them all in a single afternoon and has left them with someone to post every Saturday she’s gone. She’s never going to be able to tell me what she does. Even if this bloody war ends—“
“When.”
“Fine, have it your way – even when this bloody war ends, she’ll be under some statute of secrecy.”
Sherlock thinks of the information they receive sometimes; the oddness of it, or at least the oddness in that it’s obtained at all. “You think her work is so secretive.”
John turns his head and stares at Sherlock. “Well. You’d know, wouldn’t you?”
It’s the closest they’ve ever come to discussing what Sherlock’s doing up in Bletchley. Because Sherlock’s never said, and John’s never asked, and there’s few things that would drag Sherlock out of London – even the possibility of cannibalistic Amazonian tribes is more of a joke than an actual possibility. Sherlock can’t look at John; he swirls the brandy around in his glass, so close to spilling onto his lap.
“Never mind,” says John suddenly, and turns back to his glass. “Sorry I asked. I know you can’t—“
“I don’t know what Mary’s doing,” says Sherlock finally.
“I know you don’t,” sighs John. He pauses. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Anyone special you’ve neglected to mention in your letters?”
“I don’t write letters.”
“I’ve noticed,” says John dryly. “You could. Normal people write letters.”
“I’m not normal. A machine, or so you keep reminding me.”
“A machine can spit out a letter once in a while well enough.”
“Oh, fine, I’ll write,” grumbles Sherlock. “Leave off.”
“Will do, ta.” A moment goes by, while John settles in his seat. “So. There’s no one for you, then?”
Sherlock thinks of the girls – scores of them, all brassy and bold and taking no nonsense or guff from any of them. They bring coffee and tea without so much as a murmur, and then turn right around and pull ten-hour shifts back to back without so much as a blink. They laugh and joke and paint lines up the back of their legs and go into town and come back singing songs at the top of their lungs, and they flirt with the men and wink and think Sherlock and the way he blushes at them is sweet and innocent.
Not Molly. Molly, who is comes in, does her work, never speaks up and never complains. She reads her books and smiles at Sherlock; she blushes and stammers and never leaves him notes asking for things. She waits for him, and then simply presents what she needs, with the full expectation that she’ll have it.
“Not as such,” says Sherlock finally. John doesn’t comment on the hesitation. “You know there wouldn’t be.”
“I know,” says John, as calm as he ever is, when the subject comes up. “Easier for you, I should think. Not having entanglements.”
Sherlock doesn’t say anything, because as much as John claims to understand – he doesn’t. Not really.
“Colder in the middle of the night, though,” adds John, proving Sherlock’s theory.
“And I suppose that keeps you warm at night, knowing Mary’s in danger and could be killed at any time, and you’d never even hear about it?”
John is quiet for a moment; Sherlock doesn’t have to look to know he has gone tense, that his fingers are clenched into fists.
“You right bastard,” says John softly, finally. “And that’s not what I meant. At all, and you know it. It’s not right, Sherlock – to go through life, never finding companionship.”
“I have companionship,” says Sherlock.
“I don’t count.”
“You’re the only one who does.”
John shook his head. “Romantic love, Sherlock. Not brotherly.”
Which reminds Sherlock of the absent presence in the house, and he’ll do anything to change the subject. “They’re sending you to Africa.”
“Christ,” groans John. “How the hell did you know? My shoelaces? The hem on my left sleeve?”
“Mycroft’s in Cairo.”
“The lengths you go to change the subject. Maybe I’ll look him up.” John turns and fixes his gaze on Sherlock. “It’s fine with me, you know. If you never find anyone.”
Which isn’t exactly true, Sherlock knows. Sherlock can’t find what he doesn’t seek, and it’s the act of not seeking that John doesn’t understand.
“Bloody nice of them, not to bomb tonight. Christmas Eve and all.”
“Well,” says Sherlock. “I suppose they’re probably saving up for something big tomorrow.”
*
John falls asleep on the chair. Sherlock takes the glass from his hand, finishes the brandy, and sets it on the table before covering his friend with a spare blanket. John snuffles in his sleep and snores on.
It’s a terrible idea, really, but Sherlock does it anyway. He pours another brandy and goes into the front hall. The brandy is medicinal, he tells himself. It’s liquid courage. It’s the only thing that will help him through the next fifteen stupid minutes of his life, but if he doesn’t do what he’s about to do, he’ll regret it for every fifteen minutes that follows.
He walks over to shelves that are casually, carefully arranged works of art, decorated sparsely with photographs and knick-knacks, so much unlike the shelves at 221B that he and John had overflowing with books and papers and other useful things.
Mummy and Father and Sherrinford stare back, all in various poses and configurations. In clothes that start off Edwardian and then ease into war-time restrictions, the straight lines of the Twenties, the bias-cuts of the Thirties. Mycroft in his Eton tails, Sherlock scowling as he wears the same, Sherrinford lying with his arms around Redbeard on some forgotten lawn somewhere.
The night is quiet outside; if Sherlock listens at the right moment, he can hear the air wardens walk by the house, the crunch of their boots on the pavement. No sirens tonight – not yet, anyway, and probably none at all. A Christmas gift of sorts, like John says.
Sherlock would rather hear the sirens, feel them pound in his head and his ears as he fumbles with his coat and boots. He’d like to see the people stream out of their homes, glance up at the sky as they hurry along the darkened streets. He wants to stumble over the dropped newspapers, listen to the drone of planes overhead, hear the whistle as the bomb drops—
How loud could it all be? Did they know it was coming? Did they hear it and realize, with every beat of their hearts, that their names were written on it? Did they have time to hold hands and breath and all the unspoken words that never needed saying? Did they even have time to say anything at all before being turned into ash? Mummy’s fingers had always been cold, so cold; and Sherrinford had the warmest hands Sherlock had ever known. Would they have held them together, clutched each other in those last moments, said…?
He wants to know. He wants to take their last moments and sear them into his mind, not for the morbidity of it (as John might say) or so that he can relive the pain they surely felt, knowing they were about to die (as Greg might say) but because it’s the closest he will ever come to being with them again, to shortening the amount of time it has been between the time they breathed the air which he now breathes without them.
John coughs in his sleep behind him; it’s the angle of his head on the chair. Sherlock lived with John for five years before the outbreak of the war; he knows every cough and sneeze and clearing of the throat, what each indicates for John’s health and well-being. He can determine John’s sleep patterns from the way he breathes in the morning, his day from the step of his feet on the stair. He can listen to John’s voice and determine John’s exact state of mind.
Pre-war data, all of it. He knows it should give him comfort, if John doesn’t return, to remember him in better days. But it doesn’t, because he remembers how Mummy was always cold, always leaving cardigans strewn throughout the house so there was always one near to hand when she wanted it. He remembers how Sherrinford was afraid of the dark when he was small, and even later when he was too big to admit it, and how he wanted complete silence when he slept.
They were cold, in their last moments. They were in the dark, and there were loud noises surrounding them, and so remembering them in happier days doesn’t help one bit.
John coughs again, shifts under the blanket, and sighs. But Sherlock is restless, and the alcohol has made him stupid; he goes up the stairs to the bedrooms, passes the door where undoubtedly Greg has fallen asleep in Mycroft’s bed, and goes into the room he shared with Sherrinford once. The blackout curtains are still drawn against the night, even though the room smells of dust and neglect, and Sherlock falls asleep quickly on the bed, neatly made with freshly laundered sheets. It’s not the same as being near to his brother in his last moments, but it’s the nearest he will ever come.
*
By noon, they’re all awake and it’s only the alcohol that makes the terrible presents tolerable.
“These are without a doubt the worst prezzies in the world,” says John, giggling as he unwraps the third pair of black socks.
“Manners, John,” says Sherlock, pretending to be highly affronted, but it’s difficult to be haughty about anything when he’s wearing a hat with ear flaps and a ribbon bow on the top.
“Don’t knock ‘em, I’d take a pair of socks,” says Greg, and John lobs them over. Greg catches them, and then holds up the handkerchiefs. “Trade?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” says John, and catches them neatly.
“Are we trading now? Excellent. Greg, I will trade you this hat for your long underwear.”
“Oi, I bought you that hat,” exclaims John.
“No deal. Gets cold out there watching for Jerry.”
“You don’t like my hat?”
“No.”
“I’ll have you know that hat is one-of-a-kind.”
“Thank God. When I burn it you won’t be able to replace it,” says Sherlock, and ducks when John throws a bit of wrapping paper at his head.
“One more present,” announces Greg, and reaches under the sofa. “It’s not wrapped, though – I hope you don’t mind, Sherlock.”
“I’m terribly insulted, not even taking the time to—“
But the rest of the words never make it past his lips; Greg has straightened, and holds the irregularly-shaped case out to Sherlock. Brown leather, scratched and worn in all the expected places, the spot near the handle where Sherrinford had carved his initials with a penknife. Sherlock’s mouth works open and closed for a few moments, and then he reaches out for it, and Greg hands it over.
“It’s not exactly from me,” admits Greg.
“Mycroft,” says Sherlock, taking the case. It’s heavier than he remembers; the leather is cool and rough under his fingertips.
“It was something Ford said to me once – that he always thought you’d been the one who ought to have taken the violin lessons, and not him. I don’t know why he said it, he played beautifully – remember that Christmas concert, John?” Greg asked, turning to John. “Was it ‘38? Or ‘39?”
“Thirty-eight,” says John, a bit misty-eyed now. “Yeah, I remember. Christ, I’d forgotten. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, let nothing you dismay—“
Greg joins him in singing, but Sherlock has stopped listening. He runs his fingers down the length of the case, and then pops open the locks. He lifts it up, just enough to let the light in the room catch the shiny wood of the instrument, for the smell of rosin and wax to waft up to his nostrils.
Sherrinford’s violin – and Sherlock remembers the way his younger brother had played, with all of his heart and soul, with all of him poured into the music. Sherrinford had never done anything by halves, whether it was music or sport or making friends. It had all been hard and fast and furious, and in the end, burned him from the inside out.
Sherlock slams the lid closed again. “I don’t know what he meant. He was the violinist, not me.”
Greg shrugged. “Well, mate, it’s yours. I think he would have wanted you to have it.”
Sherlock sets the case aside, and they spend the rest of the afternoon playing poker and singing carols as badly as they possibly can. It turns into a close contest, particularly given the obscene lyrics Sherlock writes for Good King Wenceslas, and when Greg leaves for his Air Warden duties, he’s still whistling the tune.
*
By the time Greg returns in the morning, Sherlock’s on his second cup of tea and John has long since left for the train station and his return to duty. There are dark circles under Greg’s eyes, and a grey cast to his face, though that might be the grey dust on his clothes.
“Building collapse,” he says shortly. “I’m only home to change; I’ve got to be at the Yard by ten.” His face brightens when he sees the tea in Sherlock’s hands. “Is that tea? Actual tea?”
“From the same source as the tinned peaches,” says Sherlock, and nods to the box on the table.
Greg nearly lunges for it. “Cor,” he says, and breathes in the scent. “I’m going to enjoy this.”
Sherlock returns to the paper, and Greg sets to making the tea. He’s still fumbling with the tea cozy when he speaks again.
“Sherlock – about the violin.”
Sherlock tenses.
“I’m sorry if it was inappropriate. Just… no idea when you’ll be down here next, mate, and I thought you ought to know it’s yours.”
“Technically, it’s Mycroft’s,” says Sherlock, and turns the page of the newspaper. “As he is the eldest, and I suspect Sherrinford hadn’t written a will.”
“I don’t think he’ll mind.” Greg leaned on the table. “Look, you don’t have to take it with you. You don’t have to do anything with it. Stupid, probably, if you can’t even play it.”
“I never said I couldn’t play it.”
“Yeah, you did, you said—“ Greg frowned, remembering. “Can you play it?”
Sherlock sets down the teacup. “I should pack; my train leaves at noon.”
“You’re dodging the question.”
“Well spotted, Inspector.”
“Berk,” says Greg fondly.
*
The train is crowded going back. The station is still decorated with thin wreathes and boughs of holly, though the scent has long since faded – possibly is faded even before the war, Sherlock thinks, and sets off for the house. Had the train been on time, there might have been a car – but then, had the train been on time, the house might have assumed it would be late and not bothered to send one.
Regardless, it’s a short walk, and he’s not carrying very much.
He sees Dilly on the porch, having a smoke, when he’s halfway up the gravel path.
“Nice hat,” says Dilly around the cigar when Sherlock pulls up closer. He points at the case in Sherlock’s hand. “Don’t tell me you’ve taken up a life of crime.”
“No,” says Sherlock. “The smoke cleared, then?”
“Lucky for you, or you’d be sleeping in the barn.”
“There isn’t a barn.”
“Exactly,” says Dilly, and Sherlock goes inside.
His box is full of papers again; schedules, notices, the regular flotsam and jetsam of life. He bins all of it and heads up to his room.
Molly’s door is open. Her radio plays Christmas music, something ringing with cheer and friendliness. He almost closes his door behind him, just to shut it out, but leaves it open, because otherwise Molly will knock, and then be offended when he doesn’t answer.
She’ll like the violin, he thinks. It’ll be better than the radio, at least.
He pulls out the violin carefully, fits it under his chin. Tests and tunes the strings.
“You’re back,” says Molly from the door, equally surprised and pleased, and Sherlock picks up the bow. “I didn’t know you played.”
“I don’t play,” says Sherlock, and plays the first note, sweet and clear.