Chapter Text
The unthinkable has finally happened: something has driven Sherlock beyond speech.
The sound coming from the back of his throat is a feral growl guaranteed to make any lesser creature bare its throat in submission or flee in terror. The tiny hairs on the back of John's neck are prickling, but he's no lesser creature. The prospective client whose footsteps are still echoing on the stairs was another matter. Her departure may just have broken a land speed record.
"I warned her, but did she listen?" John says to no one in particular as he carries the empty mugs to the sink. "Serves her right."
Sherlock paces the perimeter of the sitting room, nudging an object into place here, rearranging a stack of papers there. Suddenly, he roars with such fury that John rushes back from the kitchen expecting blood.
"Five days, John!"
Sherlock is waving a fat three-ring binder in one hand and crumpling a fistful of sticky notes in the other. "I spent five days annotating these records, and when I looked away for five minutes, he pulled out my notes. Every. Single. One."
He slaps down the binder, tosses the sticky notes in the air like confetti. "If a client ever lets a child anywhere near my desk again," he snarls, "I swear I will strangle the brat."