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He had decided to do gardening to pay for university. Not that he was a professional, but the actual gardeners often liked someone who wouldn’t mind getting his their hands dirty and lifting heavy things — John certainly didn’t. The company that had hired him asked if he’d work during Christmas break, to which he replied “yes, of course”, since he didn’t have anywhere else to go anyway. His mother was dead, his father was a right mess, and his sister… Well, John would much rather avoid thinking about Harry as much as he could.
So he was assigned to work with Mr Cornelius. He was a tall gentleman with a warm smile and a bushy moustache. He told John that his last assistant had left due to ‘personal problems’, but then he winked, and John wondered what the hell had happened to the poor bloke.
On the first day of work, and that was around the end of November — because until then, John had been trying to scrape by using the money his grandmother had left him —, Mr Cornelius picked him up in a shiny moss-green van with the name of the company on the side. They drove for an hour and a half, arriving at a beautiful estate, gorgeous, well-kept gardens — yes, plural — and the most incredible pine trees John had ever seen in real life. The house itself was a marvel. Tall, majestic, clearly worth more than John could possibly fathom.
But they didn’t enter. Mr Cornelius said that the Holmeses would rather not be bothered, and it was not as if they were ever home anyway. The housekeeper commented that Mr Holmes worked overseas, Mrs Holmes was an art collector, so she spent a vast amount of time travelling, and the boys were off to London (the eldest) and boarding school (the youngest). A stereotypical upper-class family, John would say, clearly know nothing about it, what with his lower-middle class upbringing. Mr Cornelius never commented on the Holmeses, anyway, so John just ignored the gigantic manor and focused on the garden work.
*
Sherlock looked at his reflexion on the window and rolled his eyes. His face still looked gaunt, and his hair was in disarray. There were bags under his eyes — obviously, he hadn’t slept in three days — and his head was exploding.
When he stepped out of the car and into the entrance of the manor, the Nanny (she was the housekeeper now) came running towards him, wrapping him in a bone-crushing.
‘Oh, how you’ve grown! Almost as tall as Mycroft now,’ she commented, and he sneered. Mycroft was the last person about whom he wanted to think, thank you very much. It was his last Christmas before he graduated from Harrow, and Sherlock was absolutely certain he would not return home after he left for Oxford. But he never voice these thoughts, because Nanny dragged him to the kitchen, because God forbid the boy spent two minutes without food stuffed down his throat.
An hour later, he managed to get away from her, saying he needed some fresh air and to get re-acquainted with the property. Of course the ever-daft woman believed him, so Sherlock went for the gardens, where he found that gardener whose name he could never remember taking care of Mummy’s early Christmas gala decorations.
‘’Eello, Sherly!’ he called, smiling broadly when he saw Sherlock — the only person other than the Nanny who ever did, in fact. He liked to tell Sherlock about plants, and Sherlock liked listening to him.
‘Good afternoon,’ Sherlock greeted, turning the collar of his school blazer up. ‘Why must Mummy insist on this ridiculous decorations?’
The man chuckled and shook his head. ‘I dunno, boy, but at least it makes the trees ‘happy. Y’know how ladies love to look pre’y,’ he said, and Sherlock grinned. Yes, he had a custom of thinking trees were of the female gender — most peculia. ‘Oi, Johnny, why don’t you go take care of the tinsel in the back pines?’ he yelled at a figure standing next to the gazebo by the lake. Sherlock looked over and that wasn’t the rough boy who used to work there.
‘Who’s that?’ asked Sherlock.
‘My new assistant, John Watson. He got the job after Bobby left — it’s good ‘cause the kid if hard-working and doesn’t mind the extra hours during Christmas time,’ the gardener explained. Sherlock nodded and walked over John Watson.
John Watson was lifting a box of decorations. His forearms were well-defined, strong, but not bulky. He was short and his skin was golden, even with the cold. He was wearing a black body warmer with a white T-shirt underneath, and battered jeans. His boots were well-worn, but relatively new. He didn’t have a lot of money, then, and worked a lot as well. His hair was blond under the beanie he was wearing. He turned to face Sherlock, eyes kind and smile warm.
‘Hey!’ he greeted, putting the box back down. ‘I’m John—‘
‘Watson, yes I know,’ Sherlock cut him. ‘I’m Sherlock.’
John smiled even though Sherlock had been rude, and that was extremely odd because people hated when he was rude. ‘Nice to meet you, Sherlock — unique name, that.’
Sherlock rolled his eyes. ‘Well… don’t you have gardening to do?’
John chuckled. ‘I don’t really do a lot of it, mostly maintenance and decorating,’ he smiled again. Sherlock most certainly did not linger on the thought that that was a beautiful sight. Then John sparked up and picked up something from the box. ‘Anyway, I’ve got to work, then.’
Sherlock nodded, watching him pick up the box once more. He was never going to offer help, of course, that was ridiculous, but it didn’t mean he couldn’t watch him work. It was his house, after all. So he followed John to the back and just stared at him as he put the tinsels on the trees. John never paid him any attention, just rolled his eyes from time to time, with no annoyance whatsoever.
When he was finished, John lifted the now-mostly-empty box again and walked towards Sherlock. He picked something from it, a string of golden tinsel, and placed it atop Sherlock’s head. Sherlock gaped at him.
‘Staring is rude, Sherlock,’ he said with a wink, and walked away.
Sherlock took the thing from his head and smirked. Then he walked away, looking back only once.