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Sherlock wouldn't consider the bar completely packed, but the loud conversations and louder drunken blabbing and clinking of ice in glasses was starting to get to him.
He clenches his jaw shut so tight that his molars ache and leans to the side in his chair, just past a crowd of people. John and Mariana are still talking. Still. Certainly there has to be someone that knows Jim Browner. Someone.
He'll want a girl, not just you two.
Pity, Sherlock quietly figures. He sits back. He would've been far more helpful up there with John. He trusts his own ability to seek information more than John's.
Swingers will use a lot of figurative language, a lot of gesture, insinuation, innuendo…
Well. Okay. Perhaps not. After all these years of studying his way around interactions, his brain still opts for a more literal sense of things. That would especially be an issue by now. He's two drinks over his usual limit, having decided he could use one to make up for the hassle of the case, and the next to potentially bridge the gap between his uncalibrated self and someone perceived as mildly sociable. By now, it's deeply affecting his judgment and is probably amplifying his frustration.
He also contemplates that, if the need could've risen, his seduction skills wouldn't be up to par, either. He's been told so before. He wouldn't be much help in that area.
The thought seems to wash down with the next sip of his pint, which he's particularly thankful for.
When he looks up again, John and Mariana have paused to look back at him. Sherlock pointedly furrows his brows and squints, leaning over to be seen. What's the hold-up?
Mariana grimaces and shrugs her shoulders. John awkwardly rubs the back of his neck and looks away. No luck yet.
Sherlock sits down again. He'll just finish his drink and…
There's a soft presence at his back. Someone leaning on his chair. Every hair stands on end as he turns his head and looks up at whoever decided to approach a table deliberately chosen at the back of the establishment.
She's around his age, he reckons, maybe a little older. Faded red dye leading down to the tips of her hair, light brown roots grown out. She speaks before Sherlock can get a better look at her eyes or gauge much more about her.
“You mingling with somebody?” She asks, gesturing vaguely with the drink in her hand.
“Mingling how?” Sherlock asks.
She huffs a slight laugh. “With the rest of the bunch. Canal life enjoyers. You interested at all?”
“Oh. No.” Sherlock curtly replies.
She stares at him, head tilted. “Yeah… Yeah, alright. Okay.” She turns.
“Wait.” When she looks back at him, Sherlock leans forward toward her. “Would you happen to know Jim Browner?”
She shakes her head. “Sorry, mate.” She turns and returns to someone, presumably her also interested partner.
Sherlock sits back again. Bugger. Worth a shot.
When the two return to being in his line of sight, he directs his attention to John and Mariana once more. John's cheeks are flushed. He's not drunk, he's just flustered and uncomfortable. Mariana looks deeply disturbed. That worries him.
As much as Sherlock trusts Mariana's endurance for the sake of the case, he does worry about the potential consequences of pulling her into this. Of course, it was John's idea, not his, but still.
Then again, if they had told her what needed to happen, she would have never agreed.
Sherlock taps an absent rhythm into the surface of the table. He has to be patient. They can't end this case until they find Jim Browner, and they won't find him until they get information out of someone. Someone has to know him.
There comes a gentle tap on his shoulder.
Oh, what now?
When Sherlock turns his head to curtly refuse whatever proposition comes his way, he finds himself staring into the eyes of a man who…
Ah.
Looks surprisingly similar to John.
Nearly the same sandy blonde hair. The same eye color. A similar build. A warm disposition.
Looking into his eyes feels so familiar yet so unbelievably foreign. The man is almost completely unreadable emotionally to Sherlock, and the physical similarities to John disorientates him. It's absolutely jarring. He doesn't know this man, not at all, and still finds himself drawn in despite all the differences he can deduce between this individual and his own flatmate.
Likely due to his own fondness for John–
Fondness? Fondness?
Oh, he's been speaking for a long minute now. It felt so muffled.
“No,” Sherlock finally brings himself to answer, voice unsteady. He wants absolutely nothing to do with this scene.
“Hey, completely alright.” The man backs off.
He doesn't sound like John. Thank goodness.
Sherlock stares down into the dredges of his pint when he's (relatively) alone again and quietly wishes to drink himself to death.
No– No. They have a case to do. It's perfectly rational to freak out when looking at a doppelgänger of your flatmate. It's not relevant at all. He needs to focus on his work. He should probably be looking outside at the boats in the canal. This was all very strange. Very strange indeed.
He detests the way his heart had stuttered.
Sherlock sits up in his chair just as John looks over his shoulder. He widens his eyes. HURRY UP. John only offers him a sympathetic expression in return.
Only two more attempts to persuade Sherlock to commit to less-than-savory endeavors occur that night.
“I'm not here for that,” Sherlock tersely informs the first.
“Then… why…?”
Sherlock completely makes the whole thing up, knowing he's lying through his teeth and somehow completely unaware of what's going to spill out of his mouth. “I'm watching my cheating husband to find evidence for the divorce lawyers.” He completely makes the whole thing up.
“Oh. Shit.”
“Yes. If you'd be so kind,” he snaps, and gestures for them to back off before he can fumble a further explanation. They do.
On the last attempt, Sherlock just stares them down as if they're a distant figure in the fog. They retreat rather quickly. Sherlock considers the effort a success.
He slips away from his booth when he sees that John and Mariana have stepped aside from whatever group they were “mingling with” (ugh) and started bickering with each other.
“Well?” he inquires.
John nods. “We've got him, yeah. Lock 96.”
Mariana furrows her brow. “We should call the police.”
“Absolutely not,” Sherlock grumbles, affronted.
***
“I believe I was being pursued.” Sherlock breaks the silence the day after, in the early morning. He's sitting at the table in the kitchen, hunched over in his chair with his knees to his chest, turning a fidget toy around in his hands. His mug of tea sits cooling in front of him.
“Pursued? What, like chased?” John asks. “I didn't see you leave at all.” He takes a sip of his tea.
Sherlock sucks his teeth. “Well, propositioned would be a more appropriate word.”
John chokes. “Sorry? You were what?”
“You heard me perfectly well, judging your reaction.”
“No, yeah, I guess– I just– How–?”
Sherlock looks up at him from the Tangle in his hands. “Watson, you yourself realized and thus informed me that The Fox at Hanwell was something of a hot spot for swingers,” he begins.
John cuts him off. “Well, I know that, but it's also just a bar!” Sherlock watches the flush rise up his neck. “You'd think they would just– I mean, you were sitting at the very back! Surely they could've read the vibe, or something.”
“Perhaps they suspected I had an interested partner not present at the table at the moment they approached,” Sherlock offers.
“They approached you.”
Sherlock blankly stares back at John.
John is flustered. He's almost seething. Why? Why would this make him so uncomfortable? Sherlock has expressed no discomfort with the situation.
How peculiar.
“It wasn't a bother, if that's what you're so worried about,” Sherlock states. “It's not like I was being bombarded. I… politely turned them down, and they were nothing but polite upon approach and when rejected.”
John lets out a great sigh. “Yeah, but… It's just shit that you had to deal with that on your birthday.”
“The height of the case distracted from it, I assure you,” Sherlock replies. He reaches for his tea now. “It's a forgivable offense. A hotspot for interested couples looking for other interested couples, under the impression that anyone there would be there for the same reason.”
John gets up. “Yeah, well can't guarantee you wouldn't get propositioned anywhere else,” he mumbles. “You being you and all.”
Sherlock hums, and then double takes when he registers the words and sees that John's ears are bright red. “What?”
John waves him off as he leaves the kitchen.
“Watson, what is that supposed to mean?” He questions, leaning back in his chair. “Watson!”
He receives no reply.
What.