Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The flat looked the same.

The old scars on the wallpaper, the faint scent of tobacco in the fabric of the chairs, the violin propped up in its usual corner like a ghost of who he used to be. Sherlock Holmes stood in the centre of 221B Baker Street as if he didn’t belong there anymore, like someone had pressed pause on his life a year ago, and now he was standing in the ruins of something he didn’t quite remember building.

And then—laughter. Tiny, unfiltered, bright laughter.

Rosie was sitting in John's lap on the sofa, clutching a ragged stuffed rabbit and grinning at Sherlock like he’d just done something funny. He hadn’t. He hadn’t said a word in at least fifteen minutes. But she was smiling anyway. Maybe she saw something he couldn’t.

John looked up, eyes soft but tired. The kind of tired that came with loss and parenting and the ache of starting over.

"She likes you," John said simply, rubbing Rosie’s back.

Sherlock blinked. "She likes the violin."

"She likes you, Sherlock."

He didn’t answer. He didn’t know how.

Night came fast, like it always did this time of year. Sherlock found himself sitting in his old armchair, elbows on knees, hands steepled under his chin. John was upstairs putting Rosie to bed, murmuring lullabies that echoed faintly down the hall. Soft things. Safe things.

Sherlock didn’t know how to exist around soft things anymore.

In the silence that followed, he heard the click of a heel. A chuckle. That voice, sing-song and cruel, curled around his ears like smoke.

"Did you miss me?"

Sherlock stiffened. Closed his eyes.

Not real. Not real. Not real.

He hadn't used in eleven months. Eleven months and sixteen days. But the craving—the desire to not feel anything at all—was as familiar as it ever was. The memory of Moriarty was a wound that never scabbed, only bled quieter some days than others.

A knock broke the silence. Three sharp raps at the door. Not John.

Lestrade stood on the threshold, face drawn. He didn’t wait to be invited in. “Got a case. Fresh. Twisted. And personal.”

Sherlock barely registered the details—only the word personal. That was enough. Something in him lit up, despite everything. Or maybe because of everything.

“I’ll take it,” he said too quickly.

Lestrade hesitated. “You sure you’re—?”

“I said I’ll take it.”

The next day, he visited Sherrinford.

Eurus Holmes met him behind reinforced glass, a strange half-smile on her face.

“You’re looking thin,” she said, tilting her head like a doll.

Sherlock didn’t flinch. “You’re not.”

She smiled wider. “They’re feeding me better these days. Ever since you started coming.”

It was their fourth visit. The first had ended in screaming. The second in silence. The third in something like siblinghood. Or its echo.

“Do you think about him?” she asked, out of nowhere.

He didn’t ask who she meant. Of course she knew about the way Moriarty haunted him. Of course she saw straight through him. She always did.

“All the time,” Sherlock admitted.

Eurus leaned closer to the glass. “Maybe you should listen.”

“To a dead man?”

“To what he left behind.”

There was no logic in her riddles. But there was something else: a flicker of pain. Of loneliness. She didn’t know how to be human. But she was trying.

So was he.

“I brought you music,” Sherlock said softly, taking a flash drive from his pocket and sliding it across the small hatch.

Her eyes lit up.

He didn’t know if he was doing this for her, or for himself. But either way—it mattered.

That night, back in Baker Street, Rosie toddled across the carpet and reached up to Sherlock without hesitation.

He lifted her, awkward but careful. She nestled against his chest. Trusting.

John watched from the doorway, arms folded. A small smile on his lips. But there was worry behind his eyes.

“Are you okay?” John asked.

“No,” Sherlock said. Then after a pause: “But I’m still here.”

It was the best he could do.

Chapter Text

outside the windows of 221B Baker Street, but inside the flat, it was already a battleground.

John was dressed sharply, slipping on his coat, ready to leave for the clinic. Rosie, barely a year old but bursting with curiosity, was strapped into her high chair, squirming and babbling, her wide eyes tracking every move Sherlock made as he prepared their breakfast.

Sherlock moved stiffly, a strange blend of awkwardness and focus. Babysitting wasn’t his natural element. It was a puzzle missing the key pieces, a problem without an obvious solution. He wasn’t used to this kind of responsibility—this kind of noise, this kind of constant attention.

John crouched beside the high chair, brushing Rosie’s hair back from her forehead. “She’s hungry. I’ll be back later,” he said, pressing a gentle kiss to Sherlock’s cheek.

Sherlock froze for a heartbeat, his eyes widening slightly in surprise. It wasn’t something John usually did—so simple, so intimate—and it caught him off guard.

After a brief pause, Sherlock swallowed and looked up at John, voice low and hesitant. “Why... did you do that?”

John smiled softly, a flicker of something unspoken in his eyes. “Because sometimes you need to be reminded you’re not alone.”

Sherlock blinked, still processing, then nodded slowly. “I... understand.”

John’s footsteps faded down the hall, then the front door clicked shut.

Rosie squealed and wiggled, reaching out her tiny hands. Sherlock’s heart clenched. He picked her up carefully, feeling the unexpected weight of her trust.

She grabbed at his coat, tugging it. “Da!” she babbled, her voice bright and innocent.

“Not ‘Da,’ Rosie,” Sherlock murmured. “I’m Sherlock.”

She giggled, and for a moment, something fragile and warm softened the edges of his guarded mind.

The hours that followed were a blur of baby-proofing and discovery. Rosie was fascinated by the violin case in the corner, and Sherlock found himself humming a quiet tune as he carefully handed her a wooden spoon.

She banged it on the table, clapping her hands, laughing.

Sherlock smiled — but it felt brittle, forced. The noise and the mess—somehow it frayed his nerves. He could feel the itch under his skin, the shadow creeping back in the corners of his mind. The ghost of Moriarty, whispering, laughing, watching.

“Focus,” he told himself. “Just focus.”

But when Rosie’s eyes flashed and she started to cry suddenly, a sharp, piercing cry that filled the small flat, Sherlock froze for a heartbeat too long. His hands trembled as he reached for her.

The craving flared.

The desire to escape. To numb. To forget.

He swallowed hard, gripping the edge of the kitchen counter. The cold surface bit into his skin and grounded him.

No. Not today.

Midday brought a sharp knock at the door. Lestrade’s face appeared, lined with fatigue but urgent.

“We’ve got a lead,” Lestrade said without preamble. “On the case you took.”

Sherlock’s heart sank. The personal nature of the case was already an ache in his chest. Now it was becoming a weight.

“Can you come down to the station?”

“I’m… babysitting,” Sherlock said, glancing down at Rosie, who was now crawling around the rug, chewing on a book.

Lestrade raised an eyebrow but nodded. “Understood.”

After Lestrade left, the flat was too quiet, too still. Rosie’s soft coos couldn’t fill the hollowness that stretched inside Sherlock.

He watched her sleep in the afternoon, tiny breaths like whispers, the light catching the fine down of her hair. Protective, yes—but also terrified. Of failing. Of losing himself again.

The evening brought a restless Sherlock pacing the flat, Rosie's cries piercing through the growing fog in his mind. He tried everything: rocking her, singing, even the violin, but his usual sharpness was dulled.

The memories came unbidden: Moriarty’s smile, the dead eyes, the impossibility of escape. His hands shook as the shadows grew longer.

John returned just as Sherlock’s control slipped. Rosie was cradled in his arms, both of them exhausted.

John saw the dark circles under Sherlock’s eyes, the tension in his jaw. “How are you holding up?”

Sherlock swallowed the bitter truth. “Burned out.”

John stepped closer, voice low and steady. “You don’t have to do this alone.”

Sherlock wanted to believe him.

Sherlock wanted to believe him. Wanted to believe that the cracks in his armor could be mended, that he didn’t have to face the darkness on his own.

But the shadow of Moriarty lingered, the weight of Eurus’s cryptic words pressed down, and the case waiting for him outside the door was already tightening its grip.

John reached out, brushing a stray lock of hair from Sherlock’s forehead. “We’ll get through this,” he promised.

Sherlock closed his eyes, the warmth of John’s hand a lifeline in the encroaching cold.

Chapter Text

The morning came like a slap—abrupt, grey, and unwelcome.

Sherlock stood in the bathroom, staring at himself in the mirror. The light above buzzed faintly, flickering every so often like it was on the edge of giving up.

He looked pale. Hollow. His curls were unkempt, his cheekbones more pronounced than they had been a few weeks ago, and his eyes were rimmed with shadows. He pulled at the collar of his shirt and slapped a nicotine patch onto the inside of his arm with clinical precision.

It didn’t help.

Not really.

But it was better than the alternative. It gave his hands something to do. Gave his mouth an excuse not to smoke. It dulled the edges of his cravings, barely, but that edge was getting sharper again. The old restlessness stirred under his skin like static.

From upstairs came Rosie’s squeal—her morning voice bright and bubbly. The floor creaked under John’s familiar footsteps as he moved around above, probably changing her nappy or singing one of those ridiculous little songs he made up just to make her laugh.

Sherlock stood in the kitchen, already halfway through his first cup of coffee, his dressing gown hanging loosely from his shoulders. He’d been up for hours. The nicotine patch on his arm itched faintly under his sleeve, but he resisted the urge to scratch at it. A second one sat untouched on the counter, staring at him like a dare.

He didn’t want to admit how badly he wanted it.

John finally came down the stairs, Rosie nestled against his chest, blinking sleepily. Her curls were a mess, her cheeks flushed with warmth. She lifted her head and gave a loud, delighted squeal when she saw Sherlock.

“She’s happy to see you,” John said with a soft smile, moving toward the kitchen. He set Rosie in her high chair and began rummaging in the cupboard for baby cereal. “Didn’t sleep again, did you?”

Sherlock didn’t answer. He kept his eyes on his coffee cup.

John was pouring coffee. Rosie was seated in her high chair again, her face smudged with mashed banana. She looked up and gave a delighted noise when she saw Sherlock, arms flailing like she was greeting a hero.

Sherlock blinked and nodded at her. “Good morning,” he said stiffly.

John turned, handing him a cup. “Rough night?”

Sherlock said nothing at first. Just sipped the coffee, black and bitter. “The nicotine patches are ineffective,” he muttered eventually. “I considered doubling the dose.”

“You’re not supposed to,” John said, worried.

“I know.”

They stood in the kitchen, close but not close enough, the space between them filled with things unsaid. John was watching him, Sherlock could feel it—how his eyes flicked to the twitch in Sherlock’s fingers, the too-quick blink, the rigid posture.

John spoke gently. “You don’t need to push yourself like this.”

“I took a case,” Sherlock said sharply. “You told me to find something to focus on.”

“I didn’t mean something that’s going to destroy you.”

Sherlock’s cup trembled slightly in his hand.

Rosie sneezed, startling them both. Sherlock quickly set the cup down and moved to wipe her face, his motions almost too delicate. Her tiny hand gripped his thumb tightly. Anchoring.

“I have to go in for a few hours,” John said, quiet now. “Can you—?”

“Yes,” Sherlock interrupted, before the question could be finished. “I’ll look after her.”

“You’re sure?”

Sherlock nodded once. “I have contingency plans.”

“You mean Mrs. Hudson.”

“I mean tranquilizer darts and classical music. Yes, I mean Mrs. Hudson.”

John smiled faintly, but the worry was still there, etched into the lines around his eyes. He stepped forward and touched Sherlock’s arm.

Then—again—he kissed his cheek.

Sherlock flinched, barely, but he didn’t step back. This time he turned to look at John directly. “Why are you doing that?”

John blinked. “What?”

“Touching me like we’re—” Sherlock hesitated. “Like we’re something.”

There was a long silence.

John ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Maybe because we are something. Or we used to be. Or... I want us to be again.”

Sherlock’s mouth parted slightly. “You never said—”

“I didn’t know how.”

Rosie shrieked again, this time from boredom. Sherlock pulled away to attend to her. It felt like pulling out of a dream too early. He didn’t look back at John.

“I have to get to work,” John said after a moment.

Sherlock nodded without turning around. “Of course.”

The flat was too quiet after John left.

Rosie was content for a while, tumbling over her soft toys on the rug, babbling nonsense. Sherlock sat nearby, trying to analyze blood splatter patterns from the case files Lestrade had dropped off. But nothing held. Nothing made sense.

The victim’s body had been posed—arms crossed over the chest, a mirror placed beside the head. No fingerprints, no forced entry. No message. Just a blank page, daring him to fill it in.

And underneath it all, Moriarty’s voice—taunting, smug.

"You always break it off, don’t you? Every chance. Every feeling. Snap—gone. It’s cleaner that way."

Sherlock pressed his fingers to his temple. “Shut up.”

Rosie began to cry.

He scooped her up too quickly, her little body startled by his sudden movement. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m—” He rocked her against his chest, heart pounding like a war drum. “I don’t know how to do this.”

She didn’t understand the words, but her body responded to the rhythm, the way he held her. She quieted slowly.

Sherlock’s eyes burned.

Hours passed.

He applied a second nicotine patch.

Then a third.

His hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

Mrs. Hudson stopped by once with soup. He told her he was fine. She didn’t believe him but left it anyway.

By the time John returned, Sherlock was sitting on the floor in the middle of the sitting room, Rosie asleep in his lap, classical music playing too loudly through the speakers.

John took one look at him and crossed the room in seconds.

“Sherlock—”

“I didn’t use,” Sherlock said hoarsely. “I wanted to. But I didn’t.”

John knelt beside him, eyes wet.

“I’m trying,” Sherlock whispered, his voice breaking.

“I know,” John said, voice thick. “Come on. Let me help.”

Sherlock let him take Rosie, let him lift him gently to the couch. John pulled the extra nicotine patch off his arm with a sigh and pressed a hand to Sherlock’s hair.

“Just breathe.”

So Sherlock did for a moment well he tried.

Chapter Text

Rosie’s small hand tugged at his collar.

Sherlock looked down at her, barely awake and curled against his side on the sofa, the soft morning light pooling through the blinds across her fuzzy hair. She smelled like milk and baby powder, and her thumb was stuffed securely in her mouth. Sherlock watched her with a quiet intensity, as if trying to memorize her in case she vanished.

The flat was quiet—John had gone into work early again, another long shift at the clinic—and Sherlock had been up since four, pacing the flat with Rosie in his arms, trying to outwalk the racing of his mind.

Moriarty’s voice had returned in the hours before dawn.

"Back again, are we? Thought you’d left me behind. You never really do, though, do you?"

Sherlock pressed his fingers to his temple and sat down hard on the armchair.

Rosie reached out again, fingers curling in the fabric of his shirt. Anchored.

He needed to move. To do something. Anything.

He needed to see her.

The secure facility that housed Eurus Holmes was a little less cold now. Clinical, yes. Monitored to an obsessive degree. But Sherlock had been visiting her often—once a week at first, then twice, and lately more often, sometimes without telling John. Mycroft had loosened the restrictions, reluctantly. For the past few visits, Sherlock had been allowed into the cell proper, sitting across from her without glass or shackles between them.

There were always guards outside the door, of course. And she was never untied, not entirely. But she was still—different now. Softer around the edges. Or perhaps simply playing a longer game. With Eurus, Sherlock was never quite sure.

This time, he did something he never had before.

He brought Rosie with him.

“She’s... one year old,” Sherlock explained curtly to the gruff man at the front security desk. “She doesn’t speak. She won’t remember any of this. She poses no threat.”

The man raised an eyebrow. “Is it wise to take a child into a Level Red psychiatric cell?”

“No,” Sherlock said. “But I’m doing it anyway.”

Rosie clung to his shoulder as they were led through the facility. She wore a pale pink fleece, her small face pressed into Sherlock’s coat. She could sense the unease in him, the tension. Her hands clutched him tighter the closer they got.

Eurus’s cell had been modified—a soft rug placed under the table, the walls painted a pale cream. A bookshelf had been added, filled with psychology texts and ancient poetry. A gesture from Mycroft. Sherlock doubted Eurus cared.

When the guard opened the door, Eurus looked up, her eyes glinting like frost over fire.

“Well,” she said. “Look who’s inside again.”

Sherlock stepped in, holding Rosie against his chest. “I brought someone with me.”

Eurus tilted her head, her face unreadable. “Is that your child?”

“No.”

“But you’re holding her like she is.”

Sherlock swallowed. “Her name is Rosie. She’s John’s.”

“Ah,” Eurus said softly. “So that makes her... yours by proximity.” She leaned forward slightly, eyes narrowing. “You’ve always been drawn to orphans.”

“She’s not an orphan.”

“But you were.”

Sherlock didn’t reply.

Rosie whimpered, hiding her face again.

Eurus's expression shifted, barely. “She doesn’t like me.”

“She doesn’t know you.”

“Children are better judges of character than adults.”

Sherlock sat down in the chair opposite his sister, keeping Rosie close. “I didn’t come to debate my parenting skills.”

“No,” Eurus said, voice low and thoughtful. “You came because you’re fraying. Again.”

He didn’t answer. He couldn’t.

“You’re using nicotine again,” she continued, her tone almost gentle. “You’ve been thinking about worse. And Moriarty’s back, isn’t he?”

He flinched.

She smiled—not cruelly, but knowingly. “He never leaves you. You made him part of you. Like I am.”

“You’re different,” Sherlock said, voice sharp. “You’re real.”

Eurus didn’t blink. “And that makes me worse.”

Rosie stirred. Eurus’s eyes flicked to her, and for a moment something almost tender passed across her face.

“Let me see her.”

“No.”

“I won’t hurt her.”

“I said no.”

Eurus leaned back, sighing dramatically. “Still don’t trust me. Not even after all our lovely talks.”

Sherlock didn’t respond.

They sat like that for some time, Eurus quietly watching, Sherlock gripping Rosie tighter than necessary. Eventually, she said something he didn’t expect.

“She’s beautiful.”

He looked at her sharply.

“Rosie,” Eurus clarified. “She’s very... alive. It must be strange to hold something so full of life when you’re mostly made of ghosts.”

Sherlock stood, feeling the suffocation creeping in again.

“I have to go.”

Eurus tilted her head. “Tell John I said hello.”

Outside, Sherlock took three deep breaths before strapping Rosie back into her pram.

She was quiet now, sucking on her fingers, blinking up at him. He crouched down, leveled his gaze with hers.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said softly. “But I’m trying.”

Rosie blinked. Drooled.

He sighed. “Yes, that’s the appropriate response.”

He stopped by Bart’s on the way home.

Molly was at the lab bench, pulling on gloves, her hair tied up in a messy bun. She looked up when she saw him, and her expression softened. Then brightened.

“You brought Rosie!” she exclaimed.

Rosie giggled, delighted to be in a new place, reaching for Molly instantly.

Molly lifted her carefully. “You look tired, Sherlock.”

“Observant as ever.”

“I mean it.”

He rubbed his face. “I saw Eurus today.”

Molly’s smile dimmed. “How did it go?”

“She said Rosie’s alive. That I’m made of ghosts.”

Molly gave him a look he couldn’t quite interpret. “Well... she’s not wrong.”

Sherlock frowned.

“But that doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing,” she added. “You’ve lost things. People. But you’re still here. And Rosie—she loves you.”

“She’s one. She loves warm things and people who feed her.”

“She reaches for you like you’re home.”

Sherlock blinked, unsure how to respond.

Molly held Rosie on her hip and turned back to her work. “You know, you can come here anytime. If you ever need to talk. Or just... breathe.”

Sherlock nodded stiffly. “Thank you.”

“And Sherlock?”

“Yes?”

“You’re not just made of ghosts.”

They returned to Baker Street after dark. John wasn’t home yet.

Sherlock fed Rosie, bathed her with far too much bubble bath, and rocked her gently to sleep. She curled against him, fingers tucked into his sleeve.

He stayed like that, still holding her long after she’d drifted off, the nicotine patch on his arm starting to sting.

In the silence of the flat, he closed his eyes.

And for the first time in days, the voice of Moriarty didn’t come.

The door clicked open just before midnight. Sherlock heard the muffled sound of John’s keys, the soft creak of the stairs, and the rustle of his coat being hung by the door.

John paused in the kitchen, peering into the dim light. Then he walked into the living room and found Sherlock still holding Rosie on the sofa, both of them half-asleep.

“Oh,” John breathed, surprised but smiling. “You didn’t put her in the cot?”

Sherlock blinked at him, eyes heavy. “She fell asleep here. I didn’t want to move her.”

“You didn’t want to or you couldn’t?”

Sherlock glanced away.

John walked over, gently scooping Rosie from his arms. She stirred, whimpered, then settled against his shoulder.

“She’s getting attached to you,” John said as he rocked her softly. “Keeps saying ‘Lock’ when she sees your coat.”

Sherlock’s expression was unreadable.

John looked over his shoulder. “Did you two go out?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

Sherlock hesitated. “To see my sister.”

John stiffened, pausing mid-step. “You took Rosie to see Eurus?”

“She’s behind twelve security doors, John. You trust me with your daughter, do you not?”

“That’s not—God. I do trust you. I just… wish you’d told me.”

“I didn’t want you to worry.”

“That’s exactly why I’m worried.”

Sherlock stood slowly. “She didn’t even go near her.”

John didn’t speak for a long moment. Then he nodded, quietly. “Alright. Just… just keep telling me things. Yeah?”

Sherlock nodded.

John stepped closer. “You did good today. She’s happy. That’s not nothing.”

Sherlock blinked. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Neither do I,” John said, offering him a small smile. “We’re learning.”

The days blurred—soft, grey mornings, quiet hours with Rosie in the flat, interrupted by flares of something darker in Sherlock’s chest.

Moriarty’s voice would return, sometimes in whispers, sometimes in sudden cruel explosions—echoing off the walls of 221B when Sherlock stood too long at the window or stared too deeply into the fire.

"You took her to see your sister. Why? Looking for the monster in yourself, Sherlock?"

"Tick-tock. Everyone leaves. Except me."

But sometimes Rosie would crawl into his lap, tugging at his curls or babbling nonsensical syllables, and it would shut the voice up—just for a while.

He returned to Bart’s twice that week.

Molly was kind. She always had been. She asked careful questions, didn’t press when he flinched, let him stand in silence beside her as she processed specimens or labelled vials. He wasn’t sure if it was affection, pity, or stubborn loyalty—but it steadied him.

“You could bring Rosie here again,” she told him one afternoon, as she handed him a tea he hadn’t asked for. “She seemed to love the place.”

“She liked the fluorescent lights,” Sherlock said dryly.

“She liked you,” Molly replied, and left it at that.

One evening, four days after the Eurus visit, Sherlock was in the kitchen late—mixing chemicals with meticulous slowness, using the methodical process to silence the storm in his skull. John came down, barefoot and tousled, holding a crying Rosie.

“She won’t sleep,” he muttered, bleary-eyed.

Sherlock looked up, holding out his arms. “Give her to me.”

John blinked. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

John hesitated, then handed her over. Rosie immediately buried her face in Sherlock’s dressing gown, still sobbing.

He paced with her in the kitchen, whispering low nonsense under his breath. “Hush, child. The world isn’t quite as terrible as it seems. Some of us are trying.”

Within minutes, she was asleep.

John watched from the doorway.

“You’ve changed,” he said softly.

Sherlock didn’t turn around. “Into what?”

“I don’t know. Something quieter.”

Sherlock looked down at the child in his arms.

“I don’t think I’m meant for quiet.”

Chapter Text

The morning was quiet.

Rosie’s giggle drifted down from upstairs — light and uninhibited — followed by John’s familiar footsteps creaking across the ceiling as he chased her with exaggerated slowness. Sherlock stood by the kitchen window, watching the steam curl from his mug. For once, his thoughts weren’t racing. They moved gently, like leaves in tea.

He was wearing a clean shirt. Not perfectly ironed, but clean. He’d remembered to eat. There was only one nicotine patch on his arm.

The silence in his head, once a violent absence, now felt like a reprieve. The voices were dull, faded — Moriarty’s laugh distant, like it had been pressed between the pages of a book long closed.

He didn’t trust it.

But he accepted it.

Small things. Everyday things. Rosie’s sleep-warm hand on his cheek. John leaving him a mug of tea before going to work. A note stuck to the fridge: Day off tomorrow. We’ll go after that bloody case, yeah? – J

Sherlock had read the note five times.

And then again.

The next day, John finally had the full day off.

Sherlock was already dressed when he came downstairs: coat, scarf, gloves, even the old Belstaff cleaned of last week’s baby puke. Rosie was in her buggy, snug in layers and already half-asleep from the movement of Sherlock’s pacing.

John blinked, smiling. “We’re really doing this?”

Sherlock didn’t say anything — just handed him the file with a quiet confidence John hadn’t seen in weeks.

It was time.

A woman named Marlene Withers. Late thirties. Missing for three days. A history of hospital admissions for self-harm. Her ex-partner, suspiciously calm. Her flat had been left in perfect order—except for a broken window from the inside, and a set of muddy footprints that didn’t match hers.

Sherlock examined the photos like he was reading scripture. He muttered observations under his breath as they walked to the address, Rosie sleeping peacefully in her buggy between them.

“The pattern of the footprints—deliberate. Not panic. Whoever left them wasn’t fleeing.”

John glanced over. “So what were they doing?”

“Watching. Waiting.”

A beat.

“Or performing.”

John sighed. “God, we’ve missed this.”

Sherlock blinked. “We?”

“You know what I mean.”

Sherlock said nothing, but a faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

They spent the morning canvassing the building. An elderly neighbor offered tea and sympathy. A teenager three floors down mentioned a “weird man with a dog” who came around sometimes but never actually had the dog.

Sherlock took it all in, absorbed and focused. He didn’t dissociate. He didn’t twitch. He asked John questions. Real ones.

And when they stopped in the park for Rosie to stretch her legs, he watched her toddle across the grass like she was something sacred.

That night John sat on the sofa with his laptop open, a beer in hand. Sherlock was across from him, silently flipping through his notes from the day, a red pen tapping rhythmically against his lip.

Rosie was asleep upstairs.

The flat smelled like takeaway and tea.

John stared at the blinking cursor on his old blog. He hadn’t touched it since before The Final Problem — hadn’t wanted to. Everything after that had felt too heavy. Too raw. Too real to write about.

But today felt different.

He began typing.

> “Everyday is a Good Day”

It’s strange what becomes normal.

A flat full of baby toys, murder case files, and nicotine patches.

Sherlock Holmes, once considered dead, now carefully warming milk at 3AM because a toddler won’t stop crying. Me, typing at 11PM because I actually feel like it.

We’re working a case again. A real one. Muddy footprints, vanishing woman, shady boyfriend — all the classic trimmings. But this time there’s a pram involved. This time, he asks me what I think.

There’s still darkness. Don’t get me wrong. There always will be, with Sherlock. With me too. But today—today was quiet. And warm.

And that’s something.

Maybe even everything.

He hit publish before he could talk himself out of it.

Sherlock looked up from the other side of the room. “You wrote again.”

John blinked. “How did you—?”

“I can tell from your posture. You always sit straighter after finishing something meaningful.”

John snorted. “You are feeling better.”

Sherlock looked down at his notes.

“I’m trying,” he said softly. “That counts, doesn’t it?”

John nodded, his eyes warm. “Yeah. It counts.”

They sat in silence for a while longer, the old kind — the kind that was comfortable, well-worn.

Sherlock reached over and turned on the radio. A soft classical piece drifted out, something familiar, something slow.

He didn’t say it out loud, but John felt it in the way he relaxed, the way his foot tapped in time to the music.

For tonight, at least, the ghosts stayed quiet.

Chapter Text

The case was moving quickly now.

Too quickly.

Sherlock didn’t sleep the night before. Not for lack of trying — but because every time he closed his eyes, he saw Marlene Withers’ kitchen table. The open jar of marmalade. The half-smoked cigarette stubbed out on the windowsill. The missing shoe.

And the voice — not Moriarty’s this time, but his own. Cold, rapid-fire deductions cycling through his mind like a faulty metronome. Performance. Intent. Message left. Witness observed. Try again. Try again.

By dawn, he’d already scribbled six new theories on the living room wall in wax pencil.

Rosie stirred upstairs.

John’s alarm would be going off soon.

Sherlock ran a hand through his hair, eyes bloodshot.

He needed to go out. To the scene. To the boyfriend. To the building opposite Marlene’s — there was a tenant with a broken window and a broken alibi.

But John had a hospital shift. Twelve hours.

And Rosie couldn’t come.

"You want me to babysit?"

Molly’s voice was half amusement, half genuine disbelief.

“I’m aware it’s unorthodox,” Sherlock said over the phone. “But you’ve done it before. Briefly.”

“Once. At Bart’s. For twenty minutes. While you interrogated the vending machine.”

“She knows you. She likes you.”

Sherlock looked over at Rosie, who was playing with a set of measuring cups on the kitchen floor. She looked up at him and gurgled happily. One measuring cup was in her mouth.

“I have no other options.”

“You know you do,” Molly said gently.

Sherlock’s jaw clenched. “I have no other acceptable options.”

There was a long pause.

Then: “Alright. I’ll be there by ten.”

Molly arrived bundled in a scarf, cheeks pink from the wind.

“Look at you, little lady,” she beamed as she knelt down to Rosie’s level. Rosie blinked, then grinned wide and reached out toward Molly’s necklace.

“Well,” Molly laughed, “I suppose that’s a yes.”

Sherlock hovered awkwardly, already half in his coat. “There’s food. There’s nappies. There’s—”

“I know how to watch a child, Sherlock,” Molly said kindly. “Go. Do your work.”

He stood still for a beat longer.

Then, abruptly: “Thank you.”

Molly looked startled, but smiled. “Of course.”

He was gone a moment later, coat flying, scarf catching the wind like a shadow behind him.

By noon, Sherlock had stood face-to-face with Marlene’s former partner: a wiry man named Darren, who claimed to have “seen the light” and now lived above a spiritual crystal shop. He offered Sherlock herbal tea and insisted that “Marlene ran away because of bad energy.”

Sherlock didn’t buy it. Not because of the tea, but because the man’s fingernails were dirty with soil that didn’t match the plants in his flat. He wore a heavy coat despite the warmth. There was a bruise on his knuckle that didn’t align with any recent injuries he’d mentioned.

But most damning of all — he kept referring to Marlene in the past tense.

Sherlock left him with a warning and a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.

Outside, the wind bit his skin through his coat, but he didn’t mind. His mind was sharp, adrenaline prickling his spine.

Still, somewhere underneath the rush — there was an ache.

A pull.

The faint image of Rosie’s small hands, reaching for his curls. The way she’d leaned her head on his shoulder that morning, murmuring, “’Lock stay.”

He shook it off and moved on.

Back at Baker Street Molly sat on the floor with Rosie in front of her, plastic stacking cups spread in chaotic formation. She looked at the child with a strange mixture of affection and awe.

“You’re kind of amazing, you know that?” she whispered. “You got him to soften.”

Rosie giggled and threw a cup.

“Yeah, sounds about right.”

Molly looked around the flat. It was cleaner than it used to be. Not clean, exactly — Sherlock still left folders everywhere, and there was a bullet hole in the skull on the mantle — but there were signs of life.

Photos of Rosie. A tea towel folded on the counter. A rattle shaped like a bee.

Sherlock Holmes had made room for a child.

It made her throat tighten unexpectedly.

Sherlock returned just before six. His coat was damp from rain. His hair was windblown. He looked almost… human.

“She was an artist,” he said without preamble. “Marlene. Not professionally. But there are sketches in her neighbor’s bin. Ripped up. That’s where the footprints came from — the neighbor’s. He was watching her. Obsessed.”

Molly blinked. “Do you… want to sit?”

“I—” Sherlock paused, suddenly noticing Rosie curled up against her leg, fast asleep. “Did she… was she alright?”

“Perfect. She had mashed bananas and danced to ABBA.”

“Ah.”

Molly studied him for a moment. “You’re getting better.”

Sherlock looked down. “I’m not sure.”

“You are.”

He didn’t respond.

As Molly gathered her things to leave, she turned at the door.

“You’re allowed to stop sometimes. You know that, right?”

“I’m not sure I do.”

“Well. Learn.”

She left him standing in the soft hum of the lamp-lit flat, Rosie breathing gently on the rug.

John came home to the smell of stew — Sherlock had attempted to cook. Sort of. The results were edible, and that alone felt like a miracle.

After dinner, John read Rosie a book while Sherlock sat nearby, watching her eyelids flutter as she drifted off. The day’s storm had worn off. She clung to Sherlock’s scarf like a security blanket.

“She missed you,” John murmured.

“I missed her.”

“You’re good with her, you know.”

“I wasn’t always.”

“You are now.”

Sherlock didn’t reply. Just sat there, eyes on the sleeping child.

After John carried Rosie to her cot, he returned to find Sherlock still seated in the same spot, hands in his lap.

“You alright?”

Sherlock nodded slowly.

“I just… don’t want it to stop.”

John sat beside him. “Then don’t stop.”

Sherlock exhaled, voice nearly inaudible. “I don’t think I could survive losing it.”

“You’re not going to. We’re right here.”

There was a pause.

And then, finally — Sherlock leaned against him, just slightly.

John didn’t move.

They stayed there in silence, warm and whole and fragile.