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“Why aren’t you packing?”
John looks up from where he’s trying to reorganize his medical textbooks to force them to fit on the bottom shelf, Sherlock having taken up the rest of the book case with miscellaneous books that he doesn’t actually need for his Chemistry courses.
He drops Robbins Basic Pathology by his feet with a thud. “I’m… not going anywhere? Why are you packing?”
Sherlock blinks at him owlishly. “You aren’t going home for the holidays? I would’ve thought…” he trails off awkwardly.
“Not this year. My parents finally managed to get some time off, so they’re on holiday in Scotland, and Harry’s. Well. She’s Harry,” John explains. “Anyway, it could be worse, I suppose. I’ve still got this lot to organize—.”
Sherlock cuts him off halfway through his half-hearted wave at the pile of textbooks. “You could come stay with me!” he blurts out.
It’s John’s turn to blink owlishly. “With… You? In Sussex?”
Sherlock blushes right to the tips of his ears and seems to have spotted something incredibly interesting on the floor. “Well… Since you were going to be alone here, I just thought— Never mind, sorry, that was stupid, of course you have other things to do, I’ll just—.”
John feels mortified. “No! No, Sherlock, of course I want to come! Just— Isn’t your family rather… posh?”
Sherlock seems to be recovering slowly, the red now only visible in the highest parts of his cheeks. “That does seem like an apt descriptor for them, yes. Unfortunately. But that won’t be a problem, I promise!”
Sherlock shuffles his feet a bit, then glances slightly backwards, like he’s trying to distract himself. John narrows his eyes.
“All right. I know that look. What would be the problem, then?”
Sherlock continues to shuffle his feet; he seems to be doing his absolute best not to meet John’s eyes. “It’s just that— Mycroft will be bringing his girlfriend—,” he wrinkles his nose, “So if I were to also bring someone, my mother would likely assume—.”
“That we’re dating?” John finishes for him. “So… you’re gay? Which is fine, by the way!”
Sherlock looks uncomfortable. “I know it’s fine.”
There’s a brief moment where they simply stare at each other, the silence slowly growing more and more uncomfortable around them, but John can’t quite bring himself to care.
Sherlock is gay.
John hasn’t exactly been hiding his sexual orientation from Sherlock (although Sherlock’s would probably explain why Mike had introduced them with a rather pointed, “This is my bi friend, John!”), but this is the first he’s heard of Sherlock’s.
John slowly becomes aware that he’s started to gape. Sherlock clears his throat pointedly.
“So… Do you want to come, then?”
John internally kicks himself. This new bit of information in no way indicates that his nearly two-year crush is reciprocated; Sherlock is just trying to help out his best friend.
“Yeah! Yeah, just let me grab my bag, I’ll be down in a minute!” he tells him, then rushes up the stairs to pack his things, hoping his face isn’t quite as red as Sherlock’s.
***
John’s jaw drops as the taxi pulls in to the driveway of Sherlock’s house.
Mansion, more like it.
“Second thoughts?” Sherlock murmurs beside him. They’re both practically vibrating with tension.
“I guess I didn’t quite realize what you meant by ‘posh’,” John manages.
“What you meant by ‘posh’, you mean,” Sherlock corrects him, and John playfully smacks him in the arm.
“Anything I should know before we go in?”
“Um. We should probably hold hands. They’ll be expecting that. But other than that. I, um. Don’t really know, actually.”
The taxi stops just as John’s head whips around towards Sherlock. “What do you mean, you don’t know?”
The blush is back in full force. “I’ve never— That is— I’ve never been in a relationship before.”
John turns so that he’s fully facing Sherlock. “Never?”
Sherlock turns his head, pulling his gaze away from John’s. “They’re expecting us,” he announces before practically leaping out of the car. John pays the fare and follows him out, making sure to reach for his hand as naturally as possible.
Sherlock’s hand is enormous; it nearly engulfs John’s perfectly-normal-sized-fingers-thank-you-very-much. It’s also warm, and soft, and is absolutely not helping John crush his enormous, well, crush. Sherlock looks down at him in concern, but John waves it off with his other hand as they walk towards the friendly-looking couple standing in the doorway.
“Sherlock!” Mrs. Holmes cries out. She rushes towards them at an alarming speed to wrap her son up in a warm hug. “You’ve barely packed at all, I was hoping you’d stay longer this time!”
“I do have to study sometimes, Mummy,” Sherlock murmurs, looking embarrassed. His mother tuts at him, gesturing towards John.
“You haven’t even introduced me to your boyfriend!” she says, indignant, and Sherlock mutters something about We’ve only just arrived and You haven’t even given me the chance to— before John cuts in and introduces himself, trying to hold back what would have been an embarrassing snort.
“John Watson,” he says formally, putting his hand out for Mrs. Holmes to shake. She accepts it, giving him an appraising sort of look.
“John. Lovely to meet you!” she tells him, shaking his hand enthusiastically. The look, however, feels like it’s boring straight into his soul, and with a shudder, he realizes he’s being deduced. “And how long have you and my son been seeing each other?”
It’s a test; he knows it is, seeing how her gaze carries the same intelligent weight as Sherlock’s. He fumbles for words. “Um. Nearly two years now, yeah, love?”
Sherlock’s head twists down towards him at the speed of light at the endearment, making John wish, for one, that they’d practiced that before coming, and two, that he was able to call Sherlock that all the time. “I— yes. Yes it has. We were just flatmates, originally.”
Sherlock’s mother narrows her eyes, and John is just about to panic and give it all up when Sherlock’s father shouts at them from the door. “No hug for me, then, Sherlock?”
The spell is broken; Sherlock nearly sprints for the door, John hot on his heels. He gets introduced to Sherlock’s father and then they head inside to drop their bags off and have dinner.
***
Dinner, as it turns out, is much less formal than John had expected. He and Sherlock are seated across from each other, and Mycroft is sitting to John’s left shooting glances at him and looking incredibly smug about something. Sherlock’s parents are seated at either end of the table, and Mycroft’s girlfriend, Penny, is sitting next to Sherlock, who looks like he would rather be sitting anywhere else.
The roast is delicious, the vegetables done to perfection, and while Mycroft’s girlfriend seems a bit lost at times, the conversation flows easily enough. John is just starting to think they may be off the hook when Penny turns towards him and says, “I didn’t know you were gay! Weren’t you dating Sarah last semester?”
Sherlock opens his mouth to speak, but John gives him a swift kick in the shins and his mouth abruptly shuts. “I’m bisexual, actually. And no, Sarah and I are just good friends.”
He can practically feel Mrs. Holmes’s gaze drilling into his skull. Penny, oblivious as ever, gasps. “Oh, you’re bisexual! But I could have sworn I saw you two— Mrmph!”
She cuts off as John delivers a swift kick to her shins, as well. He prays to a god he doesn’t quite believe in for the ground to open up and swallow him whole.
Mr. Holmes, bless him, cuts in. “Well, it’s getting rather late, isn’t it? I think I’m for bed! How about all of you?”
He gives Mrs. Holmes a very pointed stare, and she slowly tears her gaze away from John. A slow, possibly menacing smile spreads across her lips. “Good night!”
John looks to Sherlock for guidance, but he seems to have turned even whiter than usual, as though something horrible has just occurred to him.
“Sherlock?”
Mr. and Mrs. Holmes leave the room, and rather than answer, Sherlock leads John upstairs to the room they’ll be sharing. Earlier, they had simply opened the door and tossed in their bags, but now, Sherlock pushes the door fully open to reveal that the bed they’re meant to share is nowhere near the size of the luxurious king John had envisioned in his head.
It’s a twin bed. It’s both John’s worst nightmare and greatest dream come to life at once.
“Well shit.”
“John, I’m so sorry, I— I can just. I’ll go set up a guest room and get out of your way—.”
His voice sounds choked, like he’s about to cry, and John immediately regrets his words. He grasps at a feeble straw of hope that maybe, just maybe, he’s not been completely alone in his ridiculous two-year pining.
“No! Sherlock, it’s fine, we’ll just... We’re not that big, it’ll be fine!”
Sherlock nods slowly, but his hands are still clenched tightly at his sides. John looks at them, then up at Sherlock’s face, and takes the leap.
“Sherlock. Your mum doesn’t really seem like the type to… assume. Anything.”
“She isn’t,” Sherlock gets out, his gaze focused somewhere above John’s left shoulder.
“So why would she assume that we were—.”
“Because I told her we were!” Sherlock cries out, looking desperate. “I was always talking about you, and she could tell, John, she could tell, so I just— I just went along with it! But I know you don’t like me that way, you’ve been chasing girls all year, bisexual or not, and I have no experience with this at all—.”
He stops abruptly when John reaches out and takes one of his hands in his, hope flooding his heart. He looks up at Sherlock.
“What could she tell, Sherlock?”
Sherlock holds his gaze, then quickly turns away. “That I’ve been in love with you for nearly two years. I’m so sorry, John. I never meant to—.”
John is so happy the words practically come flying out of his mouth, unstoppable. “Me too!”
Sherlock’s eyes are like saucers. “You too— what!?”
“I’ve also been in love with you for nearly two years,” John tells him, a grin spreading over his face. He nearly trips over his own feet in his haste to hug Sherlock.
Sherlock’s arms slowly but surely come up to wrap around him, as well. He gives the tiniest of contented sighs, and John’s heart swells in his chest.
“I think we’ve been idiots,” John murmurs into Sherlock’s shirt. He feels Sherlock’s watery laugh, then Sherlock’s shaky nod into the top of John’s head. He pulls back to get a good look at Sherlock.
Sherlock’s eyes are sparkling in a way John has never seen, and it breaks John’s heart that they made themselves wait so long for this. He stretches up to plant a chaste kiss on Sherlock’s perfect lips. He swallows Sherlock’s quiet gasp, but doesn’t deepen the kiss any further.
He takes Sherlock’s hand again. “Come on. Let’s get some sleep, we can talk about this more in the morning.”
They both quickly change into pyjamas before Sherlock slips under the duvet, scooting over as much as he can to leave room for John. John eyes the tiny space and smiles.
“We’re going to have to spoon, I think,” he says, and Sherlock’s eyes widen.
“What?”
“I’ll show you,” John says. He gets into bed and gets as close to Sherlock as possible, turning him in his arms, then wraps himself around Sherlock’s taller, lankier frame. It would be almost comical if it wasn’t for the way Sherlock melts in his arms, giving the same contented sigh. John feels himself melt against Sherlock.
“I love you,” he whispers into Sherlock’s shoulder. Sherlock shivers a little, then tries to get even closer to John, who finds it so endearing that his chest hurts.
“I love you, too,” Sherlock whispers back in the darkness.
John has never slept better.
***
Mrs. Holmes’s smile, when they come downstairs holding hands properly, this time, is incandescent.