Chapter Text
There was a child in the alley way. It was dirty and wrapped in a plastic bag, its head poked through a hole someone made in the top and its arms trapped inside. Sherlock, of course, was the only one who saw it. It was silent as if it was used to the odd situation it was in. Sherlock couldn’t tell if the child was male or female and he slowed to a stop.
“Sherlock! He’s getting away!” John called. For once he was ahead of Sherlock and slowed when the detective showed no sign of having heard.
“Sherlock?” he began to jog back toward the man when it seemed that Sherlock picked up a bundle off the ground.
The child didn’t make a sound. It felt like a sack of potatoes in his arms and for a moment he was worried (he’d carried a sack of potatoes once. A dare by Mycroft when he was high. It had proved his brother’s point, sadly). Then the child opened its mouth and wailed once before settling once more.
“Sherlock, is that a baby?” John asked incredulously.
“Phone Lestrade. Tell him we will contact him with more information tomorrow. Tell him…Tell him what the man looks like. Tell him anything. We’re going back to Baker Street,” Sherlock said, his eyes never leaving the face of the child he held.
“We can’t take a baby home with us, Sherlock,” John said. He sounded off kilter but Sherlock could empathize for once. He also felt shocked.
“We can and we will.”
It was a voice that promised any argument made would be ignored. John crossed his arms for a moment before looking more closely at the child. He also couldn’t tell its sex but the look in its eyes made him realize why Sherlock simply couldn’t let it go. There was no hope. No real fear, either. Only a dead look that assumed the worst had already happened and nothing more could be much more dire. The child was in a plastic bag for god’s sakes. John slowly took out his phone and dialed Lestrade.
“Yes…Lestrade….we’ll talk to you tomorrow. No, he got away. He’s a tall man. Dark hair. Wearing a leather jacket. He has a slight limp when he runs. Yes. Tomorrow. Good night,” he said, his eyes stuck on the child in Sherlock’s arms.
“John…” Sherlock looked over helplessly and John put his arms out. The child didn’t make a sound as Sherlock placed it in John’s arms.
“I know. It’s okay. We’re going home.”
^ ^ ^
Sherlock couldn’t help but stare at the child that sat strangely in John’s lap. The night had started normally enough. They’d found the killer and tried to hunt him down. It had gotten odd when the man had turned down the alley and begun jumping dumpsters. A man with a limp simply wouldn’t have that kind of ability. It had only gotten stranger when he’d seen the baby. And it truly was a baby. Probably only 12 months old, if that, it hadn’t motioned to him and it hadn’t cried. There wasn’t even despair, just cold acceptance and that had stopped Sherlock in his tracks. He’d seen that look in his own eyes and it had coincided with a needle in his arm. He didn’t kid himself. He couldn’t help every hurt child or lonely person. He didn’t even particularly want to. But this single child in its plastic bag with its wide, dark eyes had caught him and he simply couldn’t let it go.
John was in his own world of shock. Sherlock had returned home in a flurry of surprise only two years prior. John had been engaged to Mary at the time and had gotten married in a numb daze while Sherlock looked on. They’d mended with the help of Mary. Mary, who had gotten ill and left him alone while he buried her. Of course he’d gone back to Baker Street. The shock of all of those years, all of that life that had passed him by could all add up to the shock he felt in holding a baby on his lap while sitting next to his best friend, Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock Holmes who had never shown any interest in children at all. He blinked as the child shifted to look up at him.
“Our lives…” he trailed off, unsure of how to finish the sentence. Sherlock only hummed agreement.
When they pulled up to Baker Street Sherlock didn’t shoot out of the cab but instead reached over for the child almost tenderly. John put the baby into his friend’s arms and paid the cabby who looked at him with angry judgment but said nothing.
Sherlock hoisted the child onto his hip and unlocked the door. The child watched in its characteristic silence as he took it into the foyer.
“The first step is to clean it up. Find out….what it is,” John said as he followed them inside. He rubbed his forehead at the thought.
“We have no clothing for a baby,” Sherlock replied.
“I’ll ask Mrs. Hudson. She might have something floating around,” John said.
The child gurgled deep in its throat but didn’t move a muscle.
Sherlock nodded and bounded up the stairs holding the child safely against him. John knocked on Mrs. Hudson’s door.
“Oh, yes dear?” she answered in her night robe with a cup of tea in her hands.
“Do you….have any clothing for a child? A baby? A nappie or anything like it?” he asked. He couldn’t believe what he was asking and Mrs. Hudson’s eyes widened.
“I have a onesie and leftover nappies. What is this for?” she asked as she bustled back into her flat.
“An experiment,” John said.
“This late? Oh dear, don’t let him keep you up all night,” she fussed as she handed over the objects in question.
“No worries, Mrs. Hudson. Everything will be fine,” he said for his own sanity. Mrs. Hudson nodded and watched him head back to his own flat.
^ ^ ^
Sherlock had brought the child into the bathroom and was staring at it with frank and nervous curiosity. To anyone outside of himself it would come off as a calm and uncaring curiosity, but in his mind he was working out who would leave a baby like that in an alley wearing only a plastic bag and how a child that young could look so defeated and defiant. Finally, as if reaching the point of boredom, the child reached out to him as if urging him on. Sherlock nodded to himself.
“Time to find out,” he said.
He ripped the bag as carefully as possible and winced when he saw the mess stuck to its sides. There was no diaper on the child and it was smeared in what smelled like a drunk man’s vomit. Sherlock wrinkled his nose and started the water in the tub so it was lukewarm. The baby stared up at him.
It seemed there should be more ceremony in finding out what sex a child was, but Sherlock needed only to look down after he’d pulled the bag free to see that the child he’d picked up was a girl. She was a mess of dirt and her own bodily functions but he couldn’t help but smile slightly. He’d done something good, he felt. He was not a man who prided himself on being “good” in the way he knew people wanted. He left that to John. It wasn’t good that he left for years. It wasn’t good that he dominated others with his brain and it wasn’t good that he was rude and short when he found people dull, but he did good things. Or so John told him. This time, he didn’t need John to tell him. When he lowered the baby into the water she didn’t smile or laugh or squeal but she did look at him and her dark eyes seemed to convey relief. And Sherlock truly thought that was a start.
John came into the flat with what they needed only to hear Sherlock humming from the bathroom. Sherlock was not sentimental. Not in the least bit. He’d come back with flash and a bang, smiling when he first saw John and frowning when he got punched and he truly didn’t seem to understand the impact he had on the other man. He’d play the music John liked and he’d try his best to make John happy, but he was not someone who took care of children or who smiled or laughed easily. John followed the sound to the bathroom door and leaned against it.
Sherlock had his sleeves rolled up and was washing the baby with a small washcloth. He had a look of pure concentration on his face and the child watched him with wide eyes. He was humming a song he must have written himself. It was soft and slow and beautiful.
“John,” Sherlock greeted. His voice warm and thick as chocolate.
“What’s that you’re humming?” John asked with a smile.
Sherlock didn’t turn to look at him as he replied, “Something I wrote while I was gone.”
John nodded and entered the room.
“It’s a girl, John. I brought home a baby girl,” Sherlock said and for the first time since John could ever remember, Sherlock sounded proud and awe filled over something living and breathing.
“Sherlock….” John trailed off unsure of how to continue.
“I know. I know,” Sherlock dismissed.
Sherlock knew they couldn’t keep her. Knew there was no way. But he wanted this one night. He wanted one night of being good and when he looked over at John, one hand steading the baby’s back, the other gripping the washcloth as it sat in the water, John understood. He nodded.
“We’ll talk about it in the morning,” he said.
Sherlock smiled in quick relief before closing off his face. He turned back to the baby and let the water begin to drain the dirt and muck of her life away. Continuing to hum, he watched the little girl yawn and felt something in his chest tighten. John pretended not to see the emotions cross his flatmate’s face.
“I’m going to bed. The things you need are here,” John laid his hand on Sherlock’s shoulder on his way out.
“Where will she sleep?” he asked as a second thought.
“With me,” Sherlock replied, his eyes glued to the baby who was lowering her fists into the new water then raising them out, “She’ll be with me.”