The Address is 221B Baker Street: October
Mar. 7th, 2013 08:40 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
impulsereaderSherlock was, extremely thoughtfully mind you, making tea. He reached up for the box of tea bags and a sharp stab of pain from his presumably not-entirely-healed wound caused him to make a small noise. A small noise, it should be noted. John, however, apparently had the hearing of – well – something that could hear extraordinarily well; a dog, perhaps? Definitely an entry worthy of deletion until this moment.
In any case, Sherlock abruptly found himself no longer extremely thoughtfully making tea but sat down and fussed at.
It felt as if John had been fussing at him for days on end.
***
Sherlock was fine.
Sherlock was perfectly fine.
The fact that Sherlock was perfectly fine was apparently a point of contention within the confines of 221B at the moment.
But Sherlock was perfectly fine: please, thank you very much, and full stop.
He knew this was true because: He was Sherlock; he was the one who knew he was fine; he was always right; therefore he was fine.
It had been simply ages since that tedious incident when he had got himself injured.
He was perfectly fine.
He absolutely didn’t need a cup of tea.
He refused to demand one because he didn’t need one.
He was fine.
Sherlock was perfectly fine.
…
All right maybe – just maybe, mind you, and only when he reached up to get something on the very highest shelf (why on earth was the tea on the highest shelf anyway?) – he was still in a bit of pain.
Just a very little bit.
Nothing to worry about.
Nothing at all.
It was just transport.
***
“No.”
“But -,”
“No.”
“John -,”
“I am your doctor. Deal with it. You are not going anywhere.”
-
And that was when Sherlock threw the wobbly to end all wobblies.
-
The aftermath was - well - epic.
-
John surveyed the sitting room which he had once considered a space they – well, all right, he – could expect a civilized human being to consider he or she was willing to occupy without demanding monetary compensation for doing so.
He was now forced to re-evaluate that opinion.
***
John decided to make tea.
Making tea and drinking tea had a long history of sorting things out. So far it hadn’t helped the current situation (and he had been making quite a lot of tea just recently) but he was English and he was supposed to keep calm and follow that up with various steadfast sorts of things as he maintained a stiff upper lip etcetera.
So he did.
He then took it one step further and made tea for two.
He did this even though one of the main platform points of the recent wobbly had been that Sherlock very much did not require tea.
“So what’s actually bothering you? Because I know it isn’t this year’s Eurovision upset as you so passionately claimed it was yesterday.”
Sherlock eyed the tea warily. It looked extremely wonderful. He wondered if drinking it would make it obligatory for him to behave. This existence which he maintained since his return to Baker Street and John so often seemed to involve his behaving. And perhaps, too, this new John was still so very relieved to have Sherlock returned to him (This bear belongs to: Dr John Hamish Watson. Please return to: 221B Baker Street, London if found. Reward offered.) that he was reduced more often to smiling fondly than to shouting about body parts in the fridge.
And maybe Sherlock had actually counted on the shouting.
Just a bit.
“You didn’t actually think Lestrade’s case was interesting. You just want to run around London and pop yet another stitch.”
Because the shouting meant that John was still there. It meant he was choosing to stay despite the fact that he periodically felt moved to shout about the pancreas in the fridge and the Batrachotoxin next to the tea bags.
“Though yesterday’s performance wasn’t much better as far as alternatives go.”
And at least Sherlock heard the shouting. Sometimes it was difficult to hear things over the hum of his own thoughts.
“Not talking? All right. Fine. I’m going out then.”
The flat was quiet.
And the tea was cold.
***
While John was gone it rained.
The sky over London opened up and matched Sherlock Holmes’s temper tantrum howl for howl and whirlwind for whirlwind. The driving rain battered the great city and its timeless structures as if trying to reduce all of it to rubble.
***
John sat out the thunderstorm in a pub realigning his patience over a pint of bitter. He then walked home through the stillness which was the ten or so minutes before birds will begin to sing again after a hard rain.
He opened the door of 221, called out a cheery, “Afternoon, Mrs H.”, and mounted the steps, determined to put the flat to rights and ignore Sherlock completely. If he wanted to be in an epic strop that was perfectly fine, but it didn’t mean that John had to join him or live like some sort of refugee trapped in a bombed-out village for the duration.
He crossed their threshold and a parrot; vibrant red, blue, yellow, and green; larger than his head, swooped through the air before him.
John stopped dead and looked around him incredulously.
The sitting room had been filled with birds of every colour, shape and size. Some perched, others hopped, a number pecked at the furniture and the various belongings of the resident humans which lay scattered about, a very few were engaging in short flights from one surface to another.
Several free-floating feathers wafted gently through the air, whimsically making their way toward the floor.
Sherlock sat in the midst of it all, appearing completely unconcerned, reading a book.
“Sherlock?”
“Hm?”
“There are birds. In the flat.”
“Oh, well spotted, John.”
“Birds. Inside our flat.”
There was no response.
“Birds that belong in the rain forest or the zoo, or even just outside the flat, are inside our flat!”
Still nothing.
“Dozens and dozens of birds that were not in our flat when I left it an hour ago are now inside our flat!”
“I believe there should prove to be an even hundred, actually.”
“You are spectacularly ignoring my point! Why are there birds in the flat?”
“I needed them.”
“You needed them?! What did you need them for?”
“A case,” he said vaguely.
“You don’t have a case!”
“Hm.”
“Sherlock! You cannot be serious! Even you cannot - ! Oi! Over the course of the last week you have sulked and sniped at me, laid waste to the sitting room, and now you have somehow, impossibly, filled this room with birds! BIRDS!!”
“Hm.”
“Sherlock! Pay attention when I’m shouting at you! What are we going to do with them all?! Couldn’t you at least have conjured up some cages to -,” John abruptly stopped mid-shout and sniffed the air suspiciously. “Is that – is that smoke?! Jesus! Tell me you haven’t blown up another – Christ! You have, haven’t you?” he accused hotly as he strode into the kitchen to investigate. “You’ve blown up the new blender already – oh my – Jesus bloody Christ!! More bloody birds?! Seriously, Sherlock, what the bloody, fucking hell!?!”
Sherlock smiled serenely and brushed absently at a blue tit when its flight path veered close enough to his ear that he felt the tip of its wing ghost across his skin.
In any case, Sherlock abruptly found himself no longer extremely thoughtfully making tea but sat down and fussed at.
It felt as if John had been fussing at him for days on end.
***
Sherlock was fine.
Sherlock was perfectly fine.
The fact that Sherlock was perfectly fine was apparently a point of contention within the confines of 221B at the moment.
But Sherlock was perfectly fine: please, thank you very much, and full stop.
He knew this was true because: He was Sherlock; he was the one who knew he was fine; he was always right; therefore he was fine.
It had been simply ages since that tedious incident when he had got himself injured.
He was perfectly fine.
He absolutely didn’t need a cup of tea.
He refused to demand one because he didn’t need one.
He was fine.
Sherlock was perfectly fine.
…
All right maybe – just maybe, mind you, and only when he reached up to get something on the very highest shelf (why on earth was the tea on the highest shelf anyway?) – he was still in a bit of pain.
Just a very little bit.
Nothing to worry about.
Nothing at all.
It was just transport.
***
“No.”
“But -,”
“No.”
“John -,”
“I am your doctor. Deal with it. You are not going anywhere.”
-
And that was when Sherlock threw the wobbly to end all wobblies.
-
The aftermath was - well - epic.
-
John surveyed the sitting room which he had once considered a space they – well, all right, he – could expect a civilized human being to consider he or she was willing to occupy without demanding monetary compensation for doing so.
He was now forced to re-evaluate that opinion.
***
John decided to make tea.
Making tea and drinking tea had a long history of sorting things out. So far it hadn’t helped the current situation (and he had been making quite a lot of tea just recently) but he was English and he was supposed to keep calm and follow that up with various steadfast sorts of things as he maintained a stiff upper lip etcetera.
So he did.
He then took it one step further and made tea for two.
He did this even though one of the main platform points of the recent wobbly had been that Sherlock very much did not require tea.
“So what’s actually bothering you? Because I know it isn’t this year’s Eurovision upset as you so passionately claimed it was yesterday.”
Sherlock eyed the tea warily. It looked extremely wonderful. He wondered if drinking it would make it obligatory for him to behave. This existence which he maintained since his return to Baker Street and John so often seemed to involve his behaving. And perhaps, too, this new John was still so very relieved to have Sherlock returned to him (This bear belongs to: Dr John Hamish Watson. Please return to: 221B Baker Street, London if found. Reward offered.) that he was reduced more often to smiling fondly than to shouting about body parts in the fridge.
And maybe Sherlock had actually counted on the shouting.
Just a bit.
“You didn’t actually think Lestrade’s case was interesting. You just want to run around London and pop yet another stitch.”
Because the shouting meant that John was still there. It meant he was choosing to stay despite the fact that he periodically felt moved to shout about the pancreas in the fridge and the Batrachotoxin next to the tea bags.
“Though yesterday’s performance wasn’t much better as far as alternatives go.”
And at least Sherlock heard the shouting. Sometimes it was difficult to hear things over the hum of his own thoughts.
“Not talking? All right. Fine. I’m going out then.”
The flat was quiet.
And the tea was cold.
***
While John was gone it rained.
The sky over London opened up and matched Sherlock Holmes’s temper tantrum howl for howl and whirlwind for whirlwind. The driving rain battered the great city and its timeless structures as if trying to reduce all of it to rubble.
***
John sat out the thunderstorm in a pub realigning his patience over a pint of bitter. He then walked home through the stillness which was the ten or so minutes before birds will begin to sing again after a hard rain.
He opened the door of 221, called out a cheery, “Afternoon, Mrs H.”, and mounted the steps, determined to put the flat to rights and ignore Sherlock completely. If he wanted to be in an epic strop that was perfectly fine, but it didn’t mean that John had to join him or live like some sort of refugee trapped in a bombed-out village for the duration.
He crossed their threshold and a parrot; vibrant red, blue, yellow, and green; larger than his head, swooped through the air before him.
John stopped dead and looked around him incredulously.
The sitting room had been filled with birds of every colour, shape and size. Some perched, others hopped, a number pecked at the furniture and the various belongings of the resident humans which lay scattered about, a very few were engaging in short flights from one surface to another.
Several free-floating feathers wafted gently through the air, whimsically making their way toward the floor.
Sherlock sat in the midst of it all, appearing completely unconcerned, reading a book.
“Sherlock?”
“Hm?”
“There are birds. In the flat.”
“Oh, well spotted, John.”
“Birds. Inside our flat.”
There was no response.
“Birds that belong in the rain forest or the zoo, or even just outside the flat, are inside our flat!”
Still nothing.
“Dozens and dozens of birds that were not in our flat when I left it an hour ago are now inside our flat!”
“I believe there should prove to be an even hundred, actually.”
“You are spectacularly ignoring my point! Why are there birds in the flat?”
“I needed them.”
“You needed them?! What did you need them for?”
“A case,” he said vaguely.
“You don’t have a case!”
“Hm.”
“Sherlock! You cannot be serious! Even you cannot - ! Oi! Over the course of the last week you have sulked and sniped at me, laid waste to the sitting room, and now you have somehow, impossibly, filled this room with birds! BIRDS!!”
“Hm.”
“Sherlock! Pay attention when I’m shouting at you! What are we going to do with them all?! Couldn’t you at least have conjured up some cages to -,” John abruptly stopped mid-shout and sniffed the air suspiciously. “Is that – is that smoke?! Jesus! Tell me you haven’t blown up another – Christ! You have, haven’t you?” he accused hotly as he strode into the kitchen to investigate. “You’ve blown up the new blender already – oh my – Jesus bloody Christ!! More bloody birds?! Seriously, Sherlock, what the bloody, fucking hell!?!”
Sherlock smiled serenely and brushed absently at a blue tit when its flight path veered close enough to his ear that he felt the tip of its wing ghost across his skin.
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no subject
Date: 2013-03-07 02:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-07 09:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-07 06:58 pm (UTC)It makes sense that John would be overprotective, to the point of realizing that Sherlock is, actually, fine - and that it's not the stitches that bother him, it's the hovering.
I do wonder how they got the birds out. And what Mrs Hudson said about it all. :)
no subject
Date: 2013-03-07 09:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-07 09:30 pm (UTC)*giggles madly*
This is a wonderful interlude - you were right, it was definitely about time Sherlock had a tantrum and this is a doozy of one. And did I really read that end bit right ... birds in the broken blender? Blended? *wrinkles nose in digust at the mess, a la Mrs Hudson*
no subject
Date: 2013-03-07 09:43 pm (UTC)The writers of the show are completely right in that the best bits to write are the ones that you don't have to explain. Not even John bothers questioning where the birds came from because Sherlock just has super powers like that. :-)
no subject
Date: 2013-03-08 08:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-08 01:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-08 11:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-29 06:16 am (UTC)