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“Watson! Fetch my racket!” – SH
“What? What racket? You don’t own a racket.” – JW
“My tennis racket, John. The red and white one.” – SH
“That’s my racket!” – JW
“No it’s not, it’s mine. I distinctly remember it being mine.” – SH
“Oh really, where did you get it from?” – JW
“I don’t have time for this John, just bring my racket down.” – SH
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John sighs, and pocketing his phone, gets the racket out of the wardrobe. He walks downstairs to confront the irritating detective. Walking into the living room, he finds Sherlock in his customary pose on the sofa – lying down, head tipped back, eyes closed, and hands under his chin in a position prayer wished it looked as good as.
He clears his throat, “Is this the racket you were texting me about… from downstairs?!” Sherlock raises his head slightly, and then holds his hand out for the object. “Yes. That is my racket, hand it over.”
“No Sherlock, this is my racket. If it was yours, why was it in my wardrobe? Also, more importantly, why does it have the initials J.H.W engraved on it?”
“You’re wrong. I don’t know why it was in your old wardrobe, it must have been put there when you were moving your things around. It’s my racket, John. Why are you so adamant that it is yours? Just give it here.” Sherlock sits up, reaching for the racket. John moves it out of his reach, his patience wearing thin, “I'm not lying Sherlock, Look!” He shows the handle to Sherlock, the gold engraving clearly standing out.
Sherlock huffs, and jumps up, annoyed at being proven wrong, “Alright, fine, it’s yours. Hand it over, please.” He paces, holding his hand out for the racket.
“Wow, an acceptance of the fact you were wrong, and you saying please in one sentence. Can I get that in writing?” John mocks, not relinquishing his hold on the object.
“Oh don’t be so pedestrian, John. Really. Just hand me the racket, would you?” Sherlock doesn't roll his eyes, but John can tell that he’s fighting to not do.
“No, why should I? What are you going to do with it?” John frowns. Sherlock actually does roll his eyes this time, replying with, “I need it John. It’s for an experiment.” “What kind of experiment? I don’t want you breaking this Sherlock!”
“Oh, please.” Sherlock sarcastically replies, “I need to study the rate at which bruises form on the skin after death, when being beaten to death by a tennis racket. Why are you so protective over this? It’s just a rack-” Sherlock’s confused and annoyed expression clears, understanding and slight disgust shown clearly on his face. “Oh! It’s that sentiment thing again, isn't it?” Sherlock almost spits the word sentiment, like it’s a nasty taste on his tongue.
“Yes, Sherlock. Sentiment. My grandfather gave me this on my tenth birthday. It’s very dear to me. You’re not having it; you’ll have to find another one for your experiments, one that you can break without it meaning too much.”
“But Joooooohn!” Sherlock whines. John shakes his head. “No means no, Sherlock. If this experiment is that important to you, we’ll go out and buy you your own racket. Maybe we could even get some balls and have a game at some point.”
Sherlock groans, flinging himself back on the sofa “Boring!” he exclaims. John crosses his arms, glaring, “Fine then, if it’s obviously such a waste of time to go out and get a racket, then your experiment doesn't matter too much then. Now budge up, so I can sit down.”
“BUT IT DOES, John! Don’t you see? This could prove a man’s alibi; it could solve that cold case Lestrade gave me yesterday. It is vital that I do this, Watson.” Sherlock complains, making no effort to actually sit up or move.
John leans the racket against his armchair and moving Sherlock’s feet out of the way, sits down on the opposite end of the sofa. Sherlock immediately places his feet in Johns lap. John sighs, but his hands fall to massage Sherlock’s ankles.
“What? Is that not your name? I was under the impression that you are Captain John Hamish Watson, M.D, formerly of the fifth Northumberland Fusiliers. Current occupation, live-in blogger of Sherlock Holmes, Consulting Detective. The only one in the world.”
“Shut it, you git. Yes, that is my name, but I’m not just yours, you know. I do work at the surgery as well. Not everything revolves around you, although you like to think it does. He stops massaging Sherlock’s feet, until the detective nudges his hands so he’ll start rubbing them again.
“Don’t be so ignorant, John. Of course I don’t think everything revolves around me. I'm not that egotistical.” John snorts and mutters, “Yes you are.”
Sherlock ignores him in favour of jumping up and pacing the room, “You’re barely at the surgery any more, you've cut your hours back, and your patient load is significantly less than last month. You try to cover it by walking instead of taking a cab or the tube home. Now that could be due to funds, and wanting to save money, but you've also been taking a longer route. This shows that you need time to yourself, to think things over. The only thing to figure out, is why? Your sister hasn't relapsed recently. You’re not overworked. We haven’t had a major case-load in the past few months. Which whilst that normally drives me insane with boredom, it normally makes you take on more shifts and patients, not drop them. Though you seem very paranoid and antsy about something, you’re not feeling overly guilty. You seem almost bored most days. It’s me who gets bored though, not you. What is it?” Sherlock muses, fixing John with a calculating gaze whilst still pacing around the room.
“Sherlock-“, John tries again.
“You've been acting strangely around me recently. You want to tell me what you've been taking the time to think so deeply on, but you’re worried about how I will react. Spending more time in your old room, hiding things from me, and surprisingly rather well too. I haven’t yet been able to deduce what it is. You’ve also been acting increasingly nervous around me as well…” Sherlock continues, working himself up, his pacing becoming more and more frantic as he ignores John.
John tries again, louder this time, “Sherlock-“, but the arrogant detective is completely oblivious to John’s pleas.
“Now my first deduction would be that you’re getting bored of me and our life together. From this I would gather that you've been seeing someone behind my back, or at least contemplating it, and therefore you've been trying to find the best way to break it off me with me, so that you can pursue them and not be held back by me and my eccentricities and my freakish nature. However, the lack of guilt puts a stop to that theory, although you could just be so disinterested in me that you truly don’t care for me any more, and are lying whenever you tell me that you do, and that you l…love me-“
“WILLIAM SHERLOCK SCOTT HOLMES!” John yelled; frustrated with the increased pacing and the wild theories that Sherlock is spewing. This froze Sherlock in his tracks and he spun to face John, completely silent at last, a look of shock upon his face, quickly replaced by the blank mask that he shows to the general public, but never to John, not any more. Seeing the cold, distant look on Sherlock’s face breaks John’s heart, and he quickly tries to make amends.
“Sherlock, love, come sit down, please.” Sherlock moves to sit on the couch next to John, who takes Sherlock’s hands in his. “Sherlock, I love you, you are eccentric, but you are not a freak, you never have been, and you never will be. You’re eccentricities make you, you, and I love you because of them, not in spite of.”
“I am not lying when I tell you I love you, I love so much that sometimes it’s painful, and that’s usually when you’re being an annoying dick.” John laughs, and Sherlock’s mask cracks a bit. John notices and tries to get Sherlock to be as open and unguarded as he usually is around John.
“The reason I have been cutting back my hours at the surgery and taking the longer route to get to work is so that I can visit a shop to get something very special, that took time and careful consideration. I cut back my hours to spend more time with you, on the cases that we do have, and hopefully I can stop going to the surgery altogether, soon. I have been spending the time in my old bedroom to consider a very life-altering decision. Yes, I do have something that I'm worried about your reaction for, and I have been trying to find the best way to put forward my question for you. I didn't think that the best, and most obvious, place for it would be here, in our home.”
“John, I-” Sherlock attempts to speak, but John quietens him.
“Please, Sherlock. If I don’t get this out now, then I’ll have to try and find the courage all over again. After all I've been through, all we've been through, I still find this moment the most terrifying and all I am doing is asking you a simple question. It’s the answer that frightens me the most.” John laughs.
John keeps a hold of one of Sherlock’s hands, whilst putting his other in his pocket and slipping down onto one knee.
John holds up the velvet box and opens it to show two beautiful wedding bands nestled in the fabric inside. The inscription on one read “The game...” and on the other matched the inscription “…is on!”
“Sherlock Holmes, I love you with all of my heart, and I would be honoured to call you my husband. Will you marry me?”
Sherlock stares speechless at the box, unblinking for several minutes.
“Sherlock?” John asks nervously, biting his lip and frowning.
Sherlock looks up at John, then and John can see the un-shed tears in his eyes. “You… want to… marry me?” Sherlock finally whispers.
“Yes Sherlock, and I know that it’s only a bit of paper, and something that we don’t need to prove our love for one another, but I want to do this. It’s cliché, but by marrying me you’d make me the happiest live-in-blogger-for-a-consulting-detective in the world.”
“John, I… I don’t know what to say. Out of all of my deductions, this never crossed my mind, it was stupid of me, I know.” Sherlock babbles.
“Well you could start by giving me an answer to my question. Preferably soon so that I can get off my knees, which isn't always a bad thing, but the floor is cold” John prods.
“What was the question?” Sherlock asks.
“Will you marry me, you dick?”
“Well, when you put it that way…” Sherlock smirks.
“Sherlock!”
“Of course I’ll marry you, John.” Sherlock smiles.
John grins and slips one of the rings onto Sherlock’s ring finger, Sherlock doing the same to him with the other, before leaning up and capturing Sherlock’s lips in a sweet kiss that soon turns heated with John falling on top of Sherlock on the couch.
“You do realise this means that we have to tell everyone now, firstly Mrs. Hudson” Sherlock murmurs against John’s lips.
John groans, and buries his head in Sherlock’s neck. “How long can we put it off, do you think?”
“Yoo-hoo, boys are you decent?”
“Not very long, it seems” Sherlock snickers, before sitting up and attempting to look presentable for the first of many congratulations, once news of their engagement has got out.