Chapter Text
Chapter One
John wanted to talk to him about something important that he wasn’t going to like.
Sherlock knew this because Sherlock knew John, of course, but John was so obvious about these things that Sherlock was sure people passing him on the street knew that he had something important on his mind that he dreaded. Even the everyday idiot would be able to read John in such a circumstance.
So Sherlock kept them busy because Sherlock was nothing if not brilliant at avoiding unpleasant circumstances. Sherlock had grown up avoiding his parents, so of course he was brilliant at such things. (Although, to be fair, Sherlock really was brilliant at most things, if he did say so himself, and he did.)
Luckily, Lestrade was being run ragged by a series of bank robberies, and bank robberies weren’t usually Sherlock’s thing but they worked well as a distraction. Plus, Oliver was fascinated by them, after too many murder scenes, so Sherlock thought it was all working out well.
Until he miscalculated John’s willingness to bring up an unpleasant topic during a stakeout of the bank that was the likely next target.
“Oliver needs to go to school this year,” John said without preamble.
Sherlock startled badly and then fixed John with a glare. “Can we possibly save this for a time when we’re not chasing criminals?” he asked, keeping his voice low and gesturing to the bank for emphasis.
“No,” said John, “because you are going to contrive to have us constantly be chasing criminals until Oliver is eighteen years old, and then you’ll say, ‘Oh, we never did send him off to school, did we? Oh, well, he did just fine.’”
“He would do just fine, too. He doesn’t need school, he has me.”
“And me,” John pointed out.
“Right. Yes. You, too.” Sherlock flapped his hand around. “He has me and he has you, discussion settled.” Sherlock turned back to the bank.
“No, no, nothing is settled,” said John. “He needs to go to school.”
“You’ve already said that.”
“But you haven’t responded to it.”
“I responded to it. I didn’t agree to it, so you’re ignoring my response.”
“Sherlock, there shouldn’t be a debate about this. He’s unbearably clever and he’s ready for school—”
“Exactly why he shouldn’t go to school: He’s unbearably clever. They’ll make him be…ordinary and boring.” Sherlock kept his gaze on the bank.
He could feel John’s gaze on him, which was annoying because they were supposed to be doing a stakeout here, not fake-psychotherapy hour. “Do you think I’d let that happen?” asked John, finally, after a moment of blessed silence.
“Oh, look,” said Sherlock, “I think I see a bank robber there.”
“He’d like school, I think.”
“Yup, definitely a bank robber,” said Sherlock.
“He’d get to lord it over all the other children.”
“Why are we still having this conversation?” Sherlock hissed, turning to John swiftly.
“Because we have to,” John replied, and it was so annoying to Sherlock that John was so bloody stubborn all the time.
“He’s three years old,” Sherlock reminded him. “He is three years old. He doesn’t need to go to school. He doesn’t need to go anywhere but where we are, or Mrs. Hudson or Molly or Mycroft in a pinch because you like Mycroft.”
“I’m not saying he’s going to go to school full-time. A few hours a week, just—”
The bank exploded.
***
“Sherlock,” said John.
Sherlock snored extravagantly.
“Sherlock, I know you’re awake.”
Sherlock continued to snore.
“Psst,” John hissed in his ear. “Wake up. Are you awake?”
Sherlock snored and snored and snored.
And listened to John leave the room, go into the kitchen, and…start cleaning. It definitely sounded like he was cleaning.
Clearly John was trying to prove that Sherlock was only faking his deep sleep, but it didn’t matter because that was definitely the rubbish bin John had pulled out and Sherlock had been working on those specimens for weeks.
“Good,” John said, when Sherlock appeared in the kitchen doorway, and calmly put the specimens back down on the table. “You’re awake. Sit down, I’ll make tea.”
Sherlock glared at him. “It is sleeping time.”
“Sleeping time,” echoed John. “And you yell at me whenever I try to simplify vocabulary for Oliver.”
“I mean it’s the time when you say people should be sleeping.”
“Otherwise known as nighttime, Sherlock. It’s called ‘nighttime.’”
“Whatever.” Sherlock waved his hand around. “Let’s go sleep, then.”
“No, we’re talking,” John said firmly. “Sit down.”
“I hate talking,” Sherlock complained.
“You love talking. You adore talking. You are completely obsessed with the sound of your own voice. You and Oliver talk constantly without ever acknowledging what anyone else is saying to you. You don’t like talking when you have to listen to my voice.”
“You have a lovely voice,” Sherlock said sincerely, after a second.
John looked at him in what seemed like pleasant surprise. “Thank you.”
“I just don’t like to hear your lovely voice saying stupid things,” said Sherlock.
“Oh my God,” said John, “sit down.”
Sherlock sat down because Sherlock obeyed Captain Watson tones of voice, and Sherlock didn’t provoke them very often—Sherlock was smug that Oliver provoked them much more often—but Sherlock had been expecting one. He watched John silently make them tea and then settle at the table with him.
Then he ventured, “Do you want to shag, maybe?”
“Sherlock, let’s talk about the school thing,” said John.
“Last time we talked about the school thing, a bank exploded.”
“It only exploded a little bit.”
“Best not to tempt fate. God has spoken on the subject of Oliver going to school.”
“It wasn’t fate or God, it was bank robbers we were chasing. Now I wanted to do this in bed with you in the dark because that’s how you prefer to have serious conversations, but you kept snoring obnoxiously in my ear. Which, by the way, is a dead giveaway, you know, because you actually don’t snore. Now talk to me about school. Why don’t you want him to go?”
Sherlock decided to take the question seriously. It was a stupid and pointless question, but John was obsessed with it so he might as well humor him. “He’s happy how he is. He won’t learn anything in school we can’t teach him. We’ll just make him unhappy and resentful. And I prefer him to be neither of those things.” Sherlock thought that was a very reasoned and sensible response. He sipped his tea, proud of himself.
John looked at him with that look he had sometimes, that look like Sherlock had said something John found momentous.
“You tell me why you think he ought to go to school,” Sherlock demanded, trying to head off whatever momentous thing John was going to act like he’d discovered.
“He needs friends, Sherlock,” John said.
“He doesn’t need friends,” Sherlock said gamely.
“Yes, he does.”
“I didn’t need friends,” Sherlock pointed out sourly.
“Yes, you did,” said John simply.
Sherlock frowned. “I did fine without friends. Look, other children are idiots and they’ll—they won’t—it’s dangerous to make him think that he needs other people if other people won’t—he has us, he’ll be fine.”
John gave him that look again.
“Stop it,” Sherlock told him. “Never mind. Let’s go back to bed in the dark; that would be better.”
“Do you think I’d ever make him do anything that would make him unhappy, Sherlock?” John asked.
“I think you wouldn’t know, John. I think you’d think you’re doing a splendid thing, but sometimes you’re an idiot, and sometimes you have no idea, and for you school was wonderful because you played rugby and shagged girls and, I don’t know, got drunk and threw up in alleys—”
“Sherlock, he’s three. That isn’t what school is—”
“Don’t pretend to miss my point,” Sherlock cut him off. “You were the popular boy. If we’d been in school together, you would never have even looked twice at me. You would have been all golden-glow and no one would laugh at you being clever at biology and chemistry because you’d also be clever at stupid football nonsense and, I don’t know, sitting around wearing hoodies or whatever it was people like you did in school.” Sherlock put a finger in his cooling tea and stirred it around absently. “It isn’t how school is, for people who aren’t you.”
“Every single person you ever knew before you met me was an idiot,” John said fiercely.
Sherlock chuckled without humor. “We agree on that point.”
“He’s not you, Sherlock.”
“He is entirely me,” Sherlock reminded him.
“No. Sherlock. Look at me.”
Sherlock did, and realized it was the first time he’d looked at John since he’d suggested they go back to bed. John was no longer wearing that look. Instead, John was wearing his look of supreme determination. His I carry an illegal gun and I’m not afraid to use it look.
“He’s not you,” John said.
“You can’t just—” Sherlock said, and cut himself off and took a deep breath and tried to be coherent about this, because it was important and Oliver needed him to be coherent on this point. He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose because he preferred these conversations to be in the dark, even if he had to manufacture the dark. “You can’t just put him in this situation and think he won’t want it, John. Because he will. He’ll want to be… He’ll want to be like everyone else and then he won’t be, and it will break his heart, and I love you, you know I do, but I won’t let you break his heart.” Sherlock held his breath and waited for John to respond.
“Okay,” John said softly, after a long, agonizing moment.
Sherlock dared to squint out at John. “Okay?” he said hopefully.
“Okay. Let’s table the school discussion. Let’s start slowly.”
Sherlock’s eyes were now narrowed suspiciously. “Start slowly how?”
“A playgroup. Can we just do a playgroup? Just…just a few kids, right? Just a few hours? We’ll just…see.”
“See what?” asked Sherlock, still suspicious.
“I don’t know. Dangerous to draw conclusions without all the evidence, right? I don’t know what we’ll see.”
Sherlock regarded him. “This is a trick,” he said doubtfully.
“This is a compromise, Sherlock,” John countered.
“Who are these children?” Sherlock asked. “How would you find them? Are you just going to place an ad on your blog asking for volunteers?”
“Of course I’m not going to— Listen, leave it to me, okay? We’ll just…do a playgroup. And if the whole thing is a disaster, then we’ll table the school discussion for a few years. But if it goes well, we revisit the school discussion. Deal?”
Sherlock considered. “We’ll revisit the school discussion. We won’t necessarily send him to school.”
“Yes,” John said. “Absolutely.”
“Okay,” said Sherlock slowly. “Deal.”
***
Sherlock and Oliver were at Speedy’s, practicing deductions on the patrons, and John walked to the market and rang Mycroft on the way.
Mycroft answered with, “What’s wrong?” because that was how Mycroft answered the phone when John rang.
“I need your help,” John said.
“Of course. What’s wrong?” asked Mycroft evenly.
“Do you know any children?” John asked.
There was a long, flat moment of silence. “You mean other than Oliver?” asked Mycroft, finally.
“Other than Oliver,” John confirmed.
“John, of the two of us, who do you think is more likely to know children other than Oliver?” Mycroft queried patiently.
“I need to find a playgroup,” said John.
“Not usually in my job description,” remarked Mycroft.
“Oh, come on, your job description is ‘everything.’ And I need this to be a good playgroup. Good children who will be, you know, nice.”
“You want me to find you a playgroup with good, nice children,” Mycroft clarified.
“Maybe Greg will know of one?” John offered hopefully.
“I’m sure in your head it makes sense that Greg would know of a playgroup.”
“Mycroft,” John said firmly. “I know that you are on my side when it comes to socializing Oliver. I know you know that it would be good for him to go to school and make friends.”
“And I always told you that you’d never get Sherlock to agree to it. Sherlock had a terrible time in school.”
John knew that. John could always have guessed that, but it was worse for him now that he had the perfect reference of baby Sherlock that was Oliver. And it was worse now that he’d made Sherlock sit in the kitchen and basically be raw in front of him about how much it had broken his heart not to have friends in school. “Right, but I think—”
“You think it will be different because you’re involved, and I don’t know how you expect to control the cruelty of other children. You can’t go around shooting all of them, you know. School is an inescapably terrible place, but it’s just a rite of passage, and it will make Oliver stronger.”
“Jesus, Mycroft, you’re really selling this, aren’t you? What the hell are those posh schools like, anyway?”
Mycroft sighed heavily.