Fiction: Ruby 18
Ruby 18
Title: Ruby 18
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: John/Sherlock
Warnings: None
Word Count: Part II: 1,958 , Total: 4,218
Summary: A Valentine's Day fiction. Johnlock. John's got a girlfriend. Sherlock has a Valentine's Day gift for John. There's awkwardness and tea. The usual.
PART II
Sherlock awoke from a deep and dreamless sleep. He kept his eyes closed and listened to the traffic buzzing about outside. It was around 6:30AM, based on the level of commotion, and still dark. But no, it wasn't dark, at least not as dark as it should be.
Sherlock opened his eyes just a crack, just enough to register the thin wedge of light that stretched and broadened as it crossed the floor and wall of his bedroom. Not just light, but a shadow too. The shadow of a man; John. He was standing in the threshold, so quiet and still that he could have been a statue. The sight was so unexpected, so odd that Sherlock pinched himself to be sure he wasn't dreaming, even though that practice, for him, was highly unreliable-he'd had dreams of pain that were quite realistic. But he'd never dreamed of an odor before, and at that moment he was enjoying the unmistakable scent of tea.
"How was it?" Sherlock asked, not even bothering to fully open his eyes.
John startled.
"Oh, god. I didn't mean to wake you. I was just… I couldn't sleep and I… I'll talk to you in the morning."
The wedge of light began to shrink.
"No! Stay and talk to me. It is the morning. I wasn't sleeping anyway. Stay and tell me about it."
"You really want to hear?"
John let out a small dry laugh and scrubbed his face with his hand.
"It was awful, Sherlock, a nightmare. I mean, it started out OK. She liked my flowers and seemed to be in a great mood. But as we got talking… Christ. Turns out Celia had a timetable, for us I mean. A very detailed and very scary timetable. It started with our visiting her parents next week, which was fine; they're nice people. But she had the whole next year planned. Calendar completely filled. Dinner parties to throw, concerts to attend, a dog to adopt. Can you believe that? She actually said that at our six-month relationship mark, we should adopt a dog together. Of course I explained that, maybe, we shouldn't rush things, get ahead of ourselves. A dog…that's big deal, and you and I can be gone working a case for weeks at a time! Well, having met Celia, you can guess how that went over and… Oh, no. You were sleeping, weren't you? And you probably knew all this the moment I walked in the door. Shit. I'm sorry, Sherlock. Don't know what's wrong with me. I'll go and let you…"
Sherlock propped his head up on an elbow. With his eyes fully open he could now see the mug in John's hand. The smell of tea was getting stronger. It was not John's regular brew.
"I did not know about the dog, but, yes, I had deduced the rest, more or less. Not important. I was asking about the tea, John. How was it?"
"Oh…you were?"
John got quiet. Sherlock could feel his gaze upon him even if he couldn't quite see it, not with the shadow.
"Yes. I can smell it. You're holding a cup of it now. It has a sharp wintergreen component that makes it easy to distinguish from the pricy first flush Taiwanese variety you've been drinking all week."
"You can smell it?"
"I can almost taste it."
Sherlock lay still listening to John's breaths, long deep pulls that were forcing air across his tongue and pallet, up through his sinuses and finally down deep into his lungs. Some of those same aromatic molecules were invading Sherlock's own respiratory system, separate notes of sweet and floral mixing with mint and an underlying scent of rich, malty tea. And John. Sherlock thought he could detect the faintest whiff of John's shower gel, but he couldn't be sure. He wanted John closer. He wanted to sample him.
John cleared his throat.
"It's very nice, Sherlock. A wonderful gift. Thank you."
Sherlock gave a curious hum.
"Why are you here, John? You couldn't sleep, you made the tea, and now you're here. Why?"
John's breath, deep pulls.
"OK. I'll try to explain." John paused to collect his thoughts. "Mrs. Gupta, you know, the woman with the tea shop? Well she's always saying…"
Ah, Mrs. Gupta. Sherlock didn't need to hear the rest. Everything was now very clear, and he was tired of being patient.
"Wait, John. This is no good. You look tired, and I've no desire to move. Come and sit."
John hesitated. Sherlock gave an exasperated please, shuffling back and bossily patting the empty spot on bed.
John was very careful not to encroach upon Sherlock too much when he sat. Up close he looked tired. As usual he was wearing only a tee-shirt and pajama bottoms despite the chill. Even though John had showered three hours earlier, Sherlock was still able to smell him, the subtle but rich human base note beneath the stronger overtones of shower gel and tea. Oh, how wonderful that tea smelled, and the combination of all the aromas was positively heady.
"Before you go on, John, you should know that I'm well aware of Mrs. Gupta's unusual ability, her absolute mastery of the power of suggestion. I've felt its effects myself."
John's eyebrow's rose in surprise.
"You? I would have thought you were immune to that sort of thing."
"I am, usually. But Mrs. Gupta wasn't using her Svengali charms to sell snake oil or to run a con, John. She was using them to sell an experiment."
"Ah, an experiment," John grinned. "But wait, I'm lost. What experiment, exactly?"
"May I?"
Sherlock took John's mug and tipped the last drops of tea, now cold, into his mouth.
"Mmm. That is good. Unusual. Now I need a sample for comparison. With your permission?"
Sherlock circled John's wrist with his hand. He felt John's arm give a small jump of surprise.
"Sherlock, what are you doing? Just so you know, I'm not going to allow you to bite me."
Sherlock scoffed.
"Don't be ridiculous. If I bite you, you may bleed, and I am supremely confident that your blood does not, even remotely, taste like Ruby 18."
"Ruby 18?"
"The tea, John. Do try and keep up. Now, where was I?"
John's arm came willingly. Sherlock examined its bare length before bringing the tip of his tongue to John's wrist. He began to lick the same spot over and over with small swipes, all the while breathing deeply. Once satisfied he moved on to new territory, sampling John's palm, the spaces between his fingers, and the crease of his elbow. Sherlock's vocal chords became involved, so that each exhale ended in low, rumbling sigh of satisfaction.
John didn't taste like tea after all. (Sherlock had known all along that he wouldn't.) But the slight yield of flesh, the smoothness beneath his tongue, the delicate earthiness of male scent, and the warmth, together, were very appealing and not unlike the complex pleasure found in a fine cup of tea. That must have been what Mrs. Gupta had been trying to say in her strange, roundabout manner. Sherlock let himself get lost in his lapping and tasting and breathing until he heard John clear his throat.
"Well?"
John sounded breathless, and his eyes looked impossibly dark. Was that due to the dimness of the room, or was it because of something else? Sherlock had to know. He let go of John's arm and took John's head between both his hands. Slowly he closed the distance between them until they were mere inches apart. He peered into John's wide eyes, searching for an answer.
"Christ," John murmured. Then, "My turn."
John was on Sherlock's mouth in a flash. Sherlock found it very, very hard to let this be John's turn, but he managed it. Good thing too, because it soon became obvious that John was quite experienced and proficient in this area, far more so than Sherlock. His lips and tongue were very convincing, and he effortlessly guided Sherlock into positioning his own so as to give John access to all the areas he wanted to stroke and taste. The tea flavor was still lingering about, and Sherlock was just wishing he had more when John's tongue touched a group of nerves on the top of Sherlock's mouth, instantly wiping from his mind all but the here and now that lay between them.
When John finally pulled away, he looked ecstatic. Sherlock, after he caught his breath, began to chuckle.
"Marvelous, John. Marvelous! Now, tell me about your results."
"What? My results? What?"
"The results of your experiment, of course," Sherlock explained, patiently.
John just sat there looked absolutely baffled. Maybe that was because he was tired. Sherlock would have to prompt him.
"Mrs. Gupta said that when you drink tea, it reminds you of the sensations you experience when tasting me, and you came to me tonight for confirmation. She's been telling you this for months, but you never came before because you never believed her. She's a nice old lady, but tea's just tea, right? But tonight Ruby 18 changed your mind. It's wonderful. It's ambrosia, and something about it reminded you of me. The complexity? The shocking color? The way the mint gets up your nose?"
John looked surprised, then amused.
"You gave me a gift, Sherlock, on Valentine's Day. A wonderful and thoughtful gift. A little thing like that, well, let's just say it can change the way a person sees things. It changed how I see us. That's why I came tonight. To be honest, I wasn't quite sure what I wanted or what would happen, but I'm glad I came. Very glad."
"Oh."
Sherlock now started to wonder if maybe neither of them had been experimenting that morning. What hypothesis had he been testing anyway? That John tasted like tea? That didn't sound reasonable. It sounded more like an excuse to see what John tasted like, just for the pleasure of doing it. Maybe he had simply wanted to enjoy John in this new way. Or maybe it had been open-ended experiment, an exploration. Yes, that idea very much appealed to Sherlock. It meant that the experiment wasn't over, and they could continue it for as long as they wished. And really, when had Sherlock not enjoyed experimenting on John? The problem was that he, himself, was right in the thick of this one, his brain nearly offline, far from objective. So, not an experiment. Just John, warm and undiluted and very personal. Sherlock found that he didn't mind, not one iota.
"I know tea's just tea, Sherlock. I do understand metaphors." John smiled at his jibe at Sherlock's weakness. "And I also know what I like. I have a very discerning pallet, I'll have you know."
Sherlock rolled his eyes remembering John's string of awful girlfriends. John ignored him and continued.
"And if I ever get stuck, it's nice to have an expert around like Mrs. Gupta to give me a recommendation."
"Well, even I must admit she's an expert when it comes to her customers."
Sherlock thought about all Mrs. Gupta and her small box of tea had been able to achieve. It was just possible that now Sherlock owed her a favor.
Sherlock placed a small, tasting kiss to the base of John's neck before pronouncing, "As good as you taste alone, I'm betting you'll taste even better with tea. Wait here while I brew some. Don't mind if I sample your gift, do you? I'll be needing at least two cups. So much uncharted area, you know."
"Sounds good. Wake me when you get back," yawned John. Sherlock promised he would.
-fin-