Fic: Mise en Place (16/25)

Nov 06, 2013 05:34

Title: Mise en Place (16/25)
Fandom: Sherlock BBC
Relationship, Characters: Sherlock/John, just about everyone else
Warnings: None
Rating: R

Summary: John Watson had no intentions of taking over the family business, but when he returns from Afghanistan, battered and bruised, and discovers that his sister Harry has run their restaurant into the ground, he doesn't have much choice. There's only one thing that can save the Empire from closing for good - the celebrity star of the BBC series Restaurant Reconstructed, Chef Sherlock Holmes.

Prologue ~ One ~ Two ~ Three ~ Four ~ Five ~ Six ~ Seven ~ Eight ~ Nine ~ Ten ~ Eleven ~ Twelve ~ Thirteen ~ Fourteen ~ Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

I’m in the lobby, come down when you’re ready. GL

Where are you? GL

It’s a quarter past five, you better not be sleeping. GL

I’ve been banging on your door for ten minutes, get up already. GL

Bloody fuck, Sherlock, where are you? GL

I’m at John’s door. Answer the fucking bell. GL

John’s car is not here. Why is John’s car not here? GL

BLOODY FUCKERING FUCK, SHERLOCK. YOU’RE NOT AT THE EMPIRE, YOU’RE NOT AT BAKER STREET, YOU’RE NOT AT THE HOTEL. YOU BETTER BE DEAD. GL

Is fuckering even a word? SH

WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU? GL

Not dead. SH

YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO MEET WITH THE STUDIO HEADS IN TWENTY MINUTES. GL

SOD OFF, SHERLOCK. I’ll go into the meeting for you, I’ll be damned if I make any excuses for you this time. GL

*

Mary figured it out first.

“John’s not coming in today,” she said at ten, and Molly looked up from the dough she was kneading.

“Is he sick? Did he call?”

“No and no,” said Mary, and she pinched a bit of dough and popped it into her mouth. “But he said he’d be here an hour ago, and we already know that Sherlock’s gone missing. I bet you tomorrow’s tips that John’s gone off with him.”

“John?” repeated Harry, stricken. She stopped stirring the soup on the range for a moment, and then kept going as if nothing was wrong.

“Maybe Greg’s found them and is bringing them back,” suggested Molly, almost hopefully.

“Moll, are you mad? Maybe if we’re lucky, they’ve finally pulled their collective idiotic heads out of their arses and admitted they might actually care for each other, and they’re off shagging like bunnies as we speak.”

“Funny hearing that from you, seeing as how you dated John,” said Harry.

Mary shrugged and stole another pinch of dough. “I like to think of myself as open-minded. And anyway, you were just as eager to have John flirt with Sherlock as the rest of us a week ago. You can’t go changing your mind now.”

“Flirting is one thing,” said Harry. “Running off and leaving his responsibilities behind is another.”

“Lucky you’re here to hold down the fort,” said Mary, and she licked the last of the dough from her fingers. “I’m off for the deep freeze; if I find ravioli, can we have it for lunch?”

“Sure,” said Harry listlessly, and concentrated on the soup. When Mary found the ravioli, deep in the recesses of the freezer, she quickly offered to cook them upstairs, to keep out of the chaos in the kitchen.

It was less altruistic than the others supposed. Harry wanted a bit of quiet, a bit a space where no one was gleefully happy that John and Sherlock had run off into the night together. Mary and Molly seemed to think it was all some grand twist of a soap opera, EastEnders performed live in the Empire kitchen. Artie was keeping his mouth closed, though Harry thought he wasn’t quite so pleased, the way he didn’t join in the fun. He hadn’t been so anti-Sherlock early in the week - the punch to Sherlock’s nose, though certainly earned, had been the last thing anyone might have expected. Harry wondered what had changed Artie’s mind about Sherlock. She didn’t think it was jealousy. If anyone had the right to be jealous, it was Harry - and she knew herself well enough to know that jealous had nothing to do with how she felt about her brother and Sherlock Holmes.

She opened the door to the flat’s kitchen, and went straight to the cabinets to find a saucepan for the ravioli. She didn’t turn to the living room until it was on the hob and heating up, and saw Jim Moriarty sitting on her couch, idly reading her copy of The Sound and the Fury.

“Oh, hi,” said Jim casually. “What’s for lunch?”

“Get out,” said Harry, recovering from her shock.

“Mmm, no,” said Jim, without even bothering to pretend that he thought about it. “Frost-bitten ravioli? Yum. The anticipation amongst your staff must be overwhelming.”

“This is my flat, you can’t be here.”

“Matter of opinion.”

“Matter of fact.”

“Only if you think in chronological terms,” said Jim, and he tossed the book to the sofa. “I hear Johnny boy has fled the scene with his erstwhile lover.”

“Sod off,” snapped Harry, and went back into the kitchen to check on the water.

“Happy ending for everyone, isn’t it? Johnny comes marching home again, hurrah hurrah, finds love where he least expects it. The restaurant is a glaring success and John goes off into the sunset leaving you a successful business to run until you’re old and grey. Happy endings all around.”

Harry bit her lip and opened the refrigerator. A milk carton, half full, and a hunk of parm of indeterminate age, but at least not green and fuzzy. The hum echoed in the empty fridge, a bit of white noise that did absolutely nothing to give Harry any comfort at all.

“Anyway, just stopping by,” said Jim smoothly. Harry heard him walk across the floor towards the door. “I wanted to be the first to congratulate you on your unprecedented success. It’ll only be a matter of days now before you come in to pay off the rest of your loan, I’m sure. Of course, that’s all you really have left, isn’t it?”

Harry didn’t say anything. She didn’t dare.

“Love to Johnny and Sherlock,” sang Jim, and the door closed with a sturdy click.

Harry closed the refrigerator door, and leaned against the wall. The only thing to do was to breathe, she decided, and did just that for several long minutes, in and out. The flat was quiet again, just the sound of the range clicking away behind her, the hum of the fridge, and her own breathing. In and out.

“What the fuck was that?” asked Artie, and Harry stopped breathing for a moment. “No, I mean - no, wait, that’s exactly what I mean. What the bloody fuck, Harry? What was Jim Moriarty doing in your flat?”

Harry took a breath and turned to Artie. She couldn’t remember ever seeing him quite so angry before. Artie stood in the middle of the kitchen, the door leading downstairs wide open. His face was bright red, and his freckles stood out in spots on his nose.

“Artie,” began Harry, but that was apparently all Artie needed to unleash another round of fury on her.


I don’t believe this. First John goes off with that posh wanker and leaves us all high in the weeds, and then you have to go slumming around with Jim fucking Moriarty-”

“Wait - you know him?”

“Of course I know him!” shouted Artie. “Christ, Harry, I’ve only lived here my entire sodding life, you’d know him too if you paid attention. He’s been buying up failing businesses across Kent for the last five years and selling them off to the mass-market chain places. He’s the arsehole who turned the Janus into a sodding McDonalds.”

“I-” Harry stumbled to the kitchen table, and leaned over it, suddenly sick. “I didn’t know. I’ve been trying to keep the Empire afloat for six years.”

“Yeah, peachy keen job of that,” snapped Artie. “And you let that arse give you a loan?”

“I didn’t have a choice.”

“You always have a choice, Harry. You’re the sodding manager, you should have done something earlier-”

Harry had had enough. Bad enough to get the lecture from John, who actually had the right to shout at her. Worse to have had it from Sherlock, who at least had been called in to tell her what she’d already known. But to have it from Artie…

“What, Artie?” shouted Harry, turning on him. “What did you want me to do? Change the menu, change the wallpaper, put some fancy pop music on the stereo and stand outside offering free samples to the masses, set up a children’s menu and get Molly and Mary to wear ridiculous hats? Start offering the food at half price, drinks specials, quiz night, free snacks for the kiddies?”

“Yes!” shouted Artie. “You do what you have to do to keep the doors open!”

“You don’t get it, do you? This isn’t about keeping the Empire open, not at any cost! All weekend, all I’ve heard is how much John loves this restaurant, how much it means to him that something our grandfather built that changed the way people looked at food has managed to remain open for so long - and how much he wants to honor his memory by keeping it going. Don’t any of you realize, I want the same thing. I’ve always wanted the same thing! I don’t want to resort to ridiculous gimmicks and throw away everything that my grandfather worked for just to keep the doors open to a restaurant nobody actually wants!”

“Well, I’m sorry for not understanding that,” said Artie icily. “But you checked out of this entire thing at the beginning - you didn’t want to have a bloody thing to do with any of it.”

“Because it’s not the same!” shouted Harry. “What Sherlock’s doing - it’s not what James wanted. It’s not what my dad tried to keep up. That’s not the Empire downstairs - it’s some bastardized version of a pretentious cook trying to be all the things he can’t be.”

“Which is what? Successful? I think Sherlock Holmes is pretty good on the success front, Harry. He sure as hell knows what he’s talking about - we’ve had customers. What’s more important to you - some out-of-date memory of a menu, or people actually paying the bills?”

“What’s more important to you, Artie?” challenged Harry. “Tradition, or money in your pocket?”

Artie’s voice was cold. “Tradition doesn’t mean squat if no one takes it seriously. And no one’s taken the Empire seriously for years.”

Harry exhaled and turned away. “Funny. You hate him so much, but that’s exactly what Sherlock said to me the first night he was here. Bet you didn’t think you were so much alike.”

Artie didn’t say anything; Harry wrapped her arms around herself and hugged tightly. She closed her eyes, burning now with unshed tears, and tried to calm her rolling stomach and her pounding heart. “Just…go, Artie. Please. I know I’ve messed everything up. I don’t need you to remind me.”

Feet shuffling on the floor; Artie on his way out. Harry drew in a shaky breath, and heard the water bubbling furiously on the cooker.

“He’s going to take over the Empire, isn’t he?”

“We owe the bank six hundred thousand pounds,” said Harry dully. “So not exactly.”

Artie scoffed. “That’s what he does. He’ll buy it from the bank for a song. We’ll be slinging burgers in less than a month. How’s that sit for tradition?”

Harry didn’t answer. The door opened, and Harry heard Artie go back down the stairs. Numbly, she put the ravioli in the water, and counted down the minutes until they were cooked, floating on the surface of the water.

She half expected the mood in the kitchen on her return to be sober, accusatory, quiet. But instead, Mary and Molly were laughing together, coming up with the most ridiculous and outlandish descriptions for the various new dishes that they could imagine. Artie dutifully wrote each one down as they imagined them. The music was turned up, but not quite enough to cover the hammers and the peculiar whine from a saw in the dining room, and Harry wondered how life had managed to continue as if the restaurant would always exist, when surely they all knew that the end was near.

“Oh, good,” said Mary, springing to her feet when she saw Harry approach with the bowl of ravioli. “I’m starving. Was it cheese or meat?”

“Should I be the least bit concerned that none of us actually remember what was in it before it was frozen?”

“That’s because none of us remember when it was frozen,” said Molly.

“How old is it?” asked Artie, dubiously.

“Dinosaurs made it, I think,” said Molly.

“And Anderson took the day off,” said Artie mildly. “Well, let’s eat. What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, and all that rot.”

Harry glanced at Artie, but he wasn’t looking at her. She didn’t think he meant it kindly - but perhaps he wasn’t thinking about it at all.

*

Sherlock found John in the kitchen, rooting through the tea selection in the cupboard.

“John, I-”

“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that your brother doesn’t actually own any regular black tea,” said John. “Seeing as how he’s a poncy git.”

Sherlock couldn’t argue with that. “I wanted to take you to lunch.”

“Bit early for lunch.”

John hadn’t turned to look at him. He was still rifling through the packets of tea, the little jars of loose-leaf, all carefully labeled in Mycroft’s spectacularly neat handwriting with type and date purchased. Sherlock could just see John’s face in a quarter-profile, and even with that small sliver, he could tell that John was concentrating far harder than was truly necessary for the selection of tea.

He wondered what it meant that seeing John like this, cut off and separated, made him feel so stupid and queasy.

“We can pick up some black tea beforehand,” said Sherlock. “PG Tips, is that right? There’s a newsagent near the restaurant. I’m sure they’d have some. Or they’d know somewhere that does. There’s a Waitrose a bit further away, I’m sure they have a respectable selection of tea available.”

John’s mouth quirked. “Not a frequent customer at the local groceries, are you?”

“I don’t come here so often anymore,” admitted Sherlock, and John laughed as he put the tea away again.

“I don’t need tea,” said John, and he turned - finally - and leaned against the counter. “Sherlock-”

Tension in his shoulders, fingers flexing in and out, a guarded look in his eyes, the pause after he said his name. John wasn’t just afraid of the answer - he was afraid of the question, of the reaction it would create, and Sherlock, seeing John afraid, became afraid of it, too.

He took a step forward and wrapped John up in his arms and kissed him, pressed their lips together, and was grateful when John clung to his shirt and returned the favor. Sherlock thought he could taste the relief in John’s mouth, that the question would remain unasked, and he wondered what it was, what Mycroft could have stirred up to ruin him now.

“Hey,” said John, reaching up to brush one of Sherlock’s curls out of his face.

“Are you hungry?” asked Sherlock.

“No.”

“Good.” Sherlock kissed him again, softer this time, and took John’s hands to pull him away from the counter, out of the kitchen, down the hall, up the stairs, small kisses and touches to ease the way and keep John focused on him, and not whatever had been worrying him before. Sherlock didn’t even give John a chance to look around the little bedroom at the top of the stairs; he pulled off John’s shirt and dropped it to the floor. He shoved down John’s trousers and pants and pushed him back to the bed so that he could pull them off his legs, along with his shoes and socks. Everything was dropped with a thud, and Sherlock stood back up to see John watching him with a glazed look in his eyes.

“You’re beautiful, you know,” said John quietly, and Sherlock, who had heard this all his life, been both grateful and ashamed of it in turns, was suddenly embarrassed. He quickly started to pull his shirt over his head - half to hide the blush from John, and half to just get naked faster than buttons might allow otherwise - and immediately became trapped, unable to pull his arms out of the tight cuffs, or the collar over his head.

John laughed, but it wasn’t cruel or mocking, and Sherlock felt his embarrassment ease into something a little more gentle, even though the heat in his cheeks grew more pronounced. He wanted to see John, watch the skin around his eyes crinkle with mirth, the smile widen into his cheeks. Sherlock struggled even harder, and only succeeded in choking himself.

“Stop,” said John, giggling, and Sherlock felt John’s hands between his skin and the fabric, carefully working to undo the offending buttons from the wrong side. As soon as Sherlock felt the button give way, he pulled the shirt over his head, and could only watch helplessly as John worked at the sleeves. John was still smiling, and when Sherlock’s hands were finally free of the fabric, he put them on either side of John’s face, framing the joy he saw there.

“John.”

He might have kept going, but John broke the eye contact, kissed Sherlock’s chest and then worked his way up his breastbone until he’d reached the little hollow at the base of Sherlock’s throat. Sherlock’s breath caught; he gripped John’s shoulders and held tightly, and when John started to work his way back down, wasn’t entirely sure if John went of his own volition or if he’d pushed him to it.

He didn’t know, and the way John was kissing him didn’t seem to indicate that he minded either way. When John reached his cock, and kissed the base of it, Sherlock exhaled his breath in one long stream. John rested back on his heels and looked up at Sherlock, who thought he’d never seen a more arousing sight.

“I want to fuck you,” said John, low. “I want to throw you back on this bed and make you scream my name. I want to fuck you so hard you can’t even think about standing for a couple of hours, and by the time you do start thinking about it, I want to fuck you again, and I’m just going to keep doing that, until it’s midnight and we’re still here, you under me.”

“Christ,” said Sherlock, and his legs wobbled. John held Sherlock by the hipbones, and steered him around to sit on the bed. “Christ, John.”

“We’ll miss lunch,” added John, with a bit of a cheeky grin, and Sherlock grabbed John by the shoulders and tried to haul him up onto the bed with him.

“Fuck lunch,” said Sherlock.

John laughed and kissed him, one deep and quick and possessing kiss, and then pushed away so that Sherlock could scoot himself up on the bed.

“Shite,” said John suddenly. “I didn’t think - even if you had stored lube and condoms here, they’d be twenty years old, wouldn’t they?”

For a moment, Sherlock forgot he was meant to be a genius. “Buggering hell.”

John began to laugh again, and fell on his back next to Sherlock. “Well put.”

“I didn’t plan this very well,” admitted Sherlock.

“Sometimes I wonder how much you plan anything at all,” said John wryly, and he rolled over and rested his hand on Sherlock’s cock, already hard and aching. Sherlock closed his eyes.

“Shite.”

John pressed his lips to Sherlock’s clavicle. “Christ, I love it when you curse.”

“Bloody pissing - ah, John - sodding wanking - oh, Christ - bugger blimey blooming - I, ah…” Sherlock sucked in a breath as John’s hand began working faster on his cock; his eyes closed and he reached out with his hand blindly, landing somewhere on John’s body (shoulder, the bad one, high in the air to keep his weight off it). Sherlock tugged, and John half fell on him, his mouth covering Sherlock’s in a frantic, eager, sloppy kiss.

He came, hard, and John instantly pulled back from the kiss - not away, but enough that he was able to redirect the intenseness into something softer, and when Sherlock floated back to himself, John was still pressed next to him, both hands around his face now, kissing him gently on the lips.

“Sherlock,” whispered John. “Hey. Hey. Hi.”

Sherlock pulled John over, until the other man was lying on top of him, John’s hard cock pressed solidly against Sherlock’s softening one.

“Not fair,” murmured Sherlock.

“Well,” said John. “We’re going out to lunch, you said. And I’m willing to bet the newsagent stocks more than just tea.”

Sherlock chuckled, and pressed into the next kiss John gave him - less to kiss him than to assess.

John was quiet with his kisses, lazy and willing, relaxed and comfortable. There was none of the tension, none of the hesitation, nothing left of the John who’d stood in the kitchen, ready to ask a question that didn’t want answering.

Sherlock wondered what John had not wanted to know but was ready to ask anyway.

It would have had to be something horrible, something that might potentially end them in a way that the conclusion of filming would not.

Something Mycroft would have known about, at least in part.

Sherlock thought he might know already. If he were a smart man, he’d tell John immediately, make sure John knew absolutely everything, lay the cards on the table and see what happened. And wouldn’t it be better to end it now, a clean break, before either of them were hurt too badly?

All Sherlock had to do was ask.

Instead, he kissed John, and let John kiss him back. They smiled in between kisses, and worked their way under the blankets, wrapped themselves in each other’s arms, and only eventually remembered lunch again at all.

*

The restaurant was busy, even though they arrived rather late for lunch. John had gone in to put their names down, and when he returned to Sherlock, waiting on the pavement, he reported a half-hour wait for a table.

“Hmm,” said Sherlock, glancing inside. “I’m sure I could shorten that substantially…”

“No,” said John firmly. “You don’t get to abuse fame by screwing over the people who actually got here on time. And anyway, we can buy the tea while we wait.”

“Only tea?” asked Sherlock, and watched as John tried not to blush.

“Wait here,” said John, and walked quickly away. Sherlock wondered what John was thinking, wanting to do the shopping alone, but then, if Sherlock was recognizable enough that he could skip the queue when having lunch merely by showing his face, who knew what buying condoms in the local Boots with another man would actually do.

Tabloid fodder, no doubt. Not that Sherlock cared over-much, but he supposed John might. Lunch was one thing - lunch could be two friends having a chat, or even Sherlock showing John what a well-run restaurant was supposed to look like. Nothing untoward about it.

Condoms, on the other hand. And lube. Not much room for interpretation there.

Sherlock watched John disappear into the corner store, and then turned sharply and went into the restaurant. By the time John appeared again, he was sitting quite happily at a table, near enough to a window but not immediately at it. Pedestrians wouldn’t be able to see him unless they were looking very closely, but everyone in the restaurant was perfectly aware of his presence.

One other customer in particular, at the table closest to him, who could not take her eyes off him. Sherlock was half surprised she didn’t abandon her dining companions and offer to sit across from him, but he had made a show of telling the waitress that he was expecting company, mostly to fend her off. It worked - she didn’t advance, but she didn’t stop watching him, either. At least she didn’t pull out a mobile and snap a photo - although Sherlock half hoped she would, so that he could then be justifiably angry and annoyed and cut her into pieces in front of the dining room.

Which was probably why she didn’t, come to that. One thing about his fans, they weren’t stupid.

“Tosspot,” said John as he took off his coat and draped it over the back of his chair. “You really couldn’t wait fifteen minutes?”

“No,” said Sherlock. “How long does it take to buy tea anyway, John?”

“You’d be surprised,” said John wryly, and sat down opposite him. “Is this going to be one of those meals where I don’t need to open a menu?”

“You can if you like,” said Sherlock airily. “But I’ve already ordered our starters, and I have plans for the rest. You were taking so long, I thought you might have had to fly to India for the tea yourself.”

John rolled his eyes and chuckled. “Fine.” He rested his hand on the table, almost as if he’d wanted to reach across and take Sherlock’s hand, but was aware that everyone in the restaurant was watching them. Instead, he started to flip the cutlery in circles, letting it thump back on the table. “So.”

“Did you buy them?”

John glanced up. “Buy what?”

“The…not tea.”

John swallowed. “Oh. Yes. They’re in my pocket.”

Sherlock nodded. “Ah. All right.”

Silence fell over the table again.

“So,” said John, clearly trying to decide how he was going to say it. He wasn’t tense, Sherlock noted, but he was still turning the fork over and over, so he was clearly nervous. “Um. We’re going to…use them?”

“That would be the point of purchasing them,” said Sherlock.

John glanced to either side, still entirely too aware of the audience. More precisely, Sherlock’s Number One Fan, still paying far too much attention to the both of them, to the point that she’d dropped her napkin twice purely for the fun of leaning over to pick it up, which brought her that much closer to actually hearing what they said.

Sherlock decided he’d had enough of pretending to ignore her. When the girl dropped her napkin a third time, he leaned over so that his head was nearly next to hers.

“To answer your question,” he said smoothly, and watched her eyes widen in shock. “Soufflé dishes. We are discussing soufflé dishes. And no, your dining companion doesn’t think you’re the least bit attractive. I think you’re very nearly done with your lunch, aren’t you?”

The girl sat straight up, dropped her napkin next to her plate, and didn’t turn around again.

John didn’t say a word; he sat, subdued and thoughtful, until the waitress had brought them their bruschetta and tapenade. By then, the girl and her date had paid for their meals and left, rather quickly.

“Is this what life is like for you? Strangers trying to listen in on your conversations, asking for autographs and photos and all that?”

Sherlock tried to read him. It was surprisingly difficult: all he could tell was that John appeared to be considering things, very very carefully.

“It’s easier in London, if you can believe it,” said Sherlock. He put some of the food on John’s plate. “Celebrities or near-celebrities are a dime a dozen, and there’s an unspoken rule to ignore them. It’s only the tourists who can be rather rude, or when I try to go somewhere where I’m unexpected.”

“I can’t imagine. It must be miserable.”

Sherlock paused. “I never thought about it. It simply is.”

“But you have a house nearby. And you knew about this restaurant. I’d think you must come here often enough that you’re not remarkable anymore.”

“Not really,” said Sherlock. He paused. “What I’ve found with celebrity is that complete strangers end up knowing your name, your face, and maybe a little bit about your private life, which then gives them license to pretend as though they know you. And perhaps in a way, they do. They know the Sherlock Holmes who they see on television.”

“But that’s not you,” said John, shaking his head. “I’m not saying it’s an act - but you can’t tell me that half the people in this restaurant aren’t hoping that you’re going to go off on the chef about a misplaced basil leaf.”

Sherlock raised an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t I?”

“No,” said John.

“You sound very sure.”

“I am.”

“Why?”

“I…don’t know,” said John, almost surprised. “But I know you didn’t terrorize anyone to get this seat. You might have manipulated the hostess just by appearing and giving your name, but she didn’t look the least bit cowed when I came in, just very excited and anxious to please, so I don’t think you gave her a show of your dazzling wit and ability to deduce what she’d had for breakfast this morning.”

“Toast with butter,” said Sherlock. “There’s a very small grease stain on her shirt sleeve.”

“You see,” said John. “And she doesn’t look the least bit mortified. You could have swept right in here, done your act, and been given the best seat in the house - and then the entire staff would be tiptoeing around you for fear of incurring your wrath. But you didn’t. And they’re all calm and cool and probably giving better service all around than they’ve given in the last two weeks.”

Sherlock glanced at the servers scattered around the restaurant, and saw that John was right. They were watching him, to be sure, but they were moving between the other tables, constantly filling water glasses and checking on patrons and clearing away plates with an attentiveness that bordered on annoying.

He wondered, briefly, if John perhaps wasn’t better suited to managing than he had thought.

“Eat.”

John took a bite of the bruschetta. Sherlock watched him chew, the way he was clearly thinking about the ingredients and flavors and composition. He could easily imagine the cool softness of the tomatoes, a bit flavorless for being out of season, but compensated by the sharp garlic and the bite of pepper. The chunks of basil, giving it a fresh, clean sort of flavor, and the crunch of the toast with only the barest drizzle of olive oil to soften it. John swallowed with a bit of a smile, and it matched the smile he’d worn earlier that day, curled up in Sherlock’s bedroom, naked and pliant and covered in sex.

Sherlock swallowed, and was very glad that both his fan had disappeared, and that his napkin was on his lap.

“Aren’t you going to have some?” asked John.

“Not hungry,” Sherlock managed to say, his voice a bit high, but only barely so. He rested his chin on his hand, the better to cover his mouth so he could bite his lips in peace.

John, damn him for a bloody provocateur, took another bite of the bruschetta. He kept his eyes locked on Sherlock and chewed slowly, as if he was relishing the flavors released with every bite. His chest rose and fell as his jaw worked up and down, and Sherlock couldn’t take his eyes away from him. When John finally swallowed, his chest rising and falling with the motion, he let out a contented sigh, and Sherlock had to blink himself awake again.

“You,” he started to say, and then couldn’t think of a single word that adequately described his opinion of John in that moment.

John took another bite of the bruschetta, and leaned back in his chair. He looked very smug, and Sherlock let out a long hiss of breath, anticipating another show. John pretended not to notice.

John finished the toast, and then sat forward again. “So,” he said, his tone perfectly even and calm again. Sherlock, on the other hand, was still half hard under the napkin. “Have you ever…made soufflés before?”

“That depends on your definition of soufflés,” said Sherlock carefully. “I’ve made…types of soufflés.”

“All right,” said John. “Let’s say the type of soufflé we were discussing this morning.”

Sherlock resisted the urge to drop his hand onto his lap. “The reverse, if one wishes to be precise.”

John nodded thoughtfully, and took up one of the dry bits of toast surrounding the tapenade. He scooped up the olives and popped it into his mouth, chewing. Sherlock couldn’t take his eyes off him.

John swallowed. “Damn. I was hoping for…well, that one of us had made that particular recipe before. Eggs being tricky and all.”

“I’ve made soufflés,” said Sherlock. “But I made them in the role you were proposing for yourself. With…ah…the same ingredients we had this morning.”

John leaned back in his chair and covered his face with his hand as he burst into barely repressed laughter. “Oh, Christ. I can’t take much more of this conversation.”

“It’s a bit painful, yes.”

“The conversation, you mean.”

Sherlock kicked him under the table, and John giggled again. “Luckily for you, I know a few things about eggs and how to handle them properly, without causing much distress for anyone’s soufflés. And we should probably table the discussion before we have dessert.”

“Oh God,” said John, his eyes widening. “You ordered soufflés, didn’t you?”

Sherlock smiled, and leaned forward.

“Tell me,” he said, his voice low and sultry, and he was pleased to see John inch a bit closer in his chair. “What do you think they put in the tapenade?”

John stared at him, and then started to laugh again. Sherlock smiled, and just enjoyed the sound of it, before joining in.

*

They ended up closing the restaurant, more because they couldn’t stop talking than anything else.

The chef came out to say hello, clearly nervous and dreading the intrusion, but Sherlock was perfectly pleasant to him, and when he mentioned the excess garlic in the tapenade and the lack of oregano in the chicken parm, he did so in such a way that the chef nodded enthusiastically, thrilled to have received any criticism at all. By then, there were only a few other people in the dining room, but Sherlock was well aware of John watching him, and he knew he didn’t need to show off anymore. Not with certain supplies in John’s pocket, anyway.

The upshot of all this, however, was that it was nearly four in the afternoon by the time they returned to the little cottage, and Sherlock could already feel his mobile in his pocket, distractingly silent since the flurry of texts from Lestrade that morning.

“You want to go back,” said John quietly, while they were still in the car, staring at the path leading toward the cottage.

“Not exactly,” said Sherlock. “But…”

John nodded. “No, I understand. It’s all right. It was a stolen day, we should be glad for what we got.”

He sounded a bit resigned, with a touch of bitter. Sherlock turned to look at him; John sat, facing forward, his hands resting open on his knees. Sherlock tried to think of what to say to make him smile again.

“I…I still want to make the soufflés.”

It worked, almost. John’s smile was fleeting, and he turned to face him. “Plenty of eggs in my kitchen.”

“I don’t even want to think about what that’s supposed to mean out of context,” said Sherlock, and he started the car again. John chuckled and sat back, relaxed again. Sherlock wondered how he could be so calm about any of this. He himself was trying not to picture John naked for any reason whatsoever, because the seat belt was in a prime place to promote chafing.

“Will you need to check in with anyone?”

“Yes,” said Sherlock, thinking of Lestrade. He had to have returned from London by now, and was probably pacing up a storm at the hotel. Of course, it was entirely possible that Lestrade was sitting on the highway leading back into Upper Brickely with a cricket bat, waiting to bash Sherlock’s head in.

“I should stop in and see Harry,” mused John. “Make sure everyone at the restaurant is all right.”

“No peeking,” Sherlock warned him.

“No,” said John. He grinned, but it was a bit forced. “Have to keep my surprise for the big reveal tomorrow morning, don’t I?”

Sherlock didn’t answer. He wanted to reach over and touch John’s shoulder, his neck, his cheek, his hair, but instead he started to drive back down the gravel path and toward the highway.

They didn’t talk; the gravel was noisy, and John didn’t seem to be interested anyway. Sherlock thought about the instructions he’d left for Sally and the rest of the renovation crew; he wondered, not for the first time, what John would think about the changes in the dining room, the way he’d already taken the changes so far with a resigned air. But there was a difference between a menu and a room; a menu was changeable out of necessity, based on the seasons and the supply, the moods of a public who were always looking for the next best thing. And even John had admitted, in his own way, that perhaps the menu needed refreshing.

The dining room was another thing altogether.

“It’ll be all right,” said John once they reached the main road and talking became easier again.

“I know it will be,” said Sherlock, and they were quiet for the rest of the ride.

Chapter Seventeen

fanfiction, sherlock

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