Merry Christmas or something
Title: Sherlock's Mistletoe Encounter
Pairing: Sherlock/Lestrade
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: I don't own the show or the character
Word Count: 2527
Beta: None except by me 10 times (A/N for explanation)
Author's Notes: I didn't use a beta because by the time I got this "finished" (story all written out), it was the 23rd/24th, and I didn't want to bother anybody to do it on Christmas Eve. I've looked it over myself several times and have made my own corrections, but if you see any mistakes, please make comments.
I fixed the story as much as I could and so this is supposedly a final draft but if mistakes are found after posting, I may clean it up and repost if it comes to that.
Summary: Sherlock finds himself wishing he had made John take the mistletoe down from the door frame after he is caught underneath is with Detective Inspector Lestrade.
-
Earlier that morning, Sherlock watched John hang some mistletoe on the door frame leading to the kitchen for the Christmas party they were throwing later that evening (well, the party John was throwing.) He made a brief comment about how silly it was for John to buy into such a ridiculous tradition. John simply smirked, as Sherlock had been criticizing all of the decorations anyway, and continued decorating through Sherlock’s commentary.
Now Sherlock, standing under it with Lestrade while several eyes were on them, was cursing himself for not making a bigger fuss about the mistletoe.
Sherlock tried to remember the events leading up to this moment, but his mind was taking longer than usual to piece everything together, and that was never a good sign. Sherlock had the vague memory of doing John a favor (grabbing something off a shelf much too high for the army doctor), and that the favor was the only reason he would have gone into the kitchen, considering that he certainly would not go in there to eat any of the food on the (thankfully cleaned) table, and he promised John he would stay out of his room for the entire night.
When he’d finished the task, he turned to leave and had started to exit the kitchen, but bumped into Lestrade who appeared from behind the door frame. Quickly recovering, the older man apologized to Sherlock, and Sherlock, in turn, nodded as an acceptance of the apology. They began to part when some of the party goers noticed where the two were standing what they were standing under, and found it necessary to loudly point it out to the entire flat, thus garnering more attention to them, and the object above them.
So now here was Sherlock being stared at, mostly by some Yarders he knew (but was not fond of) and some acquaintances of John’s from work that he didn’t know (and had no desire to know), with the knowledge that they had a certain expectation for him at the moment. However, Sherlock was more concerned with Lestrade, who was currently mentioning having some subordinates fired if they didn’t drop the matter, but the smile on his face gave away that he wasn’t serious. Even John got involved, yelling out something that wasn’t about those people leaving Sherlock and Lestrade alone.
Sherlock was faced with a problem.
If it was just the fact that he didn’t want to give in to the silly custom, then he would have easily rejected Lestrade. He could have just said “No thanks”, walked away, and moved on. He’d seem cold, but when had he ever cared about what people thought of him?
The problem was...
Sherlock found himself wanting to kiss Lestrade.
Well, “found himself wanting to” was not really the correct phrase. Better put, Sherlock was being forced to recognize that he wanted to kiss the man, and with that recognition, found that turning the man down out of self-preservation was quickly becoming a less viable option. In addition to that, after everyone had seen them standing there and started encouraging them, Sherlock knew that outright refusal would not be tolerated by the crowd anyway. Additionally, he knew he couldn’t confidently sell not wanting the kiss at all.
Sherlock knew they wanted to see him kiss someone simply as a joke. The concept of it was funny to them: the great untouchable Sherlock kissing someone he must consider beneath him, especially as part of a Christmas tradition, was an appealing idea to the party goers who knew him. John’s friends who were watching were just caught up in the moment. Lestrade was just the unlucky person who had the bite the bullet.
As he was analyzing the situation, trying to figure his way out of this, his thought process was cut off.
“Let’s make it a quick one, alright Sherlock?” Lestrade suddenly said with a bit of a smirk. Sherlock just gazed at him. “It’s all for fun, right? Won’t matter later.”
Sherlock would have been proud at how well he kept up his appearance of indifference if it wasn’t for the fact that he was distracted by how upset he was. The words hit Sherlock harder than he would have liked them to (though he would have liked it if they didn’t hurt at all, or were never spoken for that matter).
Sherlock found himself becoming a bit distressed. He hadn’t been saying anything at all. He tried to imagine what he looked like, just standing there silently, his eyes darting around the room. This all should have been far more easier than it had become. He could either refuse Lestrade, or accept the kiss and move on. Oh, but those damn emotions of his.
For all the years that Sherlock had known Lestrade, he worked very hard to suppress these... feelings, because he knew that if he let them progress, they would get in the way of his work, which happened to involve the DI. Besides, he had always considered himself above such feelings and prided himself on that fact. In an attempt to suppress these growing affections, Sherlock attempted to treat the DI as harshly as he would anybody else to prove to himself Lestrade was no different from them, except Sherlock realized that he would still be unintentionally slightly nicer to him than to the other Yarders. However, he quickly attributed that to the fact that the DI gave him cases to solve and he didn’t want to ruin that. Still, no matter what the consulting detective was doing to suppress those emotions, he still knew that it meant acknowledging that they were there at all. He knew that as much as he could attempt to deny that he felt something affectionate for Lestrade, he had to eventually accept that doing so had become impossible. Sherlock tried to figure out how to deal with these new infuriating feelings, especially since he was supposed to be clean. Eventually, he decided he could allow himself to indulge in Lestrade. For Sherlock, that meant he would just watch the older man from afar and observe his movements and gestures and facial expressions and physical attributes, and try to deduce something from that and figure out things about the DI, perhaps what he did earlier that day or where he had just come from. Sherlock found that it worked for him.
So here was Sherlock, facing the DI, being expected to kiss him just as a joke, and not knowing how to proceed. Only 30 seconds had passed since they were “discovered”, but Sherlock found that his grasp of time at the moment was distorted. He could have been standing here for days, but he wouldn’t have noticed.
His eye caught John behind the DI, simply grinning at him. Sherlock suddenly found himself blaming John for all of this and the inevitable fallout with Lestrade. John was the one who hung up the mistletoe, and the one who made Sherlock go into the kitchen. John was not doing anything to stop this, he was actually encouraging it. John didn’t know what he had done. John didn’t know what he had ruined. Sherlock was fine before all of this. He was fine not having Lestrade. He was fine simply looking at him and knowing what he did about him through deduction instead finding out from the man himself. It would all be ruined because he would get one kiss (and not even out of attraction, but because of a stupid Christmas custom) and he would (finally) know what it was like, and he knew he would want more, but there wouldn’t be any more, and it was all because John spoiled it.
Sherlock started to feel what he identified as defeat before it quickly turned into anger over the entire situation. Rather than take it out on people as he usually did, he used it to muster up the energy to go through with this kiss.
Sherlock then figured that if he couldn’t reject Lestrade, he could try to act reluctant, which wouldn’t be too much of a stretch at the moment.
“Well, Lestrade, if you have no qualms over this, I suppose I can assent to this and get it out of the way,” Sherlock declared.
They nodded at each other and, after staring at the other for a few seconds, Sherlock had one last idea and moved in first. He thought that maybe he could go for the cheek and just say it still counted as a kiss. The kind of kiss it had to be wasn’t discussed, and people would just call him a prick for ruining their fun. Satisfied with himself, he moved to do so, but Lestrade saw him veer off to the left. He must have thought Sherlock was off-target because he moved to accommodate that almost-misfire.
Their lips touched, and in the five seconds that they held contact, Sherlock couldn’t help but catalogue the feel of Lestrade’s lips (slightly chapped but soft, thin, very warm). When they broke apart, Sherlock was already aching for more. People were already discussing the kiss, paying little attention to Sherlock and Lestrade in favor of talking about how strange it was to see Sherlock kiss anybody. Feeling a blush coming on, Sherlock turned his face away from Lestrade and said, “Now that inane... activity is done, you can go back to the party. I’m sure everyone would love to know what that was like.” Before Lestrade could say anything, Sherlock walked off and pushed through a small crowd of people and walked to the skull on the mantle.
Sherlock looked at the skull with some desperation, almost hoping it knew what to say to make everything better, but knew it wouldn’t happen. Still, he just needed some time to think so he could try to gain some of his equanimity back. He’d figure out later how to compose himself around Lestrade in future interactions later, but for now, he just needed to get a grasp of what happened.
Though no one else paid much mind to Sherlock after, more concerned with sharing the photos they just took, Lestrade had followed him.
“Sherlock, are you alright?” he asked a little exuberantly.
“Of course, Lestrade. Why wouldn’t I be?” Sherlock retorted. He hoped to maintain a look of indifference, but apparently he was either doing a poor job of doing so, or Lestrade had really gotten better at reading him.
“Look,” Lestrade said. He seemed to bring his own mood down a bit. “I’m sorry if-”
Sherlock immediately shot back, “That’s stupid, Lestrade. Why should you be sorry for something other people made us do?”
Lestrade looked curiously at Sherlock.
“If anything, I should apologize to you for having to go through with that with me.” Sherlock remarked. “Bet you didn’t enjoy having to kiss the sociopath.”
Lestrade cleared his throat before he said, “Oh... Well, actually...”
“Hmm?” Sherlock cocked his head as he looked at Lestrade, suddenly interested in why the DI came to talk to him. He noticed the smile reappearing on the older man’s face.
“Actually, I kind of- I liked it. In fact, I planned this a bit.”
Sherlock’s eyes widened and his brow furrowed, but he said nothing, causing Lestrade to continue on:
“Well, I noticed John had hung it up, and yes, John, because I know you wouldn’t, and the idea sort of hit me. So I would wait till you walked into the kitchen and then I’d wait until you started to leave when you finished whatever you were doing. I almost gave up because it took you so long... and then you finally went and... well, I’m surprised I was even successful.” Lestrade still had a smile on his face, but there was a slight hint of worry there now. Sherlock had only narrowed his eyes, but Lestrade noticed that and misread what it meant.
He dropped the smile completely and started babbling, “Hey, I’m really, really sorry, Sherlock, but I just... I thought maybe you were interested since you, you do really look at me, a lot, it’s hard not to notice... but, but maybe you were figuring something out about... Well, I don’t know, but- I won’t- I won’t do that again, and-”
“No” Sherlock simply said. He didn’t know what he was saying “no” to, but it stopped lestrade.
“No? Um... ” Lestrade replied, clearly confused.
“You planned that? It wasn’t an accident? You wanted to do... that?” The intensity of Sherlock’s stare that went along with that question made the DI really uneasy.
“Well, yeah...”
“Why?” Sherlock blurted out. The other man couldn’t help but glance at Sherlock, a bit baffled.
“Why? Why would I want to kiss you?” Lestrade asked, almost exasperated. He scratched his head and looked away from Sherlock for a bit. “Jesus Sherlock...”
Sherlock remained silent but his gaze didn’t falter a bit. Lestrade’s eyes kept darting from Sherlock to the crowd of people around them, who were, at most, barely concerned with the conversation the two were having.
Finally, he lowered his head and, looking down, Lestrade sighed, “Why else would anybody want to kiss someone? I... I like you, alright?”
The consulting detective was stunned. He couldn’t believe what he had just heard, but he had just heard it from the man he desired himself. Sherlock had to process this. While his mind was so busy trying to digest this, Sherlock hadn’t realized that he was just staring at Lestrade. By the time he came to attention, he realized that the other man was preparing mentally and physically for Sherlock to unleash his vitriol on him, because he didn’t dare look at Sherlock. In an attempt to rectify the situation, Sherlock raised his hands to grab the much older man’s face and turn it towards his. Sherlock could see Lestrade was still panicking, and Sherlock would find out from Lestrade the next day that it was because he still had a stern look face (Lestrade said he was sure that Sherlock was actually going to shake him right there). Sherlock had Lestrade’s admission, and yet he still hesitated with uncertainty before he brought the DI’s lips to his. The DI tensed for a few seconds before he realized what was happening, and began actively participating.
Throughout the (chaste and regretfully short) kiss, Sherlock was well aware that people were suddenly murmuring, and when they broke apart, he could see intrigued glances and people attempting to be inconspicuous. None of that mattered, though, as Sherlock was aware of warm hands on his ribs. Lestrade gave the room one quick look before looking back at Sherlock and just chuckled. Sherlock then smiled for the first time at the party.
“Lestrade...”
“Hmm?”
“Why don’t we retire to my room?”
“Already?” Lestrade asked, attempting to appear scandalized, but intentionally failing to hide his eagerness.
“Yes, my room. It’s just through the kitchen.”
Taking Lestrade’s subsequent smirk as a yes, Sherlock, not bothered by the promise he was breaking, led them to his room, but not before stopping at the kitchen door frame to keep with tradition.