Fic: Mise en Place (10/25)
Title: Mise en Place (10/25)
Fandom: Sherlock BBC
Relationship, Characters: Sherlock/John (eventually), 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
Chapter Ten
For a Saturday morning, the Slate Street Clinic wasn’t all that busy. There were only three people in the waiting room - an elderly lady who shifted uncomfortably in her seat and a young mother with a toddler who kept crying and tugging on his ear. John smiled at both of them. The young mother gave him a weary and apologetic smile in return; the elderly lady simply glared.
“Dr Watson,” she said haughtily. “I was here first.”
She remembered him; John racked his brain for a moment before recalling her name. “I’m sorry, Mrs Russell, I don’t work here any longer.”
Mrs Russell stretched out her cane and used it to knock on John’s. “You’re still a doctor? The Afghanis didn’t knock your degree out with your leg, did they?”
“Ah, no, but-”
“Nothing in this room that a good course of tea and antibiotics won’t fix,” declared Mrs Russell emphatically, and she looked pointedly at the young mother. “Tea. Hot. In his ear.”
The mother clutched the toddler closer to her, and looked worried.
“Mrs Russell,” said John patiently. “Tea isn’t quite that much of a cure-all.”
“Brew it long enough and it is,” snapped Mrs Russell. “Now are you going to give me my antibiotics or not?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs Russell, I explained already, I don’t work here any longer.”
“But you could,” said a new voice from the receptionist’s window, and John grinned and turned to see Sarah hanging out of it. “Mrs Russell, I’m terribly sorry that you’ve been waiting so long.”
“I was here first,” Mrs Russell reminded her.
“Of course you were, and we’re all ready for you, just pop into the loo and you know what to do.”
John helped Mrs Russell to her feet, despite Mrs Russell whacking him with her handbag. “I don’t need help, I need antibiotics.”
“Heaven help the man who tries to help you, Mrs Russell,” said John pleasantly, and held the door for her as she shuffled into the back of the clinic.
Sarah grinned at him from the window. “Be back in a jiff, John. You can sit in my office if you like.”
“I’ll wait out here, ta,” said John, and Sarah left the window, presumably to tend to Mrs Russell.
John sat opposite the toddler, who eyed him for a full minute before coming over and touching his cane with one outstretched finger.
“Stick,” said the boy. “Mine.”
“Tim!” scolded the mother. “Don’t touch the nice man’s stick, that’s his.”
“Mine,” insisted Tim.
“I’m so sorry,” apologized the mother. “Everything belongs to him, he thinks.”
“He’s two?”
“Twenty months; he’s tall for his age.”
“Ear infection?”
“I think so. Never had one before.”
“Does anything hurt, Tim?” asked John gently, and the boy nodded solemnly, and grabbed both ears with a sniffle.
“All right, then,” said John, and he leaned over to the boy. “Want to see a magic trick?”
Tim watched him with eagle eyes. John opened his hands, showing his palms to Tim, and then closed them up tight again. He saw that Tim copied him. John used his hands to wiggle his own ears at the boy, and Tim wiggled his with his hands, too, and John grinned at him.
“Nothing in your ears, right? Do you see anything in mine?”
Tim frowned.
“Let’s have a look in yours, then.” John reached over to Tim’s ear, and almost fumbled the coin in between his fingers; it’d been too long since he’d done this trick. But Tim didn’t seem to notice, though the mother giggled a little.
“Oh, my, look at this,” said John, wonder in his voice. “I think you’re growing money in your ears. That must be why they’re hurting. Painful business, that.”
Tim’s eyes were wide; he took the pound from John and turned it over and over in his fingers, before presenting it to his mother for inspection.
“What a lovely trick,” said Tim’s mum. “Thank the nice man, Tim.”
“Tanku,” whispered Tim to his mother, and John grinned.
By the time one of the nurses popped her head into the waiting room to call Tim and his mother into the back, Tim was leaning on John’s good leg, watching as he read the little boy a book about trucks and trains.
“Doctor Watson!” exclaimed Jeannette. “I didn’t know you were here!”
“Hello, Jeannette,” said John pleasantly. “I think it’s an ear infection, but you’ll want to double check.”
“Of course. Did you want to look yourself?”
“No, that’s fine, I’ll just wait for Sarah to finish up with Mrs Russell.”
“Righto,” said Jeannette. “Come on then, Tim, I need to you jump up on the scale for me. There’s a sticker in it for you.”
“Ticker,” said Tim, clearly impressed with the offering, and he abandoned John’s knee immediately.
“Thrown over for a sticker,” sighed John, and Tim’s mother smiled, suddenly a bit shy.
“Thanks again, it was lovely of you,” she told John. “The magic trick, I mean. Tim’s dad left, he doesn’t have that many men pay attention to him.”
“He’s a good kid,” said John.
“I…maybe I could buy you coffee sometime? To say thank you?”
The request took John by surprise. “I … ah. Sure. Sometime.”
“Great,” said the mother with a wide grin. “Ah…my number.”
“I’ll give it to him,” said Jeannette, amused.
“Ticker,” insisted Tim, tugging on his mother’s hand.
“Bye,” said the mother, and disappeared into the back. Jeannette flashed John a grin, and John glared at her as she closed the door and left him alone in the waiting room.
Christ.
John couldn’t sit still any longer; his injured leg was throbbing a little, likely exhausted from the surprise of needing to pull its own weight after several months of relying on a crutch. John stood up and began to pace the room, and held the cane in his hand, though he didn’t use it. More for reassurance than anything else, John told himself. That was all.
Tim’s mum had been flirting with him. Out and out, in his face, no doubt about it, flirting. And in any other week, John would have been perfectly willing to flirt back.
Except now, he couldn’t. He didn’t want to. He hadn’t even noticed that the woman had been sizing him up until she came right out and asked for a date. It wasn’t that John was opposed to women asking him out. It was that usually, he noticed that they were interested and asked them long before they had to do it themselves.
John was off his game. Completely and thoroughly, and worse yet, the only thing he could think about, when the woman asked him for coffee, was that Sherlock probably would not have liked it very much.
Christ. Since when did he care the least bit about what Sherlock Bloody Holmes would think about John going to have coffee with a pretty woman? Sherlock Bloody Holmes didn’t get to have an opinion about who John had coffee with; Sherlock Bloody Holmes didn’t get to have opinions about John, period. Sherlock Bloody Holmes could go right off and fix his bloody restaurant and go back to his bloody television production schedule and keep making his bloody television show for all that John cared.
Sherlock Bloody Holmes could…
John was deep in internal ranting, circumnavigating the waiting room, when the door opened again, and Mrs Russell appeared, with Sarah right behind.
Mrs Russell took one look at John with the cane and scoffed, but didn’t say a word except for, “Antibiotics.”
“Right you are, Mrs Russell,” said John, and opened the door for her to leave.
“Tea’s brewing in my office,” said Sarah, and John straightened with a smile.
Sarah’s office was exactly the same as he remembered, except that the piles of paperwork were taller and less neat. “You’d think computers would have reduced the clutter,” said Sarah, moving the piles aside to make room for John’s tea.
“Never,” said John, and fell into the chair. “Glad you’re not busy today, I was hoping to pop in and thank you for your help with Artie yesterday.”
“How is he?”
“All right, back to threatening the vegetables with the sharpest knife available. Knowing Artie, he’s either completely healed or has lost use of the arm entirely. It was good of you to see him so quickly; he said you popped him to the front of the queue, but that might have been the Percocet talking.”
Sarah waved her hand. “Nothing, it was the least I could do. Especially since I got to meet the dishy Sherlock Holmes to boot.”
John groaned. “Christ, does everyone knows he’s here?”
“Of course they do, Upper Brickley isn’t completely out of the loop when it comes to celebrities. And besides, there’s nothing else interesting happening this week. So.” Sarah leaned over her desk. “Tell me - is it true? He’s here because of the Empire?”
“No,” said John, a bit put out. “He’s here to have a wild and intense fling with me and then he’s going to flit off and fix up some other failing restaurant.”
Sarah raised an eyebrow. “John.”
“Of course he’s here for the Empire, Sarah. Who’d want to have an affair with me?”
“Other than Timothy Williams’ mother, you mean?”
John groaned and covered his face with his hands. “Does the entire clinic know about that?”
“Two people, we’re terribly extensive. If it’s any consolation,” said Sarah, “she flirts with just about every man who says more than three words to her.”
“Ta, you’re a help.”
“Actually,” said Sarah, sitting back in her chair again, and picking up her mug of tea, “I was hoping you were here to take up your job again, and not to flirt with single mothers in my waiting room.”
John shook his head. “Just the tea and to thank you.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Hmm,” said Sarah thoughtfully.
John paused mid-sip. “What?”
“You’ve been in Upper Brickley for over a month and haven’t stopped by once to say hello,” said Sarah. “And you’re not here for a job, and I rather doubt you’re impressed by Mrs Williams - who’s a bit awful but her son’s quite lovely - and you’re not one to brag about having a celebrity know your name, and you know perfectly well that Artie’s injury was no problem whatsoever….so, John Hamish Watson, MBBS, former captain in Her Majesty’s Army and recent veteran of whatever we’re calling the current Afghanistan conflict…why are you sitting in my office right now?”
John stared into his tea mug.
“Sarah,” he began, and then stopped.
Sarah sat back in her chair and drank her tea, and didn’t say a word. But her eyes stayed on John, peering over the edge of the mug.
“Would you hire me again?” asked John before he lost his nerve.
“In a heartbeat,” said Sarah. “Why? Do you want to come back?”
“I don’t know,” said John. “Yes, except…”
“The Empire.”
“Yes, the Empire.”
“What about Harry?”
John sat back in his chair. “It’s…it shouldn’t be Harry’s responsibility anymore. Not by herself, anyway. It’s not even something she wanted. But she’s been managing the restaurant ever since Dad got sick - she left school for it. Christ, that was so long ago, I don’t even remember what she was studying.”
“Photography,” said Sarah.
John frowned. “I thought journalism?”
“Both. I think she wanted to be one of those travel writers, the sort who go fantastic places and then tell the rest of us about them.”
Harry’s outburst and anger suddenly began to make sense. “And instead she’s been stuck here while I’ve been traveling the world myself. Christ, no wonder she’s bitter.”
“To be fair, you weren’t exactly on a pleasure trip.”
“Yeah.” John set the mug down and rested his chin on his hands. “She should have the chance to do that, you know? Instead of managing a failing restaurant that she hates.”
“It’s - it’s not that bad?”
“Sarah,” said John patiently. “Sherlock Bloody Holmes is, at this moment, in the Empire’s kitchen, teaching Molly and Artie how to cook.”
“Oh,” said Sarah faintly. “I…I had hoped the rumors weren’t true.”
“Rumors…?”
“John, it’s a small town. It’s been obvious to everyone for years that the Empire wasn’t doing very well. ”
John sighed, and covered his face with his hands. “If the whole town knows it…”
“I’m sorry, John.”
“Well,” said John. “Maybe I should apply for a job here.”
“And I’d hire you,” said Sarah. “But maybe wait until Sherlock’s done whatever magic he’s going to do before you throw in the towel.”
“You’ve seen the show, then?”
“Once or twice.”
“What do you think of him?” asked John, unable to keep the urgency out of his voice.
“I think he’s very intelligent and egotistical and arrogant and he’s a bit of an arse, but he’s also incredibly focused and energetic, and if anyone’s going to be able to make a success out of the Empire, it’s going to be him,” said Sarah, and then gave John a piercing look. “Oh. Oh.”
“What?”
“You weren’t lying, were you? I thought you were trying to be funny, but you were serious? You and Sherlock Holmes…”
“It’s not like that,” said John quickly. “It’s nothing like that.”
“It’s just- you get this funny bit in your voice when you talk about him, you know.”
John paused. “I do?”
“A little. And you couldn’t care less about Mrs Williams.”
John slumped down in Sarah’s chair. “Bloody hell.”
“It’s none of my business,” began Sarah.
“You’re right, it’s not.”
“But you did come to me, John. So maybe that means you want to talk to someone about it?”
John jiggled his good leg for a moment, and looked out the window. Sarah waited.
“Harry took a mortgage out on the restaurant, and if we don’t pay the bank six hundred thousand pounds in three weeks, we’re going to lose it,” said John finally, and saw Sarah’s mouth drop open.
“Bloody hell,” she whispered.
“Yeah,” agreed John, and they fell silent for a moment. Sarah lifted the mug of tea to her mouth, and then lowered it again. John knew the feeling. Drinking was impossible, and holding the mug was simply too much.
“John, I-if I’d known. I don’t think anyone realizes it’s that bad.”
“I’m not looking for pity,” said John.
“I know that, but-”
“The Empire’s important, Sarah. My grandfather nearly bankrupted himself trying to start it, he did what everyone said was impossible and he made it work. He made it great. My father grew up at the Empire, I grew up at the Empire. It’s home. It’s my home, far more than the house on Baker Street ever was or anywhere else ever will be. Do you know what I thought about, the minute before I blacked out after being shot in Afghanistan? I asked God to let me live, and when I closed my eyes, I could smell my grandfather cooking pilau, exactly the way he’d done it when I was six.
“I can’t let the Empire close. Not on my watch, not on Harry’s. She’s given up so fucking much of herself to keep the restaurant going. Her dreams, her university degree, her marriage - she’s got nothing left, if the Empire closes. It’d kill her, I honestly think it would. So anything that I might want out of this week - if it’s not strictly to do with the Empire, then it’s not mine. The Empire’s the priority here. Nothing else.”
“I get it, John,” said Sarah quietly. “You don’t have to convince me.”
John realized he’d nearly stood up with the force of his words, and his legs were shaking. “Right,” said John, and he sat back in his chair. He took a deep breath. “Right. I know that.”
Sarah leaned forward. “John. This thing with Sherlock. I have to ask - is…is it serious?”
John shook his head. “I’ve known him two days, Sarah. Of course it’s not serious.”
“Then I think you’re right. You’ve got to focus on saving the Empire.”
John exhaled. “Thank you.”
“You didn’t need to hear me say that.”
“I think I probably did, actually, or I wouldn’t be here at all.”
Sarah shook her head. “Do you know what I think? I think maybe this whole attraction you have for Sherlock Holmes is based on the fact that you see him as the Empire’s savior.”
John groaned. “Instead of killing the messenger, I kiss him?”
Sarah raised an eyebrow. “Hold on, soldier, back up. You kissed him?”
John rubbed his face. “Sarah.”
“Was it good?”
“Sarah!”
“Sorry, sorry,” said Sarah with a grin.
“No, you’re not!” John accused, but he was smiling.
“You know what they say. Kiss someone and it’s like you’re kissing everyone they’ve kissed, too.” Sarah’s eyes twinkled; she started to rock her chair back and forth.
John rolled his eyes. “I think that’s about sex, not kissing. And anyway, it would mean Sherlock Holmes kissed you, not the other way around.”
“That’s acceptable,” said Sarah, and was about to drink some of her tea when she lowered the mug again. “Ah. John - you and Sherlock didn’t…?”
John felt the blood rise to his cheeks and the back of his neck, as quickly as if Sherlock had breathed on them, open mouthed and with an accompanying caress. “We’re really getting off topic here, Sarah.”
“Fine, fine,” laughed Sarah, holding up her hands. “But, John. It’s the Empire for you. It’s always been the Empire, it always will be the Empire. I can’t even imagine what you’d be without it behind you.”
John smiled ruefully. “A doctor?”
“And a bloody good one, yes. If the Empire does fold, I’d hire you back in a heartbeat. But I’m not sure that’s what you want anymore. Is it?”
John stared into his teacup, and thought about the soldiers whose cuts and bruises he’d tended in the field, the endless days of Mrs Russells and Timothys, the comfort of seeing someone he’d treated walk down the street, cured.
“I…have no idea,” he said.
Sarah nodded. “Drink your tea,” she advised, and John followed orders.
*
John brooded as he walked back to the Empire.
He was not in a relationship with Sherlock Holmes. He was certainly not in love with Sherlock Holmes. He was a perfectly normal doctor-turned-soldier-turned-restaurant manager and whether or not he had a mad crush on a celebrity didn’t really matter because the celebrity certainly had no feelings for him, no matter how many times they’d kissed since meeting two days ago or exactly what had transpired the evening before.
People had crushes all the time. It happened. No shame in it. John wasn’t about to go around denying that he might have harbored some…feelings toward Sherlock that weren’t strictly about the Empire. And he wasn’t about to have a sexual identity crisis: that boat had sailed the first night that Sherlock had kissed him, and John had happily gone in for a second round. Besides, he’d had that particular white night years before, when Harry had leapt out of the closet with both feet. He’d come to the conclusion that he wasn’t…maybe. But then, he’d been eighteen. He would have shagged just about anything that moved and was offering.
Sherlock was offering. Maybe. John wasn’t sure what Sherlock was offering, but there was something being offered, and John might not have been eighteen anymore, but he was tempted to accept.
And anyway, it was just a week, it wasn’t as though they were headed for anything serious. John was a grown man, he’d had his share of flings and one-night stands. If he wanted to take Sherlock Bloody Holmes to bed and shag him rotten, he would do it and never mind anyone’s opinion.
The idea of shagging Sherlock Holmes was such a ridiculous one that John began to laugh to himself - not amused, just wry.
To John’s surprise, there was a moving van outside the Empire when he arrived. Mrs Hudson was sweeping the pavement when John walked up, and she waved him down.
“Isn’t it exciting?” she gushed. “I met him this morning, did I tell you?”
“Oh, God, Mrs Hudson, I’m sorry-”
“He was lovely, I think he rather liked my tart. I think he’s just an ogre for the show - better ratings, you know.”
A parade of men jumped down out of the van and headed into the Empire, empty-handed. John wasn’t entirely sure what they were doing, and half expected to see them come back out carrying the various items which had once decorated the walls.
“I can’t tell which of him is the show and which is the real him,” he said to Mrs Hudson absently.
“Oh, now, who would put on such a dour face unless they had to?” said Mrs Hudson.
The men returned, and it took a moment for John to realize that the long roll they carried between them was one of the rugs rolled up tight - the same rug that had hung on the east wall for the last three decades. John froze for a moment, and then jumped to action.
“Oi!” he shouted, and ran across the street. “Oi. What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?”
The men paid him no heed, but Sally Donovan stepped out from behind the truck, a clipboard in her hand. “Oh, there you are,” she said, relieved. “Where have you been? The butcher delivered the chickens and the sausage meats half an hour ago.”
John struggled to keep his temper as he watched another man come out of the restaurant, this time carrying a jewel-encrusted lamp. The tassels rocked back and forth, and the jewels glistened in the sunlight. “What the bloody fuck are you doing to my things?”
Sally frowned, and glanced at the clipboard. “Sherlock was meant to tell you - that freak. He probably forgot. We’re moving a few things out of the dining room.”
John counted to five. “Monday. This was all meant to happen on Monday. Not today. Not yet. He doesn’t get to chuck my menu and my stuff all in one go.”
Sally was calm. Had he been more rational, John might have been impressed with her composure under pressure. “It’s not being thrown away, John. We’re putting it in a storage unit. It will be perfectly safe until you decide what you want to have done with it.”
John turned and looked. It was true; the lamp, now sitting outside, was being wrapped in bubbles and tape. The rug was even rolled correctly, right-side out, and someone was covering it in paper and plastic to keep it safe from harm. John could see inside the windows: people were carefully removing things from the walls, using paper to protect them as they laid them in size-appropriate boxes. John, turned away from Sally, took the moment to compose himself.
By the time he turned back, he was calmer.
“I’m sorry,” he said automatically, and Sally, to her credit, smiled appreciatively.
“It’s all right. I should have thought to warn you before you left. The rest will wait until Monday, when you’re closed, but there’s so much in there, we wanted to get started today.”
“The rest?”
Sally nodded. “Carpet, wallpaper, new things for the walls. I don’t want to say much more - Greg likes to make the big reveal on film.”
“Yeah,” said John; he remembered the reveal from the show, the surprised and pleased and often teary expressions from the owners and chefs as they saw their new dining rooms, spruced and shining and gorgeous. Not every restaurant had such a complete overhaul; John hadn’t expected that they’d be in that number. “So what happens on Monday? Are we not even allowed to come in?”
“No idea,” admitted Sally. “Sherlock hasn’t really told me anything. I think-” She paused. “I think he’s not entirely sure what he’s doing, between you and me. I don’t mean that he’s winging it,” added Sally, quick to reassure him. “But…he’s normally so much more in control than he is. Normally he comes in the third day, and he knows exactly how to fix a restaurant. But this morning, he was still mulling over ideas. I don’t think he actually knew what he wanted to do until you arrived.”
“He seems to be doing all right now,” he said, and watched the movers carry out another round of boxes.
“Yes,” said Sally, but she sounded doubtful. “Anyway, you better go in, he’s been asking after you every ten minutes since the chickens arrived.”
John frowned. “He doesn’t want me to cook, does he?”
Sally shrugged. “Ask him.”
One of the movers appeared at John’s elbow, and John signed the paperwork almost absently. It was only as he was heading into the restaurant that Sally called out to him.
“John-”
John turned to her.
“Ah - your cane?”
John glanced down at the cane, still in his hand, still unused.
“Yeah,” he said. And because he couldn’t think of what else to say about it, didn’t say anything at all.
Once he saw the dining room, John realized that there wasn’t much that could be said, anyway. The bells on the door echoed in the room as it closed.
The dining room was empty.
Not really empty, of course - the furniture remained, but without the items on the walls, it seemed out of place - overly large and ostentatious. John could see the dust motes floating in the air. The walls were bare; it was obvious, looking at the bright red squares on the wallpaper, what had hung where, and John winced looking at them. Even in the dim afternoon sunshine spilling in from the street, the walls looked terrible.
The Johns, James, and Hamish Watson stared out from the rear wall onto their empty Empire, and John almost wanted to turn right around and go home. His throat was thick, either with the dust or with something else, and John had to gasp for air.
“Awful, isn’t it?” asked Harry, right behind him, and John swallowed. It wasn’t easy.
“Yeah,” said John. He was surprised how well he sounded.
“It’s like - every nightmare I ever had as a kid,” continued Harry.
John turned to her. “Your nightmares?”
Harry turned away and started to lift one of the larger maps of India. “You’re not the only one who grew up here, Johnny. This place is just as much a part of me as it is you.”
John closed his eyes for a moment. “I know. Harry…”
“No, it’s fine. It’s fine.” Harry stood, struggling with the large map. John set down the cane and went to help. Once he’d taken some of the weight, Harry stopped struggling and smiled at him. Her eyes were wet, and a bit pink at the edges. “Dust.”
“Hate that stuff,” agreed John, and helped her carry the map out the door and up to the truck outside.
*
[INTERIOR, Kitchen. Quick shots of knives cutting, slicing, dicing; cutting boards and wide dishes being washed; a box of vegetables being unpacked; raw chickens lined up in a row. The sounds of water splashing, the quick chopchopchop of a knife against a wooden cutting board, MOLLY and ARTIE talking animatedly, seriously, and a shot of MOLLY, brushing the hair out of her eyes, laughing.]
SHERLOCK v.o.: There is a marked difference between what occurs in a home kitchen, and what needs to occur in a restaurant kitchen. A home cook may have as much time as he or she needs to prepare a single meal, without interruption that could derail the entire operation. However, a restaurant chef is not so lucky. They must prepare not one, but a dozen completely different meals, all at the same time, all presented at the same time, each one piping hot the moment it reaches the customer. For this reason, home recipes can be difficult to recreate for the needs of food service.
[ARTIE holds up a head of garlic.]
ARTIE: What am I supposed to do with this?
MOLLY: Chop it?
ARTIE: Okay. How?
MOLLY: With a knife?
ARTIE: When I write my book, Molly, I’m leaving you out.
*
The kitchen was…not a mess, nor was it disorganized, but it looked a bit as if a cyclone had swept through. Every single flat surface was covered in trays, each one holding squares of what looked like slightly damp flatbread, pale and doughy. The kitchen was hot and steamy, and the scent of yeast hung in the air. It gave off a familiar, alcoholic taste to the air which seemed to result in the strange cheerful, bubbly mood that the three chefs were feeling, thought John. He watched as Molly pulled a tray of the square dough out of the oven, her feet twisting in an invisible, excited, stationary dance.
“That’s the last of it,” said Molly, pleased, and she turned to look for a place to put the tray. “Oh, hullo, John, you’re back!”
Sherlock looked up from the worktable, where he supervised Artie’s attempts to chop garlic. He didn’t say anything; John didn’t think he needed to, not the way his eyes searched John, and landed on John’s empty hands. John imagined he could see a slight smile on the bastard’s face, but it was gone a moment later, and Sherlock turned back to Artie.
“Are these done?” asked John, confused.
“Par-baked,” explained Molly, and she wedged the tray onto the warming table. “For the pizzas. We can bake them up quick once the orders come in. Harry said there’s reservations for sixty tonight, and she keeps getting requests for tomorrow and Tuesday, too.”
John’s fingers clenched around empty air again, and he wished he didn’t want the cane so badly.
“That’s good, that’s fine,” he said automatically.
“Molly,” said Sherlock quietly. “Please stay on task, there’s enough to be doing and talking to John is not on the list.”
“Right, sorry, Chef,” said Molly, flashing a last grin at John, and she turned back to the oven, switching it to a lower temperature. “Pie crusts next, Chef, they’ve been sitting long enough.”
John remembered the chocolate from the list, and he glanced around the kitchen. “Everything showed up already?”
“Indeed,” said Sherlock, and he sounded amused. “It would seem that most of the vendors were quite anxious to stop by with the orders. Artie, are you actively trying to slice your fingernails from your fingers? Because you are doing an admirable job in the attempt.”
“Sorry, Chef,” said Artie cheerfully. “I like a smaller knife. Easier to slip between the ribs.”
“Your bloodthirsty tendencies would alarm a lesser man, Artie,” said Sherlock dryly. He glanced at John again; his eyes lingered on the absent cane. His eyes seemed brighter, and when he spoke, John could hear the smug, satisfied tone. “Well. You’ve checked in with us, we’re busily trying to make your restaurant a success. So unless there’s something you’d like to discuss, we have quite a lot to be going on with today…”
John wished he’d brought the cane in, just for the comfort. Or maybe to pop Sherlock over the head. Asking after him every ten minutes, and then dismissing him nearly out of hand? “No, that’s…that’s all right.”
John left the kitchen; the moment the door swung shut behind him, he heard the chatter pick back up again. Molly asking a question, Sherlock answering, Artie adding a belligerent comment. No laughter, not as such, but it sounded…cheerful, excited, friendly. Familiar, in an odd way.
In the dining room, Mary was fast at work moving tables with Harry, setting them into place. The tables were solid, light-colored wood, with leaves that dropped or lifted depending on the size of the party, and the chairs, stacked by the walls, were a similar wood color.
“Let me help,” said John, stepping forward as Harry and Mary grunted and shoved.
“Heavy work,” said Harry quickly. “You’re meant to be taking it easy on your shoulder, remember. We’ve got it.”
“I can do the menus,” said John.
“Done,” said Mary.
“The ironing?” said Harry.
“The last time John ironed, he left scorch marks on my dress shirt,” said Mary. “And I’ll just end up doing them again anyway.”
“Never mind,” said John, disgruntled, and went into the office and slammed the door so hard the pile of menus on the desk toppled over.
John sighed, and picked them up to straighten them. The cardstock was thick and sturdy in his hands, and John wasn’t terribly surprised, despite the grocery list, that the menu was disturbingly short. Considering the disaster of the previous evening, however, maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing.
Roast chicken - pizza - bangers and mash…
It sounded, thought John, like every other typical British restaurant he’d ever eaten in. Boring, predictable, tame. Completely opposite the food the Empire had built its reputation on, everything James Watson had been trying to do in the first place. John resisted the urge to rip the menus to shreds, and instead, dropped them back down on the desk and sat heavily in the chair.
His shoulder throbbed a little, stiff and sore, and John rubbed his face with his hands before looking up at the bric-a-brac that surrounded him. The office, at least, was the same. Pictures lining the walls, recipes and books and all the bits and pieces that they could never quite fit in the dining room before. A filing cabinet with menus dating back sixty years, receipts and reviews and letters.
There was a knock on the door.
“Not now, Harry,” said John, and Harry knocked again. “Just - not now, Harry,” repeated John, and the door opened.
Mary poked her head through. “I thought you might need something.”
John sighed. “What?”
Mary slipped inside the office and closed the door carefully behind her. “You’re not using your cane.”
“Well spotted,” said John, irritated.
“Oh, no, John Watson,” said Mary, and John recognized the don’t-mess-with-me tone. “Don’t you sit there sulking and snapping out at anyone who reaches out to you. You put yourself in this mess and you are not allowed to sit here and wallow and bemoan the fact that Sherlock Holmes is doing exactly what you’ve asked him to do. I know you’re sulking and I know you’re liable to sit here and feel sorry for yourself all afternoon and Harry might think you have the right but I don’t.”
“I know,” said John. “Can I just…mourn a little?”
“Fine,” said Mary after a moment. “You have three minutes. Then get off your bloody arse and do something.”
“What? You and Harry clearly think I’m not up to moving furniture, and the menus are done. I can’t put in an order for Monday since Sherlock Bloody Holmes hasn’t kept me in the loop on what he’d like us to serve. Christ, would you even let me sweep if I asked?”
“If you can’t figure out how to help, John Watson, then you’re more fucked than I thought,” said Mary, and she slammed the door on her way out. John could hear it echo in the dining room, and wondered how many slams it would take before something fell off the wall entirely.
Chapter Eleven
Fandom: Sherlock BBC
Relationship, Characters: Sherlock/John (eventually), 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
Chapter Ten
For a Saturday morning, the Slate Street Clinic wasn’t all that busy. There were only three people in the waiting room - an elderly lady who shifted uncomfortably in her seat and a young mother with a toddler who kept crying and tugging on his ear. John smiled at both of them. The young mother gave him a weary and apologetic smile in return; the elderly lady simply glared.
“Dr Watson,” she said haughtily. “I was here first.”
She remembered him; John racked his brain for a moment before recalling her name. “I’m sorry, Mrs Russell, I don’t work here any longer.”
Mrs Russell stretched out her cane and used it to knock on John’s. “You’re still a doctor? The Afghanis didn’t knock your degree out with your leg, did they?”
“Ah, no, but-”
“Nothing in this room that a good course of tea and antibiotics won’t fix,” declared Mrs Russell emphatically, and she looked pointedly at the young mother. “Tea. Hot. In his ear.”
The mother clutched the toddler closer to her, and looked worried.
“Mrs Russell,” said John patiently. “Tea isn’t quite that much of a cure-all.”
“Brew it long enough and it is,” snapped Mrs Russell. “Now are you going to give me my antibiotics or not?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs Russell, I explained already, I don’t work here any longer.”
“But you could,” said a new voice from the receptionist’s window, and John grinned and turned to see Sarah hanging out of it. “Mrs Russell, I’m terribly sorry that you’ve been waiting so long.”
“I was here first,” Mrs Russell reminded her.
“Of course you were, and we’re all ready for you, just pop into the loo and you know what to do.”
John helped Mrs Russell to her feet, despite Mrs Russell whacking him with her handbag. “I don’t need help, I need antibiotics.”
“Heaven help the man who tries to help you, Mrs Russell,” said John pleasantly, and held the door for her as she shuffled into the back of the clinic.
Sarah grinned at him from the window. “Be back in a jiff, John. You can sit in my office if you like.”
“I’ll wait out here, ta,” said John, and Sarah left the window, presumably to tend to Mrs Russell.
John sat opposite the toddler, who eyed him for a full minute before coming over and touching his cane with one outstretched finger.
“Stick,” said the boy. “Mine.”
“Tim!” scolded the mother. “Don’t touch the nice man’s stick, that’s his.”
“Mine,” insisted Tim.
“I’m so sorry,” apologized the mother. “Everything belongs to him, he thinks.”
“He’s two?”
“Twenty months; he’s tall for his age.”
“Ear infection?”
“I think so. Never had one before.”
“Does anything hurt, Tim?” asked John gently, and the boy nodded solemnly, and grabbed both ears with a sniffle.
“All right, then,” said John, and he leaned over to the boy. “Want to see a magic trick?”
Tim watched him with eagle eyes. John opened his hands, showing his palms to Tim, and then closed them up tight again. He saw that Tim copied him. John used his hands to wiggle his own ears at the boy, and Tim wiggled his with his hands, too, and John grinned at him.
“Nothing in your ears, right? Do you see anything in mine?”
Tim frowned.
“Let’s have a look in yours, then.” John reached over to Tim’s ear, and almost fumbled the coin in between his fingers; it’d been too long since he’d done this trick. But Tim didn’t seem to notice, though the mother giggled a little.
“Oh, my, look at this,” said John, wonder in his voice. “I think you’re growing money in your ears. That must be why they’re hurting. Painful business, that.”
Tim’s eyes were wide; he took the pound from John and turned it over and over in his fingers, before presenting it to his mother for inspection.
“What a lovely trick,” said Tim’s mum. “Thank the nice man, Tim.”
“Tanku,” whispered Tim to his mother, and John grinned.
By the time one of the nurses popped her head into the waiting room to call Tim and his mother into the back, Tim was leaning on John’s good leg, watching as he read the little boy a book about trucks and trains.
“Doctor Watson!” exclaimed Jeannette. “I didn’t know you were here!”
“Hello, Jeannette,” said John pleasantly. “I think it’s an ear infection, but you’ll want to double check.”
“Of course. Did you want to look yourself?”
“No, that’s fine, I’ll just wait for Sarah to finish up with Mrs Russell.”
“Righto,” said Jeannette. “Come on then, Tim, I need to you jump up on the scale for me. There’s a sticker in it for you.”
“Ticker,” said Tim, clearly impressed with the offering, and he abandoned John’s knee immediately.
“Thrown over for a sticker,” sighed John, and Tim’s mother smiled, suddenly a bit shy.
“Thanks again, it was lovely of you,” she told John. “The magic trick, I mean. Tim’s dad left, he doesn’t have that many men pay attention to him.”
“He’s a good kid,” said John.
“I…maybe I could buy you coffee sometime? To say thank you?”
The request took John by surprise. “I … ah. Sure. Sometime.”
“Great,” said the mother with a wide grin. “Ah…my number.”
“I’ll give it to him,” said Jeannette, amused.
“Ticker,” insisted Tim, tugging on his mother’s hand.
“Bye,” said the mother, and disappeared into the back. Jeannette flashed John a grin, and John glared at her as she closed the door and left him alone in the waiting room.
Christ.
John couldn’t sit still any longer; his injured leg was throbbing a little, likely exhausted from the surprise of needing to pull its own weight after several months of relying on a crutch. John stood up and began to pace the room, and held the cane in his hand, though he didn’t use it. More for reassurance than anything else, John told himself. That was all.
Tim’s mum had been flirting with him. Out and out, in his face, no doubt about it, flirting. And in any other week, John would have been perfectly willing to flirt back.
Except now, he couldn’t. He didn’t want to. He hadn’t even noticed that the woman had been sizing him up until she came right out and asked for a date. It wasn’t that John was opposed to women asking him out. It was that usually, he noticed that they were interested and asked them long before they had to do it themselves.
John was off his game. Completely and thoroughly, and worse yet, the only thing he could think about, when the woman asked him for coffee, was that Sherlock probably would not have liked it very much.
Christ. Since when did he care the least bit about what Sherlock Bloody Holmes would think about John going to have coffee with a pretty woman? Sherlock Bloody Holmes didn’t get to have an opinion about who John had coffee with; Sherlock Bloody Holmes didn’t get to have opinions about John, period. Sherlock Bloody Holmes could go right off and fix his bloody restaurant and go back to his bloody television production schedule and keep making his bloody television show for all that John cared.
Sherlock Bloody Holmes could…
John was deep in internal ranting, circumnavigating the waiting room, when the door opened again, and Mrs Russell appeared, with Sarah right behind.
Mrs Russell took one look at John with the cane and scoffed, but didn’t say a word except for, “Antibiotics.”
“Right you are, Mrs Russell,” said John, and opened the door for her to leave.
“Tea’s brewing in my office,” said Sarah, and John straightened with a smile.
Sarah’s office was exactly the same as he remembered, except that the piles of paperwork were taller and less neat. “You’d think computers would have reduced the clutter,” said Sarah, moving the piles aside to make room for John’s tea.
“Never,” said John, and fell into the chair. “Glad you’re not busy today, I was hoping to pop in and thank you for your help with Artie yesterday.”
“How is he?”
“All right, back to threatening the vegetables with the sharpest knife available. Knowing Artie, he’s either completely healed or has lost use of the arm entirely. It was good of you to see him so quickly; he said you popped him to the front of the queue, but that might have been the Percocet talking.”
Sarah waved her hand. “Nothing, it was the least I could do. Especially since I got to meet the dishy Sherlock Holmes to boot.”
John groaned. “Christ, does everyone knows he’s here?”
“Of course they do, Upper Brickley isn’t completely out of the loop when it comes to celebrities. And besides, there’s nothing else interesting happening this week. So.” Sarah leaned over her desk. “Tell me - is it true? He’s here because of the Empire?”
“No,” said John, a bit put out. “He’s here to have a wild and intense fling with me and then he’s going to flit off and fix up some other failing restaurant.”
Sarah raised an eyebrow. “John.”
“Of course he’s here for the Empire, Sarah. Who’d want to have an affair with me?”
“Other than Timothy Williams’ mother, you mean?”
John groaned and covered his face with his hands. “Does the entire clinic know about that?”
“Two people, we’re terribly extensive. If it’s any consolation,” said Sarah, “she flirts with just about every man who says more than three words to her.”
“Ta, you’re a help.”
“Actually,” said Sarah, sitting back in her chair again, and picking up her mug of tea, “I was hoping you were here to take up your job again, and not to flirt with single mothers in my waiting room.”
John shook his head. “Just the tea and to thank you.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Hmm,” said Sarah thoughtfully.
John paused mid-sip. “What?”
“You’ve been in Upper Brickley for over a month and haven’t stopped by once to say hello,” said Sarah. “And you’re not here for a job, and I rather doubt you’re impressed by Mrs Williams - who’s a bit awful but her son’s quite lovely - and you’re not one to brag about having a celebrity know your name, and you know perfectly well that Artie’s injury was no problem whatsoever….so, John Hamish Watson, MBBS, former captain in Her Majesty’s Army and recent veteran of whatever we’re calling the current Afghanistan conflict…why are you sitting in my office right now?”
John stared into his tea mug.
“Sarah,” he began, and then stopped.
Sarah sat back in her chair and drank her tea, and didn’t say a word. But her eyes stayed on John, peering over the edge of the mug.
“Would you hire me again?” asked John before he lost his nerve.
“In a heartbeat,” said Sarah. “Why? Do you want to come back?”
“I don’t know,” said John. “Yes, except…”
“The Empire.”
“Yes, the Empire.”
“What about Harry?”
John sat back in his chair. “It’s…it shouldn’t be Harry’s responsibility anymore. Not by herself, anyway. It’s not even something she wanted. But she’s been managing the restaurant ever since Dad got sick - she left school for it. Christ, that was so long ago, I don’t even remember what she was studying.”
“Photography,” said Sarah.
John frowned. “I thought journalism?”
“Both. I think she wanted to be one of those travel writers, the sort who go fantastic places and then tell the rest of us about them.”
Harry’s outburst and anger suddenly began to make sense. “And instead she’s been stuck here while I’ve been traveling the world myself. Christ, no wonder she’s bitter.”
“To be fair, you weren’t exactly on a pleasure trip.”
“Yeah.” John set the mug down and rested his chin on his hands. “She should have the chance to do that, you know? Instead of managing a failing restaurant that she hates.”
“It’s - it’s not that bad?”
“Sarah,” said John patiently. “Sherlock Bloody Holmes is, at this moment, in the Empire’s kitchen, teaching Molly and Artie how to cook.”
“Oh,” said Sarah faintly. “I…I had hoped the rumors weren’t true.”
“Rumors…?”
“John, it’s a small town. It’s been obvious to everyone for years that the Empire wasn’t doing very well. ”
John sighed, and covered his face with his hands. “If the whole town knows it…”
“I’m sorry, John.”
“Well,” said John. “Maybe I should apply for a job here.”
“And I’d hire you,” said Sarah. “But maybe wait until Sherlock’s done whatever magic he’s going to do before you throw in the towel.”
“You’ve seen the show, then?”
“Once or twice.”
“What do you think of him?” asked John, unable to keep the urgency out of his voice.
“I think he’s very intelligent and egotistical and arrogant and he’s a bit of an arse, but he’s also incredibly focused and energetic, and if anyone’s going to be able to make a success out of the Empire, it’s going to be him,” said Sarah, and then gave John a piercing look. “Oh. Oh.”
“What?”
“You weren’t lying, were you? I thought you were trying to be funny, but you were serious? You and Sherlock Holmes…”
“It’s not like that,” said John quickly. “It’s nothing like that.”
“It’s just- you get this funny bit in your voice when you talk about him, you know.”
John paused. “I do?”
“A little. And you couldn’t care less about Mrs Williams.”
John slumped down in Sarah’s chair. “Bloody hell.”
“It’s none of my business,” began Sarah.
“You’re right, it’s not.”
“But you did come to me, John. So maybe that means you want to talk to someone about it?”
John jiggled his good leg for a moment, and looked out the window. Sarah waited.
“Harry took a mortgage out on the restaurant, and if we don’t pay the bank six hundred thousand pounds in three weeks, we’re going to lose it,” said John finally, and saw Sarah’s mouth drop open.
“Bloody hell,” she whispered.
“Yeah,” agreed John, and they fell silent for a moment. Sarah lifted the mug of tea to her mouth, and then lowered it again. John knew the feeling. Drinking was impossible, and holding the mug was simply too much.
“John, I-if I’d known. I don’t think anyone realizes it’s that bad.”
“I’m not looking for pity,” said John.
“I know that, but-”
“The Empire’s important, Sarah. My grandfather nearly bankrupted himself trying to start it, he did what everyone said was impossible and he made it work. He made it great. My father grew up at the Empire, I grew up at the Empire. It’s home. It’s my home, far more than the house on Baker Street ever was or anywhere else ever will be. Do you know what I thought about, the minute before I blacked out after being shot in Afghanistan? I asked God to let me live, and when I closed my eyes, I could smell my grandfather cooking pilau, exactly the way he’d done it when I was six.
“I can’t let the Empire close. Not on my watch, not on Harry’s. She’s given up so fucking much of herself to keep the restaurant going. Her dreams, her university degree, her marriage - she’s got nothing left, if the Empire closes. It’d kill her, I honestly think it would. So anything that I might want out of this week - if it’s not strictly to do with the Empire, then it’s not mine. The Empire’s the priority here. Nothing else.”
“I get it, John,” said Sarah quietly. “You don’t have to convince me.”
John realized he’d nearly stood up with the force of his words, and his legs were shaking. “Right,” said John, and he sat back in his chair. He took a deep breath. “Right. I know that.”
Sarah leaned forward. “John. This thing with Sherlock. I have to ask - is…is it serious?”
John shook his head. “I’ve known him two days, Sarah. Of course it’s not serious.”
“Then I think you’re right. You’ve got to focus on saving the Empire.”
John exhaled. “Thank you.”
“You didn’t need to hear me say that.”
“I think I probably did, actually, or I wouldn’t be here at all.”
Sarah shook her head. “Do you know what I think? I think maybe this whole attraction you have for Sherlock Holmes is based on the fact that you see him as the Empire’s savior.”
John groaned. “Instead of killing the messenger, I kiss him?”
Sarah raised an eyebrow. “Hold on, soldier, back up. You kissed him?”
John rubbed his face. “Sarah.”
“Was it good?”
“Sarah!”
“Sorry, sorry,” said Sarah with a grin.
“No, you’re not!” John accused, but he was smiling.
“You know what they say. Kiss someone and it’s like you’re kissing everyone they’ve kissed, too.” Sarah’s eyes twinkled; she started to rock her chair back and forth.
John rolled his eyes. “I think that’s about sex, not kissing. And anyway, it would mean Sherlock Holmes kissed you, not the other way around.”
“That’s acceptable,” said Sarah, and was about to drink some of her tea when she lowered the mug again. “Ah. John - you and Sherlock didn’t…?”
John felt the blood rise to his cheeks and the back of his neck, as quickly as if Sherlock had breathed on them, open mouthed and with an accompanying caress. “We’re really getting off topic here, Sarah.”
“Fine, fine,” laughed Sarah, holding up her hands. “But, John. It’s the Empire for you. It’s always been the Empire, it always will be the Empire. I can’t even imagine what you’d be without it behind you.”
John smiled ruefully. “A doctor?”
“And a bloody good one, yes. If the Empire does fold, I’d hire you back in a heartbeat. But I’m not sure that’s what you want anymore. Is it?”
John stared into his teacup, and thought about the soldiers whose cuts and bruises he’d tended in the field, the endless days of Mrs Russells and Timothys, the comfort of seeing someone he’d treated walk down the street, cured.
“I…have no idea,” he said.
Sarah nodded. “Drink your tea,” she advised, and John followed orders.
*
John brooded as he walked back to the Empire.
He was not in a relationship with Sherlock Holmes. He was certainly not in love with Sherlock Holmes. He was a perfectly normal doctor-turned-soldier-turned-restaurant manager and whether or not he had a mad crush on a celebrity didn’t really matter because the celebrity certainly had no feelings for him, no matter how many times they’d kissed since meeting two days ago or exactly what had transpired the evening before.
People had crushes all the time. It happened. No shame in it. John wasn’t about to go around denying that he might have harbored some…feelings toward Sherlock that weren’t strictly about the Empire. And he wasn’t about to have a sexual identity crisis: that boat had sailed the first night that Sherlock had kissed him, and John had happily gone in for a second round. Besides, he’d had that particular white night years before, when Harry had leapt out of the closet with both feet. He’d come to the conclusion that he wasn’t…maybe. But then, he’d been eighteen. He would have shagged just about anything that moved and was offering.
Sherlock was offering. Maybe. John wasn’t sure what Sherlock was offering, but there was something being offered, and John might not have been eighteen anymore, but he was tempted to accept.
And anyway, it was just a week, it wasn’t as though they were headed for anything serious. John was a grown man, he’d had his share of flings and one-night stands. If he wanted to take Sherlock Bloody Holmes to bed and shag him rotten, he would do it and never mind anyone’s opinion.
The idea of shagging Sherlock Holmes was such a ridiculous one that John began to laugh to himself - not amused, just wry.
To John’s surprise, there was a moving van outside the Empire when he arrived. Mrs Hudson was sweeping the pavement when John walked up, and she waved him down.
“Isn’t it exciting?” she gushed. “I met him this morning, did I tell you?”
“Oh, God, Mrs Hudson, I’m sorry-”
“He was lovely, I think he rather liked my tart. I think he’s just an ogre for the show - better ratings, you know.”
A parade of men jumped down out of the van and headed into the Empire, empty-handed. John wasn’t entirely sure what they were doing, and half expected to see them come back out carrying the various items which had once decorated the walls.
“I can’t tell which of him is the show and which is the real him,” he said to Mrs Hudson absently.
“Oh, now, who would put on such a dour face unless they had to?” said Mrs Hudson.
The men returned, and it took a moment for John to realize that the long roll they carried between them was one of the rugs rolled up tight - the same rug that had hung on the east wall for the last three decades. John froze for a moment, and then jumped to action.
“Oi!” he shouted, and ran across the street. “Oi. What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?”
The men paid him no heed, but Sally Donovan stepped out from behind the truck, a clipboard in her hand. “Oh, there you are,” she said, relieved. “Where have you been? The butcher delivered the chickens and the sausage meats half an hour ago.”
John struggled to keep his temper as he watched another man come out of the restaurant, this time carrying a jewel-encrusted lamp. The tassels rocked back and forth, and the jewels glistened in the sunlight. “What the bloody fuck are you doing to my things?”
Sally frowned, and glanced at the clipboard. “Sherlock was meant to tell you - that freak. He probably forgot. We’re moving a few things out of the dining room.”
John counted to five. “Monday. This was all meant to happen on Monday. Not today. Not yet. He doesn’t get to chuck my menu and my stuff all in one go.”
Sally was calm. Had he been more rational, John might have been impressed with her composure under pressure. “It’s not being thrown away, John. We’re putting it in a storage unit. It will be perfectly safe until you decide what you want to have done with it.”
John turned and looked. It was true; the lamp, now sitting outside, was being wrapped in bubbles and tape. The rug was even rolled correctly, right-side out, and someone was covering it in paper and plastic to keep it safe from harm. John could see inside the windows: people were carefully removing things from the walls, using paper to protect them as they laid them in size-appropriate boxes. John, turned away from Sally, took the moment to compose himself.
By the time he turned back, he was calmer.
“I’m sorry,” he said automatically, and Sally, to her credit, smiled appreciatively.
“It’s all right. I should have thought to warn you before you left. The rest will wait until Monday, when you’re closed, but there’s so much in there, we wanted to get started today.”
“The rest?”
Sally nodded. “Carpet, wallpaper, new things for the walls. I don’t want to say much more - Greg likes to make the big reveal on film.”
“Yeah,” said John; he remembered the reveal from the show, the surprised and pleased and often teary expressions from the owners and chefs as they saw their new dining rooms, spruced and shining and gorgeous. Not every restaurant had such a complete overhaul; John hadn’t expected that they’d be in that number. “So what happens on Monday? Are we not even allowed to come in?”
“No idea,” admitted Sally. “Sherlock hasn’t really told me anything. I think-” She paused. “I think he’s not entirely sure what he’s doing, between you and me. I don’t mean that he’s winging it,” added Sally, quick to reassure him. “But…he’s normally so much more in control than he is. Normally he comes in the third day, and he knows exactly how to fix a restaurant. But this morning, he was still mulling over ideas. I don’t think he actually knew what he wanted to do until you arrived.”
“He seems to be doing all right now,” he said, and watched the movers carry out another round of boxes.
“Yes,” said Sally, but she sounded doubtful. “Anyway, you better go in, he’s been asking after you every ten minutes since the chickens arrived.”
John frowned. “He doesn’t want me to cook, does he?”
Sally shrugged. “Ask him.”
One of the movers appeared at John’s elbow, and John signed the paperwork almost absently. It was only as he was heading into the restaurant that Sally called out to him.
“John-”
John turned to her.
“Ah - your cane?”
John glanced down at the cane, still in his hand, still unused.
“Yeah,” he said. And because he couldn’t think of what else to say about it, didn’t say anything at all.
Once he saw the dining room, John realized that there wasn’t much that could be said, anyway. The bells on the door echoed in the room as it closed.
The dining room was empty.
Not really empty, of course - the furniture remained, but without the items on the walls, it seemed out of place - overly large and ostentatious. John could see the dust motes floating in the air. The walls were bare; it was obvious, looking at the bright red squares on the wallpaper, what had hung where, and John winced looking at them. Even in the dim afternoon sunshine spilling in from the street, the walls looked terrible.
The Johns, James, and Hamish Watson stared out from the rear wall onto their empty Empire, and John almost wanted to turn right around and go home. His throat was thick, either with the dust or with something else, and John had to gasp for air.
“Awful, isn’t it?” asked Harry, right behind him, and John swallowed. It wasn’t easy.
“Yeah,” said John. He was surprised how well he sounded.
“It’s like - every nightmare I ever had as a kid,” continued Harry.
John turned to her. “Your nightmares?”
Harry turned away and started to lift one of the larger maps of India. “You’re not the only one who grew up here, Johnny. This place is just as much a part of me as it is you.”
John closed his eyes for a moment. “I know. Harry…”
“No, it’s fine. It’s fine.” Harry stood, struggling with the large map. John set down the cane and went to help. Once he’d taken some of the weight, Harry stopped struggling and smiled at him. Her eyes were wet, and a bit pink at the edges. “Dust.”
“Hate that stuff,” agreed John, and helped her carry the map out the door and up to the truck outside.
*
[INTERIOR, Kitchen. Quick shots of knives cutting, slicing, dicing; cutting boards and wide dishes being washed; a box of vegetables being unpacked; raw chickens lined up in a row. The sounds of water splashing, the quick chopchopchop of a knife against a wooden cutting board, MOLLY and ARTIE talking animatedly, seriously, and a shot of MOLLY, brushing the hair out of her eyes, laughing.]
SHERLOCK v.o.: There is a marked difference between what occurs in a home kitchen, and what needs to occur in a restaurant kitchen. A home cook may have as much time as he or she needs to prepare a single meal, without interruption that could derail the entire operation. However, a restaurant chef is not so lucky. They must prepare not one, but a dozen completely different meals, all at the same time, all presented at the same time, each one piping hot the moment it reaches the customer. For this reason, home recipes can be difficult to recreate for the needs of food service.
[ARTIE holds up a head of garlic.]
ARTIE: What am I supposed to do with this?
MOLLY: Chop it?
ARTIE: Okay. How?
MOLLY: With a knife?
ARTIE: When I write my book, Molly, I’m leaving you out.
*
The kitchen was…not a mess, nor was it disorganized, but it looked a bit as if a cyclone had swept through. Every single flat surface was covered in trays, each one holding squares of what looked like slightly damp flatbread, pale and doughy. The kitchen was hot and steamy, and the scent of yeast hung in the air. It gave off a familiar, alcoholic taste to the air which seemed to result in the strange cheerful, bubbly mood that the three chefs were feeling, thought John. He watched as Molly pulled a tray of the square dough out of the oven, her feet twisting in an invisible, excited, stationary dance.
“That’s the last of it,” said Molly, pleased, and she turned to look for a place to put the tray. “Oh, hullo, John, you’re back!”
Sherlock looked up from the worktable, where he supervised Artie’s attempts to chop garlic. He didn’t say anything; John didn’t think he needed to, not the way his eyes searched John, and landed on John’s empty hands. John imagined he could see a slight smile on the bastard’s face, but it was gone a moment later, and Sherlock turned back to Artie.
“Are these done?” asked John, confused.
“Par-baked,” explained Molly, and she wedged the tray onto the warming table. “For the pizzas. We can bake them up quick once the orders come in. Harry said there’s reservations for sixty tonight, and she keeps getting requests for tomorrow and Tuesday, too.”
John’s fingers clenched around empty air again, and he wished he didn’t want the cane so badly.
“That’s good, that’s fine,” he said automatically.
“Molly,” said Sherlock quietly. “Please stay on task, there’s enough to be doing and talking to John is not on the list.”
“Right, sorry, Chef,” said Molly, flashing a last grin at John, and she turned back to the oven, switching it to a lower temperature. “Pie crusts next, Chef, they’ve been sitting long enough.”
John remembered the chocolate from the list, and he glanced around the kitchen. “Everything showed up already?”
“Indeed,” said Sherlock, and he sounded amused. “It would seem that most of the vendors were quite anxious to stop by with the orders. Artie, are you actively trying to slice your fingernails from your fingers? Because you are doing an admirable job in the attempt.”
“Sorry, Chef,” said Artie cheerfully. “I like a smaller knife. Easier to slip between the ribs.”
“Your bloodthirsty tendencies would alarm a lesser man, Artie,” said Sherlock dryly. He glanced at John again; his eyes lingered on the absent cane. His eyes seemed brighter, and when he spoke, John could hear the smug, satisfied tone. “Well. You’ve checked in with us, we’re busily trying to make your restaurant a success. So unless there’s something you’d like to discuss, we have quite a lot to be going on with today…”
John wished he’d brought the cane in, just for the comfort. Or maybe to pop Sherlock over the head. Asking after him every ten minutes, and then dismissing him nearly out of hand? “No, that’s…that’s all right.”
John left the kitchen; the moment the door swung shut behind him, he heard the chatter pick back up again. Molly asking a question, Sherlock answering, Artie adding a belligerent comment. No laughter, not as such, but it sounded…cheerful, excited, friendly. Familiar, in an odd way.
In the dining room, Mary was fast at work moving tables with Harry, setting them into place. The tables were solid, light-colored wood, with leaves that dropped or lifted depending on the size of the party, and the chairs, stacked by the walls, were a similar wood color.
“Let me help,” said John, stepping forward as Harry and Mary grunted and shoved.
“Heavy work,” said Harry quickly. “You’re meant to be taking it easy on your shoulder, remember. We’ve got it.”
“I can do the menus,” said John.
“Done,” said Mary.
“The ironing?” said Harry.
“The last time John ironed, he left scorch marks on my dress shirt,” said Mary. “And I’ll just end up doing them again anyway.”
“Never mind,” said John, disgruntled, and went into the office and slammed the door so hard the pile of menus on the desk toppled over.
John sighed, and picked them up to straighten them. The cardstock was thick and sturdy in his hands, and John wasn’t terribly surprised, despite the grocery list, that the menu was disturbingly short. Considering the disaster of the previous evening, however, maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing.
Roast chicken - pizza - bangers and mash…
It sounded, thought John, like every other typical British restaurant he’d ever eaten in. Boring, predictable, tame. Completely opposite the food the Empire had built its reputation on, everything James Watson had been trying to do in the first place. John resisted the urge to rip the menus to shreds, and instead, dropped them back down on the desk and sat heavily in the chair.
His shoulder throbbed a little, stiff and sore, and John rubbed his face with his hands before looking up at the bric-a-brac that surrounded him. The office, at least, was the same. Pictures lining the walls, recipes and books and all the bits and pieces that they could never quite fit in the dining room before. A filing cabinet with menus dating back sixty years, receipts and reviews and letters.
There was a knock on the door.
“Not now, Harry,” said John, and Harry knocked again. “Just - not now, Harry,” repeated John, and the door opened.
Mary poked her head through. “I thought you might need something.”
John sighed. “What?”
Mary slipped inside the office and closed the door carefully behind her. “You’re not using your cane.”
“Well spotted,” said John, irritated.
“Oh, no, John Watson,” said Mary, and John recognized the don’t-mess-with-me tone. “Don’t you sit there sulking and snapping out at anyone who reaches out to you. You put yourself in this mess and you are not allowed to sit here and wallow and bemoan the fact that Sherlock Holmes is doing exactly what you’ve asked him to do. I know you’re sulking and I know you’re liable to sit here and feel sorry for yourself all afternoon and Harry might think you have the right but I don’t.”
“I know,” said John. “Can I just…mourn a little?”
“Fine,” said Mary after a moment. “You have three minutes. Then get off your bloody arse and do something.”
“What? You and Harry clearly think I’m not up to moving furniture, and the menus are done. I can’t put in an order for Monday since Sherlock Bloody Holmes hasn’t kept me in the loop on what he’d like us to serve. Christ, would you even let me sweep if I asked?”
“If you can’t figure out how to help, John Watson, then you’re more fucked than I thought,” said Mary, and she slammed the door on her way out. John could hear it echo in the dining room, and wondered how many slams it would take before something fell off the wall entirely.
Chapter Eleven