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When John opened the door to 221b, he barely got a few steps in before he noticed. It was too quiet and dark to have anyone else in the flat. Granted, Sherlock could be doing some sort of mould experiment that needed complete darkness and silence, but usually John would be usually warned about that type of situation with a text.
Usually warned.
“Sherlock? Are you here somewhere?”
No answer, and John felt that just the right level of ridiculous to make himself internally cringe. In his late thirties and calling out to his equally adult flatmate to come out wherever he was like they are in a spontaneous game of hide and go seek. This type of behaviour would get Ella sending him another reminder email to set up their next visit.
With a sigh and a shrug off of his coat, John made it to his chair. A small amount of outside street light streamed in through the window, and created just enough of a golden glow to the surfaces of furniture around for John to decide that he had enough light to be getting on with. He closed his eyes, and almost instantly every muscle he’d overworked that day burned in remembrance for his decision to work on Christmas Eve.
In hindsight, John should have known those four back to back phone calls that morning from Sarah meant John’s day off would no longer be that. The clinic ended up close to bursting with people in various states of that horrible flu bug, and just a few hours turned into a grueling ten and a half shift. Sarah actually hugged him as he finally headed out, and if John hadn’t been nearly delirious with exhaustion he’d have hugged her back.
On a case?
Even sending that quick text to Sherlock was enough to drain the small amount of energy that John collected whilst sitting in his chair. He‘d have to gather up more energy to give Harry a call to reconfirm tomorrow’s meet up time, and his sister in full Christmas spirit would do him in for the rest of the night. Harry on a regular day was draining, but Harry during her yearly holiday pub crawl with Clara in tow was tantamount to a mental 5k run.
Yes, of sorts. Be back in ten minutes. - SH
It showed how tired John was that it took a full twenty seconds to understand that Sherlock’s reply was in direct response to John’s previous message. God, John needed to go to bed soon.
Yet he wanted to at least wish Sherlock a merry Christmas Eve before he showered and crawled underneath his warm blankets. Between Sherlock being unable to shake off his parent’s Christmas Day invitation and his own promise to his sister to come around to her house before noon, this would be the last time they’d be under the same roof until tomorrow night. Not that John would really have the ability to miss Sherlock in under twelve hours, but there was something about the holiday season that gave gravitas to every moment with the detective that John didn’t have the mental spoons to parse out.
“Why are you sitting in the dark?”
John groaned, head tilted at an odd angle before he sat more upright in his chair. Dozing off hasn’t been the plan for how he spent ten minutes waiting for Sherlock to return, yet here he was. Then he groaned again when the sitting room light was switched on, and the room was quickly and painfully bright.
“Sherlock, warn a soldier before you toss out a flash grenade.”
John heard a warm chuckle, followed by the sweep of Sherlock’s coat as he formally entered the sitting room. Clutched in his right hand was a large paper bag that crinkled as it was placed on the floor in between their chairs.
“Been busy, have you?” John asked, already much more awake than he’d been moments before. He leaned forward as Sherlock crouched over and began to root through the bag.
“I decided that the flat needed a more festive atmosphere,” Sherlock replied, then pulling out an incredibly small fake Christmas tree that John had ever seen.
The tree reminded John of a slightly bushier version of what Charlie Brown ended up in that famous Christmas special. To be fair though, this tree more than likely would be able to hold up more than one red bulb. As John stared at the tiny tree, Sherlock continued to tug more items out of the bag - including a package of ornaments shaped like little drums and a small box of miniature candy canes.
“You said that it didn’t make sense to decorate since we’d not be here on Christmas,” John reminded, though he couldn’t help but grin.
“Well, I changed my mind, obviously.”
Sherlock’s gaze went somewhat dodgy, then his still gloves hands began to fidget with the drum ornaments. John joined in without another word, opening up the only box of fairy lights and wrapping them around the tree. Next came the candy canes, so delicate that a couple of them didn’t make it out of their box before snapping in two. John gently placed them off to the side as casualties of war to be eventually eaten by the New Year.
When they finished, the little tree sparkled with what John finally realised was the best Pound Land could offer on a hurried last minute decision by the world’s only consulting detective. He imagined a frantic Sherlock Holmes going down the narrow aisles in his overpriced Belstaff, harassing the overworked staff as to whether a gold star would clash too much with silver-white attempt at snow on the tree’s branches.
The tree - much like the two men who’d decorated it - was much more than the sum of its parts. It was strong, durable, and if given enough time and energy, could be quite beautiful in its own unique way. John allowed the metaphor to settle into the weariness of his bones, and knew that this just before Christmas was different.