Title: Will You Remember in the Morning?
Fandoms: Sherlock
Characters: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Rating: Teen
Word Count: 1117
Summary: John drags Sherlock to the Yard's New Year's party. John gets drunk and Greg offers Sherlock a bit of friendly advice.
Inspired works:
In the Morning Light by
beltainefaerie Sherlock sipped at the light beer that had been shoved into his hand by Lestrade the moment they’d walked through the door. He and John had been invited to the Yard’s annual New Year’s party, and, somehow John had convinced Sherlock that attending would be fun. John had promptly disappeared, surely flirting with more insufferable women, leaving Sherlock to watch London’s finest dissolve into drunken stupors. The party was at a community hall, and the detective was fairly certain there was a limit to how much alcohol could be served in such locations, but no one seemed to care at the moment.
It was nearly an hour before he caught sight of John again. He was fumbling his way through the crowd, beer in one hand, looking around aimlessly. It would have been more of a scene if John had been the only one drunk off his arse, but seen as half the Yard was in just about the same state no one took much notice of him. Pushing away from the wall he had so diligently been occupying Sherlock made his way over to John and caught him around the elbow just in time as John teetered a bit too far to one side.
“Having fun?” Sherlock asked with a raised eyebrow as John turned to face him.
John’s face lit up as he realized who had caught him from falling. “Sherlock! You’re ‘ere.” He exclaimed, his already flushed cheeks turning a darker shade of pink. “‘M so glad you came.”
Sherlock’s lips pressed into a firm line. Not only had John drug him to this ridiculous event, he didn’t even remember. Dropping John’s arm he shook his head.
“I was just leaving. Have fun John,” he bit shortly as he turned to leave. He didn’t bother to hide the contempt from his voice, though he knew it wasn’t as if John would notice in his state.
Tripping over his own feet John grabbed at the cuff of Sherlock’s coat. “No, D-don’t go.” John said rapidly.
Sherlock turned to glare down at John, but his features softened as he was met with John’s open expression. Flushed cheeks, dilated pupils, slurred speech. He was drunk there was no doubt about that, but he wasn’t off perusing the many single women, he wanted Sherlock to stay.
When Sherlock didn’t respond right away John added, “Stay... I’ll make it worth your while.”
“Oh really?” he responded, looking nonplussed by the remark.
John flushed to the point that the tips of his ears turned a deep red, but he bit his lip in response. Sherlock wondered if John would remember any of this, but after a long moment he nodded, granting him a brilliant smile from his drunk blogger.
“Come on. They were convincing Donovan to sing karaoke before I left.” John’s hand slipped from Sherlock’s coat sleeve to his hand, their fingers easily intertwining. “We have to film that.”
Sherlock allowed himself to be led through the party, but all of his attention was focused on his hand. He’d taken John’s hand before, leading him through the streets of London to safety, but John had never initiated that sort of contact.
It didn’t take long to make their way over to the smaller room where the karaoke machine had been set up. John dropped Sherlock’s hand to pull out his phone, holding it out over the crowd to record the woman’s atrocious singing. Sherlock was fairly certain she wouldn’t be heard on the audio over the sound of the party behind them, but he decided to forego this information, not wanting to ruin John’s fun.
After a few moments John’s free hand found Sherlock’s again, not quite grabbing the detective’s hand, but brushing the back of their knuckles against each other. Sherlock’s brow furrowed, but he didn’t say anything as John sidestepped back into Sherlock so they were flush. His mouth felt uncharacteristically dry. John was straight, and adamantly so, drunk or not Sherlock couldn’t deduce what he was playing at and that thought frightened him.
After a few minutes Donovan was replaced on the makeshift stage(a table with a sheet over it) by Anderson, which by some miracle actually sounded worse than Donovan.
John pressed forward into the crowd attempting to obtain better blackmail, leaving Sherlock more than a little dazed and confused. He was startled from his reverie by a hand on his shoulder.
“So...” Lestrade began, “You and John.”
Sherlock watched the back of John’s head disappear into the crowd before responding. “I don’t know what you’re referring to.”
Lestrade threw his hands up in a placating gesture, “I’m not trying to say anything bad... I mean everyone knows there’s something different between the two of you, I just didn’t know John actually swung that way.”
“He doesn’t.” Sherlock spat, shoving his hands in his pockets. John had made it abundantly clear, over and over again that he was not gay and that he and Sherlock were not, in any uncertain terms, together.
“Sorta seemed that way.” Lestrade laughed.
“He’s drunk.” Sherlock bit out. Lestrade obviously hadn’t had nearly as much to drink as the rest of his team, and when Sherlock shot him an angry stare he stopped laughing.
“Sorry mate,” he offered, “but being drunk doesn’t suddenly make you play for the other team. You should have seen him before he went and found you, was going on about how brilliant you are... Maybe he just needs a push in the right direction.”
“And if he doesn’t remember?” Sherlock said softly, his normal defenses dropping uncharacteristically.
Lestrade raised his eyebrows, studying Sherlock for a moment before responding. “I’m not going to tell you what to do Sher, I just think it’s about time you both saw the light on this.” He paused for a moment before clapping Sherlock on the shoulder and heading in the opposite direction, leaving the detective a bit less confused than before.
A few moments later Anderson finished his atrocious performance and John found his way back to Sherlock.
“I have enough blackmail for a decade.” John laughed as he toppled in to Sherlock. Instinctually the detective caught him around the middle with one arm to keep him from falling. As he helped John back to his feet their faces came within an inch of each other, John’s eyes darted to Sherlock’s lips as he licked his own.
“John-” Sherlock started a little breathlessly as the wide blue eyes of his blogger dilated further, but whatever Sherlock had planned to say was forgotten as John tipped forward, pressing his lips to Sherlocks in a wet drunken kiss.
Sherlock froze for a moment before his hand moved to cup the back of John’s neck. The kiss was sloppy and uncoordinated, and when they pulled apart the detective felt as though all of the air had been ripped from his chest.
“I’m really glad you decided to show up tonight,” John slurred out, leaning against Sherlock.
Sherlock swallowed hard, trying to process what had just happened, before finally answering.
“Me too.”