Once upon a time, things didn’t go horribly wrong.
The world didn’t end, the sky didn’t fall, and irene Adler didn’t lose everything she’d ever loved.
For whatever reason, Alex never used Sean against the people who loved him most. Maybe she decided that the damage had already been done. Maybe she planned on doing something more later. Whatever the reason though, it didn’t matter. She allowed for a happy ending. Or at least a happier one.
Irene didn’t give up streetwalking. At least not right away. Raising a child takes a lot of money, money that they didn’t have a whole lot of options towards getting. So lots of nights, she worked all night. Eventually she got better at it- a little neater, a little bit more expensive... she out her name in with a service to get more calls during the day, and took lessons in stunting and domination so she had a specialty to offer. One that earned her enough clients that she could leave the service all together and become picky about the work she did.
To offset the changes, Irene always took more work. Odd work. Work that one could put on a form. Cocktail waitress, bartender fill in, club dancer. Legal, if not something to be proud of.
Sherlock and Irene got married a few years after Sean was born. It wasn’t ever exactly ideal- they both knew it wasn’t- it was about stability and taxes and having someone to come home to. It was about lying to other people and pretending things were normal for Sean. But they went about it as best they could and a friends and it worked most of the time even as they lived in different directions- Sherlock becoming a successful detective and Irene maintaining close criminal ties to the London underworld. Sherlock got John to help him. Irene got Kate. Sherlock went from musician to investigator, Irene went from prostitution to a short stint in opera (first in ballet and then in voice) and back again as the dominatrix who brought a nation to it’s knees.
All her life Irene fought her drinking. She did manage to cut her smoking down quite a bit, but never cut it out completely. It became habit to have a glass or two each day and as long as her routines stayed in place, she was fine. She also spent quite a lot of time fighting depression and memory, things that were equally difficult to pull out of.
At the age of forty Irene found herself having certain episodes of memory lapse and a change in personality. While spread out and strange, they were worrying enough to consult a neurologist. They found her mind deteriorating from genetic defects at a rapid pace and early onset. While they try to control it, there is no doubt that soon she will lose her mind completely.
Irene no longer sees clients except one on request, she still lives with Sherlock, and is spending the time she has remaining as herself to be with her family. It’s not an idea life, but for Irene Adler-Holmes, this is as happy as life gets, and she is thankful.
