Sherlock’s midlife crisis
Pairing: Sherlock Holmes x Reader
rating: teen
word count: ~ 2,040 words
summary: You once were Sherlock assistant and secretly had a crush on him. One day, he visits you on his birthday out of the blue and this is just the first of many meetings... You begin to wonder why he’s visiting you and if it’s possible that he got attached to you.
a/n: this is dedicated to @sherlockeddetective I hope you enjoy it <3
It had been a long time since you saw him last, long enough for a normal human to forget your name or at leastr your address. But, as you had discovered quickly, Sherlock Holmes was anything but ordinary.
You wouldn’t have expected him to show up on your doorstep on your birthday though. Humans did not mean anything to him, he was a sociopath, his emotions were a mystery to everyone around him, himself included.
He waved a little, after ringing the door about a hundred times and you finally opened the door.
“I won’t take parcels for my neighbour-“, you began, but your eyes recognized the familiar face in less than a second and you stopped talking, a little flustered.
“You might want to let me in, Y/N”, Sherlock said, his face without the hint of an expression.
“Oh, oh right… Why are you here , Holmes?”, you ask, trying to imitate the neutral tone in which Sherlock had spoken to you, but definitely failing.
“If my memory is right, which it is 99,9% of all cases, today is your birthday.”
“I never told you my birthd-“, you started again but regretted it immediately. Sherlock walked past you, sat down on a chair in your kitchen and placed a small present in front of you.
How did he know your birthday? You did not want to know, it was best to not question the master detective sometimes. You, as his former assistant, knew that better than anyone.
“How’s life without me?”, he asked, smiling, but you were not quite sure if that meant anything.
You didn’t dare to try answer that question, Sherlock would know your answer already. Boring, that was what it was. But boring seemed nice to you a lot of times. Being home, reading nice books, eating chocolate, those were the best things in life, even though you missed the danger on rare occasions. The adrenaline you felt whenever Holmes was present…
But all these thoughts disappeared the second you opened his present. You had never told him that you liked chocolate, had you?
“No need to try impress me, Sherlock”, you say, staring at the chocolate in front of you.
After that, he said goodbye to you and left as quickly as he had arrived.
That was the first time you had seen him in ages. Maybe it was sentiment that had driven him here, but that seemed so unusual for a man like him.
In fact, it seemed unusual that Sherlock cared about anyone ever.
Your thoughts wandered often after that day, to him and to the reasons why he had been here. You tried to get to a conclusion, but back then, you had been too surprised to look for clues. Even if you had, it was Sherlock Holmes and he was not readable, he was not like other people….
Except that, maybe he was. He had brought you chocolate after all.
It was difficult getting used to someone who appeared whenever the hell he wanted to and the next time he knocked on your door was just a shock as that time on your birthday.
It was Christmas.
This time, you did not greet him.
You opened the door slowly and let him in.
“So, don’t you have better things to do than be here?”, you asked him.
“Oh, you can’t be serious. There’s nothing more boring than Christmas with my family. You should know that, Y/N”
“Oh, yeah sorry. So why you’re honouring me with your presence?”, you said, hoping he would hear the deep sarcasm in your voice.
“To talk about my latest case, since John takes a long time to write the blog and doesn’t wanna listen to me”
“How’s John?”
“Oh, the usual. I have to admit, its gotten a lot more boring since he has to take care of Rosie”
The first three years after Mary’s death and after they had moved in back together, you had helped Sherlock. John had been busy teaching Rosie. Sherlock helped on the weekends, but you had noticed that he was a great detective but particularly bad with kids.
Well… Bad was not the right word, he was entertaining to them. But maybe it had not been the right decision to teach Rosie about serial killers and how to catch one. After that chaos, John had decided to not leave the two alone.
“Why aren’t you with him on Christmas?”
“I already told you, I wanna talk to you about my newest case, Y/N, do I have to tell you everything twice?”
That calmed you down a little. This was the Sherlock you knew and had started to like a lot, maybe more than you’d like to admit.
He told you about his case, about the subjects and the way he miraculously found out how it had happened.
He ended with the words: “But it was pretty boring, actually.”
This was followed by him dropping a bar of your favourite chocolate on your table.
“Boring?! There’s a serial killer in your street and not one person of Scotland Yard had any idea and… You find it boring? You’re getting old, aren’t you? It might be a midlife crisis or something”, you told him, a smile on your lips and Sherlock answered nothing, he just shook his head wildly.
“Of course not”, you added, “the great Sherlock Holmes wouldn’t get anything like a midlife crisis.”
Sherlock looked at you in confusion.
“I never know when you’re joking, Y/N. Either you’re madly in love with me or you don’t mean anything you say.”
You almost choked on your chocolate bar, but you have practise in not letting your feelings shine through so…
“Hmm… You might never know”, you just answered with a soft smile.
This time, Sherlock seemed a little confused as he was leaving. But that didn’t do any harm, it was only justified to make him feel like the poor people around him he confused every day. Like you.
He did not show up on your next birthday. You had to admit that you missed him at least a little. And if not him, the chocolate was delicious.
So why did he not show up this time? Maybe your doubt had been right all along, he did not care about you. This was just a mood, just some attention seeking, maybe he visited all his former assistants sometimes.
At least you were sure of this until you noticed the parcel standing in front of your door, outside in the rain.
You opened it. Five bars of your favourite sort of chocolate in front of you, and a note. The note was written in a familiar messy handwriting and had been pinned onto the parcel. You had no idea why the hell Sherlock had thought it to be a good idea to put a parcel in front of her door, while it was raining, and just leave without saying anything.
You started reading the note and froze-
“Dear Y/N,
Apologies for not visiting you on your birthday, have this chocolate. I simply just think it is easier to invite you this way instead of living through the awkwardness of telling you in person. I want to invite you to my birthday celebration, as a reward for your loyalty and company in all these years. My birthday Is the 6th of January, be in Bakerstreet at about tea time.
SH”
Why would he do that? You had no idea but you also did not really have a choice. You couldn’t just simply say you did not have time, Sherlock would see right through that.
Since all of this had started, the presents and the surprise visits, you had started to wonder about his motivation.
Just out of nowhere, he had appeared. After a long time, after not even talking to you, not even a call or a note, he just stood in front of your door.
But there was no reason to be surprised, this was just the way Sherlock Holmes was, nothing new, was it?
Maybe it was not that surprising, maybe it was just something Sherlock liked to do when he was bored and had nothing to distract him. Still, there was a little hope left. Possibly, Sherlock Holmes needed you, possibly… Possibly he liked you?
And you would find out soon enough.
Time passed quickly and you found yourself standing in front of 221B a few weeks later.
A little nervous, a little excited. What could Sherlock’s birthday be like? Would it involve corpses and tea and violins playing in the background? You simply couldn’t stand still and wait, again and again you looked up to the window of Sherlock’s living room and rang the door bell. The poor Mrs Hudson, you thought to yourself, but your impatience was bigger than your empathy for the owner.
You heard her usual “I’M NOT YOUR HOUSE KEEPER!” before she opened the door.
Mrs Hudson had the same warm smile on her lips as always. You hadn’t met her as often as John or Sherlock, but you definitely understood why Sherlock was so fond of this old lady. She was fierce and independent and lovable and sometimes she reminded you of yourself.
“Y/N! Lovely to see ya, Sherlock told me you’d be coming. He’s in the living room but be careful, I had to take his gun away cause he was starting to destroy the carpet out of excitement. He missed you, I’m sure” You smiled a little, not sure if you should feel flattered or uneasy.
But you decided to feel charmed, you were used to this, to this unusual man and the people that were more of a family to him than his brother.
“Oh, John’s left an hour ago by the way”, Mrs Hudson said after dropping you off in front of the flat door. That and the fact that Sherlock was alone in his flat made you doubt this situation.
Sherlock sat on his carpet when you came in.
“Hi”, was all he said and he just stared at his seat.
“Happy Birthday, Sherlock”, you said and smiled, before sitting down next to him.
Something seemed different about him, you saw it in his eyes the moment he looked up to you.
“Thank you, Y/N. I… You must be wondering why we’re alone, since its supposed to be a celebration. I didn’t call you here for my birthday alone, its nothing special. I just… Felt the need to tell you something.”
You did not let him finish whatever speech he had planned.
“Why did you leave a note?”
“That’s what people do, leave notes”
You rolled your eyes at him.
“Why didn’t you visit me like usually? Why did you visit me in the first place? I’m sorry, but this is just confusing. I can’t read your mind, Sherlock, no matter how hard I try. Just say, what do you even want from me? I have no use for you anymore, I’m not gonna help you with cases, you don’t need me to take care of Rosie and I am in no means any smarter than you. So, why this?”
Sherlock sighed.
“Look, Y/N, isn’t enough to like someone to visit them?”
Your heart skipped a beat.
“You what?” “I like you, Y/N, sometimes I really think you’re deaf and just forgot to tell me”
You didn’t know what to answer to that, especially because the room seemed to be spinning all around you. Was this a heart attack? Your mind went through symptoms and you didn’t seem to be going through a heart attack, but still, your heart was beating against your rip case strongly and fast enough to feel like it was going to jump out.
Sherlock Holmes liked you.
“Ugh, say something. Don’t leave me confused, Y/N. I don’t like being confused, you know that best. What are you gonna do about this?”
You didn’t answer his question but instead you planted a kiss on his cheek. This had definitely been worth all the waiting. Seeing Sherlock Holmes blush was a rare experience and you loved it.
Sherlock looked up at you, a little suspicious.
“C’mon Sherlock, take a hint.” “I guess this means you like me too?”
You nodded, smiling a little. Whatever this was, this was just the beginning and you would enjoy every second of it.
