TBB: Chapter Two
Mar. 13th, 2011 12:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
caulkheadI've finally met my neighbour across the landing in the apartment block! Makes me feel like Mrs Bennett announcing that Netherfield Hall is let at last, though at least Bingley wasn't gay which – a single girl's luck on this point being the same both sides of the Atlantic – my neighbour Sherringford pretty definitely is.
Sherringford! Pretty unbelievable name, huh? Sounds as if it ought to come with a stately manor house and peacocks on the terrace and the ghost of Anne Boleyn, wouldn't you think? Well, when I say the guy attached to the name is all that and more you'll see why my spotting this month's copy of the Advocate in his magazine rack, to say nothing of all the product in his bathroom when I sneaked a peek (Jesus, I'll swear this guy must even tint his eyelashes, and people have claimed I'm high maintenance) had me considering throwing myself in the Ship Canal. Only for a few minutes though, because after all, a girl setting out to find true love in a strange land needs a soul-mate to confide in, but one with the guts to tell it like it is.
And I think we are going to be soul-mates, truly; especially after I'd rescued his lost cat – oh, and Toby's the cutest thing on four paws you ever saw.
It happened like this...
"Where are we going?" Tim asked the driver of the black car which had arrived to collect him, unexpectedly, from the office that evening.
"Bit of a turn-up for the book, Cook's batting in the Ashes," the driver responded. "Shame about Collingwood, though."
Tim took the hint. They second-guessed the selectors until the driver dropped him on a West London street, a typical early nineteenth century terrace of white stucco fronts and black-painted doors, most of the houses now broken up into multiple occupancy.
"You want number 221A," the driver said helpfully. He fished down beside his seat. "And you're to give this to Mrs Hudson. Mr Holmes's compliments."
The Berry Bros bag he handed out to Tim contained – as Tim's cautious peek revealed – a bottle of Armagnac which seemed to have been laid down under the Third Republic.
He rang; the bell was answered by a woman of approximately the same vintage as the Armagnac. She reminded Tim powerfully of his own grandmother. Given his grandmother had been last heard from running a charter boat in the Caribbean in partnership with the retired proprietor of a successful chain of Amsterdam coffee shops, a man some thirty years her junior, he found the resemblance less reassuring than one might imagine.
She cooed enthusiastically at him. "Ah, you'll be Mycroft's new young man. He texted to say you were on your way. Come on in; the others are all here already."
New young man? He forced the implications of that firmly back behind a bland, official, all-purpose smile. "You'll be Mrs Hudson? He asked me to give you this."
He handed over the Armagnac. She beamed. "Such a sweet boy. I keep telling him he shouldn't, but he insists. Anyway, what can I get you? By the way, just a hint. Harry's mixing the cocktails, and she's got into a bit of a state about John, so don't be shy about asking for extra mixer if they come out a bit stronger than you were expecting."
"Actually, is there any chance of a glass of white wine?"
He followed Mrs Hudson into a kitchen where two young women were already sitting, one of them tapping away at a computer screen and the other wielding a cocktail shaker. The latter looked up as Tim entered. Her flushed face and slightly slurred diction suggested she'd been sampling her own mixes for some time.
"Oh. You must be Mycroft's new dogsbody, mustn't you? Well, you can try telling your fucking boss I don't give a monkey's about the so-called national interest; if that sodding Californian harpy gets her fucking fake talons into my baby brother, I'm coming round to his office and I'm going to twist his fucking goolies off."
"Harry!" the woman at the computer said in a reproving tone. "It's not – I'm sorry, I don't think I know your name – mine's Sarah – "
"It's Tim, dear," Mrs Hudson said from the doorway.
"Anyway, Harry, it's not Tim's fault. John volunteered. Anyway, Sherlock will kill her if she tries anything."
"Popcorn, anyone?" Another young woman put her head round the door. She was carrying two large paper bags, which she put on the table with a great deal of rustling. "It seemed appropriate. I can't believe the freak's met someone even freakier than he is."
Tim blinked helplessly. His smartphone beeped. He pulled it out of his pocket, and looked at the text on the screen.
WELCOME TO LIVE-BLOG THURSDAYS. TONIGHT, DIRECT FROM MANCHESTER. HAVE FUN. MYCROFT
There had been a certain amount of trouble with the set-up. He had refused point-blank to go with the pseudo-intellectual setting that Mycroft had favoured. ("There are many things I would do for my country – there are many things I have done for it – but reading Hardy in a bar on Canal Street is not going to be one of them"). They had decided in the end to engineer a chance meeting. He hoped Sherlock's acting skills were up to it. He hoped his own were. Or, more likely, that boundless self-absorption would cover up any slips that they might make.
John checked his watch one more time, then headed round the corner into Chorlton Street.
Major Watson had not been unaware of the effect of a well-cut uniform on a body in halfway good shape. After months in M&S jumpers, the high-street equivalent of full camouflage, John was surprised to find that the suit – a uniform of a different kind – appeared to be having something of the same effect. By the time he was half-way down the street, he'd attracted a number of admiring glances, and two whistles. Thus, his confusion was not entirely feigned when he found himself quite literally walking into a familiar tall figure arm-in-arm with an intense-looking woman in – he couldn't help but notice – an almost gynaecologically short skirt.
“I'm so sorry,” he spluttered, attempting to pick himself up from the tangle of limbs and umbrellas on the pavement. “My fault entirely. Are you alright, Miss, errr, Miss...”
He was still ealizedng when a strong, wiry arm reached down to haul him to his feet. “Not at all, not at all.” Pale eyes stared into his own, widened a little – rather obviously, John thought. A pale hand smoothed down the lapel on his jacket. “You've had a nasty shock. You must allow us to buy you a drink.”
Woo! Adventures in bed-buying!
No – I haven't succeeded in my quest within my first month in Manchester. But I had a foretaste of what furniture shopping as a couple feels like – that sympathetic assistant in John Lewis's store out at Handforth Green certainly assumed me and Incredibly Cute Trauma Specialist were an item – and, hey, I could get used to that.
But that's leaping ahead. At about three am this morning I came the closest I've been so far to throwing in the towel. I'd told myself I knew I'd have times like this – when the cliff-face above me looked like more than any human could be expected to climb – but this was the first time I'd actually experienced what it felt like.
It was Sherringford who pulled me out of it – shows why every girl needs a gay guy confidante in the flat next door. Specially one who's even more of a night owl than me. I wouldn't have dreamed of knocking on his door at that time if I hadn't been sure he was awake – and alone. He's a musician – though judging by his clothes and the rent for the apartments in this block, he has to be a trust fund baby – and he'd been playing Cole Porter on the violin all evening. To be honest, that might have contributed to my mood – there's only so many times a single girl can hear "So Nice to Come Home To" without it getting to her.
Anyway, he couldn't have been sweeter to me and it was his idea to tell me to put the quest on hold for 24 hours, and he'd take me for cocktails in the Village in the evening. Where, as luck would have it, we bumped into Incredibly Cute Trauma Specialist. Literally bumped into him – the poor guy went sprawling. Of course, Sherringford offered to buy him a drink by way of apology. You should have seen the guy's face when he spotted the rainbow flag above Coyotes. Turned out he was new in town – he's a visiting lecturer in advanced trauma and wound care at the Medical School – and he hadn't even ealized he was in the gay district! Sherringford ealized instantly he'd dropped a brick, and we ended up – after a short walk through Piccadilly Gardens and down Market Street – in this incredible Victorian relic with original green glazed tiles on the walls and a wine-list the size of the Gutenberg bible. Much more Incredibly Cute Trauma Specialist's scene – kind of traditional but still quirky.
And after that one thing led to another.
"Oh, that'll be Sherlock skyping in," Mrs Hudson said as the computer screen changed. "Just click on the answer button, will you dear?"
Tim blinked as Harry muscled past to within six inches at the screen, leaned forward and screamed, "YOU LET THAT BLOODY HARPY BUY A BED WITH MY BROTHER!!!"
Sarah and Sally looked at each other, shrugged, and stepped forward in unison, grasping Harry firmly under the armpits.
"Come and lie down," Sarah suggested. "You'll feel much better about it in the morning. Well, once you stop feeling as if a terminally ill giraffe had decided to choose your mouth as its final resting place."
"FOR THE LAST TIME, I AM NOT DRUNK. I AM JUST VERY, VERY UPSET."
"Actually," the man in the Skype window said dispassionately, "I think Harry is more upset than she's drunk. Quite a bit of both, though. Try giving her two pints of sparkling mineral water and half a tin of anchovies; it'll help with the rehydration. And, Harry, I am just as bothered about the bed-buying bit as you are. She shamelessly traded on the fact that both the John Lewis's in Manchester are in out of town locations with no decent public transport links. And John is currently in possession – courtesy of my bloody brother – of a Mercedes CLS 320 Grande Edition."
Tobermory made his entrance just as Sherlock was snapping shut the lid of the laptop.
"Something of a waste of taxpayers' money, that car, wouldn't you say?"
"He's capable of having shelled out himself for the rental," Sherlock said darkly. "Where were you? If it's sushi you want, I can order out. You really don't need to spend your days around the ground floor restaurant's dustbins."
"Temper, temper," warned the cat. "I've never seen you this wound up. Don't you trust Major Watson to see this to the desired end?"
"Define 'desired end'," Sherlock grumbled. "Really, I could break into her flat in five minutes, find this USB stick and end this charade."
"Well, what makes you think Mycroft's usual posse couldn't? I know they're not you, but surely that woman can't have thought of an unguessable hiding place?"
"Sellotaped inside the trapdoor to her bathtub's plumbing," Sherlock said. "Unfortunately, she's an American used to working from home. She has backed it up on Google Docs."
Ooooh, dodged a bullet there.
So, on the way back from John Lewis, the Incredibly Cute Trauma Specialist asked me how I'd come to be without a bed. Well, I couldn't tell him that, could I? On the other hand, that sounded pretty flirty to me. So I thought I'd take the bull by the horns instead, and asked him if he'd like to come up and try out the new bed with me. Of course, I knew straight away I'd put my foot in it. He went bright pink all over – adorable, really – and nearly drove the car into a lamppost. I guess Brits just aren't used to us up-front American girls. Must remember to take things a bit more slowly.
So, I asked him up for a drink anyway – I couldn't quite hear what he said in response – it sounded like "To see your collection of stamps?", but it couldn't have been, could it? Anyway, cut a long story short, he came!
Could he be The One? Seriously, who knows? But MCR has thrown us together, and I think, I really do, that perhaps this is Fate.
I had thought Sherlock was being unnecessarily neurotic, calling "unexpectedly" on our neighbour just before she was due to depart on Operation Handforth Green and holding her door ajar while he interrogated her about whether she needed him to pick up anything for her from the corner shop and giving her an inordinately fussy tutorial on the difference between continuous springs, posture springs and pocketed springs, while I slipped unnoticed past and concealed myself in the bathroom until she had departed.
However, while Stanley might have been mildly chuffed to encounter Livingstone, Cortez a trifle pleased with the view from Darien and Xenophon and his ten thousand broken out into a spontaneous chorus of "We do like to be beside the sea-side" on encountering the Black Sea, their reactions paled into insignificance when, at a crucial moment following their return from John Lewis's, I chose to announce my presence in the flat with a plaintive "miaoul". In fact, John clasped me to his manly bosom, whispering, "Beam me up Scotty and there's a blue-fin tuna platter in it for you" into my ears under the guise of making soothing noises.
Which may have backfired a little, because the sight of a grown, attractive, apparently well-heeled and unquestionably heteroxexual single man making a besotted idiot of himself over a cat in distress would have been enough to turn the head of a much less Linda-Blairite woman than we were dealing with.
All was looking lost when, mercifully, John's phone beeped; the sound it uses to announce an appointment rather than an incoming call or text message (being around Sherlock rubs off, even on a cat).
He looked down at it, grabbed his coat, and dashed for the door. "I'm most awfully sorry," he said, "but my sister's favourite author's doing a signing session at the Waterstone's on Deansgate. It's Harry's birthday coming up – I have to get down there."
"Well, what are we waiting for? We can easily get a cab on Whitworth Street," That Woman responded. I saw John cast me a look of despair, but what could I do? At least the taxi would have a third party present and the scrummage of an autograph session in a large bookshop might afford him other escape routes.
Besides, I had a strong suspicion who had just chosen to take a hand in the game, and I am not a cat to ignore which side my Aga is warmed.
If J. was looking for Good Copy I, who was I to stand in her way?
"John, darling, how adorable of you to drop by!" She leaped up from the table, narrowly avoiding sending a pile of hardbacks flying, and drew him into an enthusiastic embrace, "And how are you settling in? But I'll find that all out at your dinner party on Saturday, of course. Darling of you to invite Sandy and Nicky, too; you've no idea how dreary it is for the pair of them, looking at each other from either end of a thirty foot mahogany dining table when they've no guests at the Castle; Nicky's been reduced to serving quail's eggs with a ping-pong bat at Sandy just to relieve the boredom. I really couldn't have left them on their own, even though it's been an age since I've seen you; you're looking much healthier than you did at the investiture but then, the lighting at Buck House would make anyone look like an Arbroath smoky. Anyway, lovely to see you, but duty calls."
URGENT. DID MYCROFT LEAVE ANY WHISKY IN THAT SHAG PAD OF YOURS? MINE'S A TRIPLE.
"You can't be seen entering my flat under any circumstances. At this time of night it takes twelve minutes 17.35 seconds to get from Whitworth Street to Didsbury and my driver can be here in four minutes. The house whisky supplies are in the downstairs cloakroom. Mine is a Springbank 17 y.o but I recommend the Prince's Feathers Islay Special Edition. Don't drink the place dry in the next half hour – being the Gay Best Friend's no bed of roses either."