Chapter Text
Chapter soundtrack: Be My Baby, The Ronettes
.........................................................................................
That was the summer of 1961, when everybody called me Johnny, and it didn't occur to me to mind.
That was before President Kennedy was shot.
Before the Beatles stormed America.
When I couldn’t wait to go to medical school and join the Army.
That was the summer we went to the Copper Beeches.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………..
John sighs and closes his copy of Grey’s Anatomy and lets his eyes drift shut. The salt-tinged air near the coast is beginning to wash through the open windows of his father’s car, the sun warm on his skin. Only another half an hour or so until they are there – The Copper Beeches, a resort owned by one of his father’s more grateful patients.
John honestly wasn’t looking forward to an entire month stuck on the Southern coast with his parents and sister, not when all of his friends were enjoying one last summer of freedom before they all parted ways for whatever life held for them. Well, except for Harry. He was stuck with her regardless.
Harry. John watches her fiddling with her hair, touching up her fringe and straightening the wide white band holding the rest back. She catches him watching and sticks her tongue out at him. He flicks her arm and she squeals.
“Mother! Johnny’s poking me!”
“Johnny,” comes his mother’s ever-patient voice. “Stop teasing your sister.”
John rolls his eyes. “Grow up, Harry,” he says, and ignores her when she flips him the bowfinger.
…………………………………………………………………………
“And over on the south lawn we have cricket, and in the gazebo there are complimentary dance lessons,” the loudspeaker announces, as John and his family gaze across a large lawn, bordered by a flower garden full of late summer roses and lilac. The sound of a small fountain can barely be heard over the distant, droning roar of the sea and the breeze. John thinks it’s actually quite lovely. Maybe even peaceful. There were certainly enough places to duck out and hide from—
“Mother!” Harry screeches, watching a porter carrying a large rack of dresses and another pushing a large cart of matching luggage up the winding path to the main house. “I knew I should have brought those coral shoes! They would have looked sublime with that cobalt dress!”
“You’ve got plenty of shoes,” their mother says, placating. “Your silver ones will look lovely, I promise.”
“Not having a specific pair of shoes isn’t a tragedy,” John’s father says, lifting a bag and dropping it onto the attendant’s waiting cart. “A tragedy is miners killed in an explosion, or a massive earthquake.”
“Monks setting themselves in fire in protest,” John can’t help adding. Christ, what a complete flake.
Harry just rolls her eyes at him. “Shut up, Johnny.”
John and his father just smirk at each other. Harry may be his sister, but you’d never know they were related with how absolutely empty her head can be at times. Parties and fashion, friends and schemes. That’s all she has time for.
Not John. He has his plans – medical school and the army. He wants to make a difference. Be in the world and of the world. To be great surgeon, like his father.
“Robert,” a voice calls, and John turns to see a tall, dark-haired man in a light suit striding down the path from the main house. John’s father grins and reaches out to shake the man’s hand.
“Mycroft! It’s been years. So pleased to see you,” John’s father beams. “Valerie, you remember Mycroft Holmes.”
“Of course,” John’s mother says, smiling. “Lovely to see you again. And thank you so much for the invitation. It’s been ages since Robbie had a holiday.”
“Of course, of course. I’m delighted you’re here at last. And these must be your children, John and Harriet.” Mycroft holds out his hand.
“Pleased to meet you,” John says, shaking Mycroft’s hand. It’s warm and soft, his fingers so long they enclose John’s hand entirely. He really is quite tall, especially next to John’s father.
Mycroft releases his hand, and studies him for a long moment. “Yes, so obviously Robert Watson’s son,” he murmurs. “Medical school and then the military for you, then, is it?”
John’s startled. “Um, yes, sir. I start at Cambridge in the fall term.”
Mycroft nods, and John feels as if he’s passed some sort of test. “Excellent. And you, Harriet? What shall you grace the world with?”
Harry giggles. “Myself, of course,” she says, and Mycroft looks surprised for a moment before he chuckles.
“Ah, yes. And quite capable of it, I’m sure.” John wants to shrivel inside. Harry’s more egotistical moments have never been more ill-timed than now, meeting someone his father obviously respects, and who respects him in turn. Mycroft doesn’t elaborate, though, and turns back to lead John’s parents across the lawn. “I’ve saved the best bungalow for you. If you like, there are merengue lessons in the gazebo in thirty minutes. The teacher is an American, a former Rockette. Or perhaps a drink at the bar before dinner…” Harry wanders off after them, and John tries to hide the embarrassed flush on his face by retreating to the rear of the car, where he reaches into the boot for a bag just as another hand closes around the handle.
“Oh, I beg your pardon,” John starts, and is face to face with a young man, perhaps only a few years older than John, wearing a tight white tee shirt and a pair of jeans rolled up at the cuff. His dark hair is combed back in a pompadour, and his grin is big and bright.
“Sorry about that,” he says. “Mr. Holmes is having me help with the bags today. Dodging the guests isn’t my normal routine.” The man watches John lift another bag from the car. “Though looks like you could have a job here, if you want,” he adds, and when he looks up, the man is giving John’s shoulders an appreciative once-over.
John feels his butterflies in his stomach for a moment before he ruthlessly tamps them down. Unacceptable, if he wants to make it through university.
“I’m Johnny,” he says, keeping his voice friendly and light, and closes the boot as the man starts to wheel the cart up the path.
“Lestrade. Greg Lestrade, actually, but everyone just calls me Lestrade. Well, let’s get you all settled in.” Just then a piercing shriek of laughter from the badminton court reveals Harry’s location, already courting a group of new friends. John drops his chin to his chest with a groan.
Lestrade gives him a sympathetic look. “Don’t worry,” he says. “Three weeks here? It’ll feel like a year.”
John just groans again.
………………………………………………………………………
“One, two, three, four, stomp those grapes and stomp some more! One, two, three, four…” Irene, the dance teacher, is leading a group of guests in a staggering, ungainly version of the merengue in the gazebo, and John has never felt more awkward in his life. He can’t believe his mother talked him into this. He couldn’t even learn the basic steps of a waltz when he went to those ridiculous lessons he had to take when he was twelve or so, and now he’s here in group of people whose average age has to be about sixty, shuffling around while a bright, beautiful, graceful woman scrutinizes his every move.
“Sorry,” John mutters as he turns the wrong way and all but bounces off of an elderly woman, so tiny she barely clears John’s shoulder.
“Oh, that’s all right, dear,” She says, and pats John’s shoulder before she wobbles away. John wonders for a moment if she’s quite all there.
“Listen to the music!” Irene chirps, her red dress swirling around her as she twirls, gently correcting missteps, encouraging, and dropping knockout, flirtatious smiles with bright red lips. “Come on, ladies, God wouldn’t have given you maracas if he didn’t want you to shake ‘em!” Irene shimmies, and John’s father laughs. Valerie shoots him a dirty look, but there’s no heat in it, just good-natured ribbing. John tries to keep the beat of the song but he missteps again, and ends up trodding on Harry’s foot.
“Ow!” she snaps. “Watch those huge boats of yours, Watson,” she says, and effortlessly swirls around into the conga line Irene starts. John tries to follow behind, but gives up after once around the gazebo. Dancing really is not his forte.
…………………………………………………………………………..
“Mum, Dad, I’m going up to the main house to look around,” John says, and makes his escape before anyone can get a word in. He’s restless, twitchy with the long car ride and enforced interaction with his sister. He needs a few moments respite before he’s forced to sit through dinner.
The sun is still high in the sky at five o’clock, the long, drawn out summer evening settling warm across his shoulders. The large verandah across the front of the house draws his eye, older people sitting in the shade with drinks, playing bridge or chess, and least likely to bother him on his quiet walk. The little old woman he bumped into at his dance lesson is sitting across a table from an equally tiny old man with a white goatee. She’s nodding as he speaks, and plays her cards quickly and decisively. John reevaluates her mental state, and as she catches his eye she waves absently at him and goes back to her cards.
He slips around the chairs as he follows the porch as it wraps around the side of the house. No one is down this way, and as John has decided to sit down in a single, solitary chair perched in the corner and overlooking the sea, his ear catches Mycroft Holmes’ voice coming from one of the French doors that lead out of the house onto the verandah.
He shouldn’t eavesdrop, but he almost can’t help himself. Holmes is one of the odder men he’s met, and something about him makes John just a little bit curious. So John quietly ducks back against the wall of the house and peers through the barely-opened door, eyeing the sliver of what proves to be the dining room, beautifully laid for dinner. Holmes is standing with a group of young men, waiters from their brilliant white short coats and black trousers, and he’s speaking very earnestly.
“…remember, there are two types of employees here. You’re all university students, chosen because you are expected to have manners and taste and, above all, discretion. Provided you prove you can exercise it, I will introduce you to some of the most distinguished personages in England – and their lovely sons and daughters. This is your opportunity. I expect you to make the most of it and not to bring, in any way, scandal or disrepute to this establishment. Is that clear?”
“Imminently clear, your royal highness,” a voice—a deep, rumbling baritone—drawls, but John can’t see the speaker until he suddenly crosses in front of John’s little sliver of a view, carrying a large guitar case and being followed by a few other men. He’s tall, so much taller than John, and slim, with well muscled arms showing in his tight black tee shirt. His tousled mess of inky black curls falls over one eye, and the arrogant smirk on his face makes John’s heart skip a beat.
“Well, if it isn’t the entertainment staff,” Mycroft sneers. “Remember, little brother, I expect the very same behavior from everyone in my employ. Including you. Your job is to teach the guests the mambo, the cha-cha, whatever they pay for. But that’s where it ends. No funny business, no conversations, and keep your hands to yourself!”
Lestrade snorts a laugh. “Remember, Sherlock,” he says, mimicking Mycroft. “Feel free to get a little ass in the studio, but no conversations!”
“You’re walking a fine line, Lestrade, so you had better watch your attitude.” Mycroft says. “Now, dinner is about to start, so I suggest you all get to work.”
John quietly takes a step back, ready to retreat, until he hears a voice call Sherlock’s name. Despite his better judgment, John stills, his heart beating in his ears.
“Think you can actually follow instructions this year, Sherlock?” The man’s voice is a bit higher, with a slight Irish accent, but John can’t see who is speaking. Sherlock drops his chin to look down over the tops of his sunglasses. His eyes are like nothing John’s ever seen – a brilliant grey-blue fringed by dark eyelashes, and so cutting in their assessment of the speaker John has to look away.
“You’ve got quite enough on your agenda without bothering the staff. You just put a pickle on everyone’s plate, Jim, and leave the hard stuff to me.” Sherlock smirks as he turns and casually and flips over the intricately-folded napkin, the salt shaker, and a glass of water on the table on the way out.
John slaps his hand over his mouth before his laughter gives him away.
……………………………………………………………………………….