Doesn't Follow Me Everywhere

"And the beans?"

"I'll get them."

Afterward, John says he doesn't remember what happened. He was walking to Sarah's then the next thing he knew he was in a changing cubicle at the pool and being told through an earpiece to go out and greet the detective. Any deviation from the words he's told to say would result in death.

But Sherlock can spot a lie when he sees one. John's always had one of those faces that seems to show every thought that passes through his head, but for once Sherlock had to look elsewhere for the truth (not that it took all that much extra effort but he couldn't decide whether he was delighted that John was actually able to hide something from him or... was he disappointed?... that John felt the need to). None of the injuries were fatal, or even particularly risky. He pointed them all out to John as he catalogued them, as though the doctor didn't already know, but John continued to maintain the story (lie) that he came up with.

He left the house, was jumped, next thing he knew he was at the pool. The problem is that John left the house at 8:45 and Sherlock didn't get to the pool until midnight. When the doctor came out of the changing stall, he had showed no signs of a head wound that would have kept him unconscious that long nor of being drugged.

No, the good doctor had been conscious and aware during the missing three hours.

He just wasn't telling Sherlock.

It was at that exact moment that Sherlock decided (due entirely to John's refusal to give up the entire story and nothing to do with his terrible habit of getting himself kidnapped) that he would just have to keep a closer eye on his doctor.

It was unacceptable that he didn't have all the facts, he could be missing some important clue about Moriarty after all.

But it had nothing to do with John's safety. Nope. Not even a little.

(Later, while John is sitting at the kitchen table and sipping at a piping hot cup of tea, Sherlock will decide that perhaps it does have something to do with John's safety after all. He really would be lost without his blogger.)

.oO***Oo.

"Um, excuse me."

John turned to look at the woman who tapped him once lightly on the shoulder. She was a tiny thing, barely 5 foot. Mousy. Skittish. Not the type to talk to a random stranger at the supermarket unless absolutely necessary. John immediately went into soothing doctor mode.

"Yes?" he asked in his gentlest voice.

"Could you...?" she gestured nervously at the top shelf.

"Of course, what did you need?"

"PG Tips... Eighty count, Please."

He nodded and reached up to grab one of the boxes that sat just beyond her reach, turning back sharply at a sudden squeak behind him. He found her lying on the ground with the contents of her bag and shopping basket scattered all around the isle. To the left a tall, lanky man walked away...

A rather familiar looking tall, lanky man...

But John shook his head. It couldn't be Sherlock. The detective was in one of his moods at home and seemingly hadn't even blinked in three days (let alone moved enough to follow him to Tescos, if he even realized yet that John had left). John was concerned to the point he'd put the shopping off as long as he could (not unreasonably worried that the detective might decide breathing was simply too boring to be bothered with while he was gone, this was Sherlock after all).

Instead, he knelt next to the woman and began helping her gather up her things. She gave him a grateful, if still somewhat nervous smile, grabbed the box of teabags he handed her hand practically bolted down the aisle with a murmured thank you.

John shook his head. The woman was obviously nervous about being in public or crowded areas, the last thing she had needed was some stranger knocking her over like that.

Poor girl, he thought, Some people are so rude.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Sherlock stalked through the aisles behind his target casually, adding random bits and pieces from the shelves he passed. He created an automated process to run in the background of the computer that was his brain. It would make sure that all the items were ones that could be eaten right out of the box and did not require refrigeration. The homeless network would stall the blond army doctor long enough for him to get through the line (they would have the shopping he bought now and had no means of storing perishables).

"Um, excuse me?"

Sherlock paused his automated program and pretended to examine the nutritional information on a package of chocolate digestives. From the corner of his eye he studied the tiny woman who had spoken to John. She was a shut-in, obviously hadn't been outside her house (no, flat) for weeks. Good with computers, does all her work remotely.

The moment John turned to get the box from the shelf for her (a reach even for him) the woman began fiddling about with her purse, her hands shaking (with either nervousness or fear). Sherlock narrowed his eyes suspiciously. He was taller and just as close as John would have been, why did she single out the doctor? He studied the contents of her basket trying to place them.

Admittedly, he didn't do the shopping often enough that in this particular store (or any store, really) to be able to place all the items, but the ones he could place would have been at her eye level. Meaning she wasn't shopping from a list, she was just grabbing things as she saw them. So she was afraid, randomly grabbing items from the shelf, and clearly doing something she didn't want to be.

Sherlock had already dropped the package of digestives into his basket and started moving towards her casually by the time the syringe made an appearance in her hand.

From there it was ridiculously easy to bump into her at just the right angle that would send everything in her purse and basket everywhere while simultaneously grabbing the syringe from her.

So with the capped syringe in his pocket, he quickly made his way through the checkout and left the bag of food and instructions to watch over John with one of his Irregulars.

(Later, after John had gone to bed, Sherlock would find that the syringe merely contained an experimental anti-anxiety medication and a quick check of hacked-into records would find that the woman was in fact in the actual medicated group. She wasn't an assassin, just a woman with severe agoraphobia who happened to think John looked a bit more approachable than Sherlock.)

.oO***Oo.

John didn't normally stop by Angelo's without Sherlock but that was more because he usually didn't frequent this part of town without him than by any sort of unspoken agreement.

"Table for two, doctor?" Angelo asked him, looking around expectantly.

"Just me today. I was hoping I could get something to take home." The doctor paused for a moment then frowned as a thought occurred to him. "Erm, if you do take-away, that is."

"Of course we do!" Angelo told him, holding his arms out in a welcoming gesture. John genuinely couldn't tell if this was an Anything for Sherlock (and, therefore John) offer or something they actually did do. "Not like you to be around without him," the restaurant owner probed. The worry that John and Sherlock were having a row was written all over his face, but the doctor decided not to comment.

"I was in the area making a house call to a friend of a friend," John explained. Lord knows he owes Sarah more than a few favors for covering for him when he needed to go bolting after Sherlock. A house call to an elderly gentleman friend of hers who wanted a discreet male doctor was the least he could do to stay in her good books, even if he didn't work at the clinic anymore. "Sherlock's on a case so I thought I might grab something to take home for dinner."

"Ah, so nothing for him then?"

"Actually, do you have something small and light?" John winced at his statement but Angelo just threw back his head and laughed.

"You're still trying to get him to eat during cases?" Angelo chuckled and shook his head. "I suppose if anyone can it'll be you. I know just the thing, it'll keep for a few days if he doesn't eat it right away. Have a seat at your table while you wait."

John nodded and made his way over to his usual seat by the window fighting the urge to roll his eyes at the candle Angelo had taken to leaving on it (the only table with a candle in the entire restaurant) for their "dates" despite any protests on John's part.

Of course, if Sherlock had been with him, Billy would have been placing the food on the table moments after they sat down (no doubt pilfered from another table's meal, as John often heard Angelo apologizing for the clumsiness of his staff yet never heard any breaking dishes whenever they came to eat). But, John supposed, he could understand where Angelo was coming from...

When Sherlock Holmes sat at your table and was of a mind to eat, you got the food in front of him as quickly as you could because there was no knowing how long you had until he'd get a text from Lestrade or would think of something that had to be taken care of right now and all thoughts of food would be abandoned in favor of something so much more interesting than eating.

John, however, did not mind waiting. Not only was it polite but it gave him the chance to rest his feet and warm up before the walk home to Baker Street. Thinking of Baker Street and Sherlock made him pause and stick his hand in his pocket to finger his mobile. He debated whether to let him know he was on his way home.

On the one hand, when John had left the detective had been plucking away randomly at his violin, so deep in thought he was completely unresponsive. There was a high possibility that the detective wouldn't even notice John had left until the doctor returned to point out that he had, in fact, not been there for the last two hours.

He'd just pulled his phone from his pocket when a glass of sweet-smelling wine was set in front of him as a man slid into Sherlock's usual seat. When John bristled, he decided that it was entirely because of the man's too-casual smile. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he was in Sherlock's seat.

"I'm Eric."

"And what can I do for you, Eric?" John pointedly didn't touch the glass in front of him or give his own name in return.

The man's smile widened as he leaned forward. "You can sit here and enjoy a nice conversation and a drink with me. Maybe some dinner if you're feeling hungry."

John took a deep breath, preparing for his usual I'm not gay, I like women not men, now if you'll excuse me I really should be going as I have a rather impatient man-child of a flatmate waiting for me at home... Come to think of it he should probably take that last bit off the speech. It probably only served to reinforce everyone's idea that he and Sherlock were dating.

"I'm not-" John was cut off as a glass (not a cup or mug, but the kind that restaurants usually serve water in) of tea was slammed on the table in front of him.

"He's taken," Angelo informed the man. The restaurant owner had drawn himself up to his full height and puffed his chest a bit in a way that seemed to be completely terrifying to most people. Not to John, of course. John knew Angelo wouldn't raise a hand against someone unless they had injured someone he cared about first. But to most people, Angelo could be downright terrifying when he wanted to be.

The man's eye shot wide and he rose to his feet, nodding once at John before making his way back to another table in the back of the room. Angelo turned a kinder gaze on John and grabbed the glass of wine off the table.

"I'll just get this out of the way, doctor. You enjoy your tea," Angelo told him. "And if he bothers you again you let me know," he added with a threatening glare towards the man for good measure.

For half a moment, John felt like commenting that he wasn't exactly a fair maiden whose honor needed defending and that he was quite capable of running off unwanted attentions, thank you very much, but Angelo was already walking away and it hardly seemed worth the effort. As he wrapped his hands around the warm glass in front of him, he felt any remaining indignation drain out of him and he settled himself comfortably into the corner of his booth seat, dozing lightly and idly wondering how Angelo knew exactly how he took his tea.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

When John arrived home, Sherlock was sitting with a dozen or so test tubes standing before him, all filled with what the doctor was surprised to see was wine for once. And dear lord, what did it say about him that he was more surprised to see wine on his kitchen table than he would have been if it had been blood?

John frowned, trying to place the vine-like etchings around the rim as Sherlock began mixing chemicals in with the test tubes... one chemical per tube.

"Are you doing a toxicology report on the wine?" the doctor asked with confusion. The case Sherlock was working on hadn't involved a drugging or a poisoning.

"Experiment," was all Sherlock answered, holding up a tube and swirling it around. Watching closely for any sort of reaction.

"No, these are the chemicals for a pretty standard report," John replied picking up one of the bottles and reading the labels. "This is more like something you'd do for a case than an experiment."

"Then it's for a case, John," the detective snapped. Holding and swirling another tube with one hand while the other snatched the bottle from the doctor's hands and placed it back exactly where it had been taken from.

John watched him quietly while he waited for the Tea Only kettle to boil before shaking his head and leaving Sherlock to it.

(Later, while John is watching the telly, Sherlock will finish his toxicology report on the wine and discover it is not poisoned or drugged. It is, in fact, nothing more than a rather expensive glass of Eiswein. This merely serves to make the detective scoff at the man's idiocy... Obviously John, on the occasions he does drink wine, would prefer the bitter tang of red wine as opposed to the sweetness of a dessert one. Sherlock makes a note to subtly perform experiments to determine John's favorite drinks, in case the knowledge ever becomes useful.)

.oO***Oo.

John was not the sort of man that allowed himself to be snuck up on easily or very often. That being said, it's rather difficult to hear the bathroom door unlocking itself while you're rinsing shampoo out of your hair. Despite that, the good doctor is amazingly calm when he opens his eyes and sees a pale, long-fingered hand holding a jar of sudsy water under the shower spray with him.

"Sherlock, your hand is in the shower with me." John felt the need to point this out. As if, by doing so, Sherlock would somehow realize that picking the lock on the bathroom door while John was showering and then proceeding to collect water samples from the shower water was a Bit Not Good.

"Yes, John."

John sighed. "Why is your hand in the shower with me?" There was a long pause while John waited for an explanation. When nothing was forthcoming he sighed again and asked, "Are you going to tell me why?"

"Experiment." The hand and jar withdrew and the sound of a lid being screwed on was surprisingly loud over the sound of the shower. "Will you hand me your shampoo? I require a sample of that as well."

"You can't use that excuse for everything, Sherlock," John told him exasperatedly. He picked up his shampoo and held it outside the shower curtain though. "This couldn't have waited until I got out?"

"Timing is everything." The shampoo bottle reappeared and John took it to put it back on the little shelf. The hand was not retracted, however. It remained, flat-palmed and waiting. For what, the doctor could only guess. "Your soap, John!" The detective wiggled his fingers impatiently.

John sighed, but grabbed the bar of Irish Spring and placed it in Sherlock's waiting hand but still the hand was not retracted. The fingers didn't even curl around to grab it and an annoyed sigh erupted from the other side.

"This is not your soap, John. This isn't even my soap." A pause and then a delightedly curious, "Where did this soap come from?"

Apparently not knowing where the soap came from made it far more interesting because the hand was withdrawn, fingers curling around it.

"They were out of my usual kind when I went to the shops," John explained then waited for his soap to be returned. When no soap was forthcoming he added, "I need that back, Sherlock. I need to finish washing."

"Use mine," came the distracted reply.

"You ran out two weeks ago. I couldn't find more to replace it, it's that specialty stuff Mrs. Hudson bought you," John huffed.

"Ah," Sherlock answered. John recognized the sound. It was the sound Sherlock made when John had explain something Sherlock never really cared enough about to think about.

"You've been using mine, haven't you?" John asked with a resigned sigh. He was beginning to lose patience and running out of hot water.

"I usually just grab whatever is readily available."

"I really hope you don't do that with my toothbrush. You do know you have your own, right?" The silence was more than telling. John stuck his head and one arm outside the shower curtain, glaring at the detective. "Tell me you don't do that with my toothbrush."

Sherlock raised his head. "I don't do that with your toothbrush," he answered in a tone of voice that said I'm doing exactly what you just asked me to do, to the letter.

"You do, don't you." It was a statement of fact, not a question.

"It does seem likely," the detective agreed, staring at the soap intently as though (if he stared hard enough) he'd be able to see the chemical makeup with his bare eyes.

"Damnit, Sherlock!" John paused for a beat and then added, "Give me back the bloody soap!"

The detective glanced at the hand for a moment before raising his eyes to the doctor's face. "No," he answered shortly, collected his samples and left.

"Sherl-" John froze half-way when he made to follow the detective, realizing he was soaking wet, naked, and the water was still running. He turned the water off and grabbed a towel then, wrapping it around his waist, made to follow the detective to the kitchen. "Sherlock!"

Instead, he found him waiting in the living room throwing his coat and scarf on.

"Oh good, you're done. Get dressed, John. We have a case!"

(Later, while John was showering with the plain, unscented soap he bought on his way home and brushing his teeth with a new toothbrush, Sherlock would find that no chemicals had been snuck into the water pipes while John was showering. Nor was the soap infused with any sort of harmful chemicals. In fact, besides the awful scent the green bar was emitting, the worst thing the soap was capable of was irritating John's eyes should he managed to get it in them. Still... Sherlock chucked it in the outside bins and decided to tell John not to buy that kind of soap anymore. The smell was awful and distracting and very not-John.)

.oO***Oo.

"I'm not dead. Let's have dinner," The Woman told John. There was the faint click of a button being pressed and a few moments later a breathy moan was emitted from the phone in Sherlock's pocket.

His hand dives in trying to silence the noise but the damage has been done and he's been heard.

He flees then, but only because he knows that The Woman will not injure his blogger.

(Later, a very strongly worded conversation with Mycroft will ensure that kidnappings are brought to a halt or- at the very least- Mycroft or the woman John knows as Anthea will always be present for them. Someone will just need to make sure that John is aware not to get into strange cars with strangers.)

(The words Stranger Danger float through Sherlock's mind momentarily, but he has no reference as to what they could mean or where they came from. He must have deleted it.)