Before Holmes Met Watson (FEATURED)

Day Six: Hair

Vanity was an unbecoming quality in an army captain, but John Watson was his father's son. His family had been solidly middle-class – not struggling, but definitely not possessed of enough disposable income to indulge in luxurious frivolities. Nevertheless, a few times a year, his father would go into London for a monstrously expensive haircut and straight-razor shave at the club of a university friend. When John turned sixteen, his father asked if he would like to come along. John had been sceptical about the outing – it all sounded terribly old-fashioned and dull, but he took every chance he got to go into the capital city and figured it wouldn't take too long at the club, and he could head out on his own afterwards then take the late train home.

The façade of the club was deceptively unremarkable, and John remembered quite well how utterly intimidated he had been by the oak-panelled grandeur of the interior when he'd entered. Every surface had been absolutely gleaming. How on earth did they keep it all so clean? John had wondered. There wasn't a single grimy fingerprint anywhere in sight, and that observation had cowed him into a bashful silence. A sharply dressed butler greeted him and his father by name and led them to the barber, where they were greeted warmly.

"Is this your boy?" one of the attendants had asked, and when John's father affirmed that was indeed the case, the woman smiled cheekily and said, "Gets his looks from his mother, does he?" John had smiled shyly and felt much more at ease.

He'd been fascinated by the ritualistic nature of the process. He was used to popping in and out of the barber's in fifteen or twenty minutes and had no idea so much time, care or pride could be taken in helping someone groom themselves. The subtle woodsy perfume of the shampoo, the decadence of the scalp massage, the almost uncomfortable heat of the hot towel, the feel of the boar's bristles as the creamy shaving foam was applied, the scrape of the straight razor and the bracing sting of the aftershave – it was all over too soon. John was hooked, and it became a tradition for the Watson men to travel to London quarterly for their barber's appointments. When he'd been accepted to medical school, his father had presented him with an antique pearl-handled straight razor that must have cost a small fortune. "I know how much you like coming to the club," he'd said. "And you won't be able to find a place you can afford when you go away. Using it will be good practice for your dissections – you'll have the steadiest hands in the class." As always, he'd been right.

Over the years, John had added a boar's hair brush to his shaving kit, and he'd discovered a simple formula for an exquisitely smooth shaving foam in Turkey. The extortionately priced shampoo and pomade were English and were all natural and gently scented with wild honey. His bath soap had been infused with ginger and gourmet coffee from the Blue Mountains of Jamaica and mixed with brown sugar. His aftershave was French and lightly scented with sandalwood and leather.

When he'd joined the Army, John had struggled with many of the regulations but never the grooming standards. There was something about looking so tightly put together that made John feel more in control, and whenever he was having a particularly bad stretch he would pull out the grooming kit he otherwise reserved for special occasions. This was one such circumstance.

Corporal Jalloh's death had knocked him for six, and he'd been uncertain why at first. He had known her only in passing, but she'd been a squaddie's squaddie – always first to jump into the fray, breach the perimeter or head over a wall into danger. She had a ready smile, an unwavering commitment to King and Country and never complained. She'd been a cornerstone of their community, but they hadn't realised it until she'd been removed and the foundation started to shift. She'd be replaced; they always were, but, until then, their house would continue to list, and the cracks it caused would stoke the fires of their insecurity.