Winter Breaks (Johnlock/Teenlock)

19

a/n extra long chapter *woot woot!*
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So this was the night. This was the night that they'd been planning. That they'd done practices of and drills of and wrote about in 500 page spiral notebooks. This was the night that had made them all mark up the map hanging on Mary's bedroom wall. This was the night of the dance.

John was (predictably) distressed. Alright, less distressed and more....absolutely terrified.

He was wearing a horrible, and I mean truly horribly, tuxedo. He felt kinda lame. He looked in the mirror a kid that he was either going to laugh or cringe at once he reached legal adult age. The tuxedo was a shade of dark blue, like something out of a James Bonde movie, which John found truly lame. And, like, it was lame. He was about to go through with a complicated plan to dance with a boy he liked (who he admittedly kissed). He'd put hair gel in his hair to try and look fancy and good and professional. What he ended up looking like was a seven year old from one of those lame fifties themed parties. He'd even put on a bit of makeup. Not enough to be notable, but just enough to cover an acne scar from when he was thirteen and make him look just a little less like a teenager who came  up with a stupid plan to be with a boy. 

Of course Mary, his pretend date, looked amazing. She was wearing a dark red dress. That sort of dark red that's almost like blood. It was like that sort of red that happens when you get a really bad wine stain on a white carpet so you just give up on cleaning up and poor all the wine on the carpet out of frustration and all of a sudden you have a red carpet. Seeing his pretend date looking so stunning was making John feel even more lame.

John's household actually genuinely felt like a normal household for once. It was a sort of normal John wasn't familiar with, and had only felt back during Christmas. It had that sort of buzz of excitement. John and Harry were talking excitedly about the dance as they ate pasta their mum made. Meanwhile, said mum was bustling doing the dishes while glancing at John every two seconds to make sure he didn't spill anything on the lame, and yet expensive, tuxedo. Even the dumbass, George, was running around with excitement.

"Well I should pick John's date up," Harry said, setting her dirty dishes down. "Don't worry, I circle back around for John and whatever annoying parent things you guys want to do with John and her."

As John silently poked at a meatball with disgust, Harry was having trouble picking Mary up.

"Look, see, Mary, you're daughter, is planning on pretending to be her friend's pretend date," Harry explained to Mary's dad.

"Well I don't see why, though," Mary's dad said.

Harry grimaced in thought. Mary's dad was difficult. The little interaction that Harry had with Mary's other dad was far better. This one was stubborn. He seemed like a decent guy, for sure. Mary talked a lot about her parents admirably, this one being 'the fun one', who liked taking risks but was still very protective of Mary. Harry was wishing 'the grumpy one' had answered the door. "Well, see, I'm Mary's friend's older sister. Harry Watson. My brother is John Watson. They're really good friends. Uh, and, my stepdad, and obviously his stepdad, is homophobic, but John, my brother, is bi and is going out to the dance with a boy. So before we can pick up his actual date, and Mary's actual date, Mary agreed to pretend to be his heterosexual date."

Mary's dad stared forward, past Harry in thought.

Harry felt the need to mention, "Er...Mary said that her other dad okay-ed it?"

Mary's dad, again, stared forward in silence. Then he snapped out of it and made eye contact with Harry. "Oh, yeah. That...that's what Arthur was talking about so excitedly. Don't tell him but I sometimes zone out when he talks. He must've okay-ed it. Er, yeah, I guess it's all alright with me. Just make sure to be back by eleven."