"Sherlock, must you make so much noise?" you said, growing frustrated. It was your day off and you were sitting in the living room trying to read a book, but Sherlock was making that almost impossible with the ruckus he was making in the kitchen.
"I could ask you the same thing," he poked his head out of the doors from the kitchen. "You are turning the pages too slowly. Its-" he shook his head feigning agony. "Obnoxious." His head then quickly disappeared back behind the doors. You rolled your eyes and him and tried to focus back on your book. That didn't last for long though because you suddenly heard the sound of glass breaking and the not so hushed voice of your flatmate saying "Oh, bugger."
You watched as Sherlock emerged from the kitchen, annoyed and slammed the doors behind him. He made his way over to his chair and threw himself into it, leaning his head all the way back and stretching out in it completely, dwarfing the chair with his long body. You couldn't help but run your eyes down the length of it, stopping quickly on his lower region just to see if you could get a glimpse of something through the thin material of his pajama pants but alas, nothing yet to be seen.
You sighed, getting enough of your fill of admiring him and went back to reading your book. After a moment you heard him speak.
"What are you reading?" he asked. You glanced up at him and he hadn't turned his head to look at you. His eyes were still up, looking towards the ceiling. You cleared your throat and shifted in your seat.
"Just a romance novel." you began to get worried that he would further inquire about the book so you glanced at the page number and set it down quickly, closing it shut so he wouldn't see the scene you were just reading. Of course he wanted to talk about your book when you finally got to the part where the main character was getting head from her long time crush.
Sherlock made a disgusted noise in the back of his throat.
"Romance." he mocked the word. "Tell me, why must you indulge yourself in that muck?" he turned to look at you. "Is it because you don't get any in your real life?" he asked. You cleared your throat and nodded, knowing better than to fight him. It was hard pretending that that didn't hurt considering you were in love with the man and knew damn well you would never get any romance ever again considering he was the lot your heart decided it wanted.
"Obviously," you said. He had made so many rude comments like that to you before and you were at a point where you felt as though you had nothing to lose. You let all your guards down and decided to speak freely. "I'm just disappointed you didn't realize that sooner, and even more so that you had to bloody ask." you shot back, a slight smile on your face. He looked at you dumbfounded, but mostly amused.
You realized in that moment that he liked this. This was why he made 'rude' comments. It wasn't because he was mean, well, sometimes it was, but it made you see something else. He liked banter. He had gotten loads of it with John when he lived here, but since he had gone to live with Mary you supposed he missed that. You were actually typically one to banter with others, but never attempted with Sherlock because you thought, or knew rather, that he was too smart to find entertainment in your words. It felt very natural however to give it right back to him. You wondered if that was why he had asked you of all the people he knew to move in with him because he had observed you banter with others.
"So, it would be unnecessary for me to state why I know you like those books so much." he sat up, clearly baiting you. You were getting slightly worried that you knew what he was getting at but then remembered, you had nothing to lose. You'd rather see the surprise on his face when you were blunt than the knowing smirk when you shied away.
"Yes it would."
"Enlighten me then." he said, a smirk gracing his beautiful features. You took a deep breath.
