I am not lonely [Mystrade]

CHAPTER 13 : A great Uncle.

"If you want a cookie you need to ask it properly Alden." warned the consulting detective.
"Cookie ?" repeated the little boy.
"No .You must say "Can I have a cookie please ?"." smiled the black-haired. "You are old enough to talk with complete sentence..."
"Can have cookie please ?" tried again the toddler.
"No. "Can I have a cookie please ?". I know you can do it. You are not stupid like Uncle John, are you ?" Sherlock encouraged him.
"Can I have a cookie please ?" grinned the boy. The detective took a biscuit in the jar and give it to Alden.
"Yes little man, I'm proud of you ! And don't say to John that I've called him Uncle, or idiot ok ? It will be our little secret." answered the man, patting the baby on the head. "Come on, we have a case to solve."
He sat the little boy in Watson's armchair and sat in his, grabbing the case's file on the coffee table beside him. He took a picture from the file and handled it to the boy. "So, what do you reckon Holmes the younger ?"
The toddler looked at the picture representing the cadaver of a young woman at the morgue. There was no blood and no apparent wound and she just looked like if she was sleeping. The baby looked up to Sherlock, wondering what he was supposed to do.
" Poison ? Yes good idea Aldy ! You know, you are nearly as good as John ..." smiled the detective.
Alden was looking very confused now. He grabbed a pen on the table and started drawing on the dead woman's picture. The black-haired looked at his nephew for a couple of minute, not offended in any way by the fact that he was ruining a police report, then stood up to his feet and kissed the little boy on the forehead. "I'll be in the kitchen if you need me." he advised him. "And please don't touch to the knifes set on the desk, it's dangerous ok?"

Theolder man was running a dangerous experiment in the kitchen when MrsHudson brought them some tea. "Oh oh !" she exclaimed herself as usual when entering the room. "Are you two having fun ? Oh Sherlock! Look at the mess you've done, with a baby in the room !"
"Ah! Mrs Hudson ! Can you hold me that please ?" he asked her, displaying a couple of blood sample on the tray the landlady was carrying.
"Sherlock !". She put the blood sample back on the table and made her way to the sitting room. She displayed the tray on the nearly clean coffee table and poured two cups of tea, one in a porcelain cup matching the tea pot, the other one in a plastic'Finding Nemo' cup. She then started cleaning around her like everytime she was in the flat.
"Look at this nice little man, so calm, drawing nicely." she smiled to the toddler before advising that the boy was drawing on a dead body's picture. "What is that !Sherlock ! It's a dead body ? Why do you let this kind of thing everywhere ?"
"Oh, I've given it to him. He helped me solve the case." replied the man, distracted.
"But Sherlock, it's a baby !" retorted the lady, horrified.
"Oh don't worry, he is already really good at that. He is definitely a Holmes." smiled the black-haired before settling back in his chair and grabbing his cup of tea. "Tell Mrs Hudson what you've done this morning Aldy ?" he added toward the boy.
"I've eat a cookie and Uncle Sherlock give me picture." he grinned happily.
"Yes it's nearly that young man . You see you can make full sentences when you want." said the detective proudly. He drank a gulps of tea and leaned toward his nephew to look at his drawing. "Oh yes he is a Holmes ..." he added for himself, then to Alden "Nice pirate young man ... very nice indeed."
It was the first time that the consulting detective was allowed to be alone with his nephew by his older brother and despite the fact that he wasn't of the paternal type, he had to concede that he like it quite a lot. He was still surprised that Mycroft had allowed him to babysit his son and he suspected tha tLestrade might have insisted to his boyfriend to let Sherlock a chance so he really didn't want to screw it up because it could be his first and last chance.
"I'm glad your brother let you have Alden for the day. I'm sure you are a great uncle, Sherlock." concluded Mrs Hudson, leaving the room.

He was pretty sure to be a great uncle too even if he didn't knew a single thing about what a 20 months old could possibly enjoy except from eating, sleeping and drawing. He decided that if he was allowed a second chance to babysit the little boy, he really needed to buy himself some books on parenting to improve his knowledge.
As he still didn't knew what to do with the toddler he decided that the easiest was to ask him what he wanted to do and then to see if it was possible to do it without risking anyone's life. "Hey Alden, when you will be done with your drawing, what do you want to do ? What did Daddy and Papa do with you ?" he asked.
"Football !" answered the kid happily.
"Did Daddy really play football with you ?" inquired the black-haired, astonished.
"No, Papa play football. Daddy read book." clarified the boy.
The consulting detective laughed. He couldn't picture his brother chasing a ball and that would have been a huge surprise if he had done. Book was much more like him. "Do you want me to read you a book ?" proposedSherlock to his nephew.
"Yes. What book you have ?" acceptedthe baby.
The detective stood up to his feet and checked his bookcase searching for a book suitable for a child. He stopped his eyes on an Edgar Allan Poe novel which, even if it wasn't the best choice for a little kid, was what he had best to offers. He took it and shows it to the boy. "Do you know the stories of Mr Poe ?"
"No. Daddy reads me Dimen ." retorted the youngest.
"Dickens ?" asked the man. The baby nodded. "It's one of my favorite too but Poe is funnier."
He sat back in his armchair and place the little boy on his lap then opened the book. "It's a story called "The Tell-Tale Heart"."

He started "TRUE! -nervous - very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses - not destroyed - not dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell. How, then, am I mad? Hearken! and observe how healthily - how calmly I can tell you the whole story.
It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night. Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult. For his gold I had no desire. I think it was his eye! yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture - a pale blue eye, with a film over it. Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees - very gradually - I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever." The black-haired was making faces and voices and the baby was smiling and giggling,watching at his uncle.
They were reading the last novel of the book when Gregory entered the room, smiling at the scene in front of him. "Good evening boys ! How was the day ?"
The toddler jumped from his uncle's lap and hugged his father's leg. Greg lift him in the air and brought him close to his chest. "You had fun with your uncle Aldy ?" he asked his son.
"Yes. We eat cookie and drawing and Uncle read book like Daddy." answered the little boy, his head in his father's neck.
"Oh ! That looks great !" he smiled to the toddler and then he turned to Sherlock. "Did he just made a nearly complete sentence ?" he requested, surprised.
"Oh yes, it was the condition for him to have a cookie." replied Holmes, looking away like if it was not a big deal. But the DI knew that the younger Holmes was probably very pleased that the boy had made his first sentence with him better than with Mycroft so than it could piss the latter off.
"Well, we'd better be off now. See you Sherlock." the inspector said, grabbing his son's belongings bag. The black-haired didn't answered but nodded toward the other men.

When Mycroft entered his house this night, he was really anxious to know if Alden had a great day with his uncle. If it had only been up to the elder Holmes, he wouldn't have left Sherlock with the baby, at least not after only three supervised visits, but Gregory had insisted rather a lot and after making sure that the consulting detective wasn't using anymore, the auburn had to agreed with his partner.
He took off his jacket and hanged in the corridor before entering the living room were his lover and his son was playing with miniature cars. Greg looked up to his boyfriend and glanced a reassuring smile to him. The little boy rushed to his father and jumped in his arms.
"Daddy !" he greeted him cheerfully.
"Hello young man" replied the official, kissing his son gently on the forehead. "How was your day with Uncle Sherlock ?"
"I draw and I eat cookie and Uncle read me book !" retorted the toddler, proudly.
"But wait, you are making sentences now ?" remarked the man, surprised and proud at the same time. "Who taught you that ?".
"Sherlock." intervened Greg.
Mycroft kissed his son again then put him back on the floor. He was proud of him but he couldn't help muttering to himself, jealous of his brother's success. The inspector had noticed that his partner was in a bad temper because of the consulting detective. He raised to his feet and hugged the auburn, rubbing a hand on his back.
"Grumpy little man ..." he whispered to his ear. "Be proud of your genius son instead of being jealous of your genius little brother...". He kissed him on the cheek and the official smiled.