Author's Note: Translation into Polish now available. Pls check my profile for the link.

Sherlock first began to notice something was amiss the night they wrapped up the Milverton mystery. Instead of hanging by his side, listening to him explain his deductions, with an awed expression and a shower of unabashed praises, John appeared to have wandered off.

Looking around, he saw John standing a little apart with Lestrade. Both of them appeared to be talking in whispers and… giggling!

He strode over and said, "Glad to see you both are enjoying the crime scene. Now if you are ready John, maybe we can go home."

John appeared to still have difficulty controlling his laughter as he bid Lestrade goodbye.

"What's so funny?" Sherlock asked suspiciously.

"Oh nothing…you wouldn't understand…Greg can be really crazy sometimes!"

"Greg?!"

"Yes, it's Lestrade's name. Or had you forgotten again?"

"I delete whatever is not useful", Sherlock said repressively as he hailed a taxi feeling irrationally irritated.

He remained silent throughout the journey home and John gave up after a few attempts trying to get him to talk.

...

The next morning things were back to normal or whatever passed for normal at 221B Baker Street. Sherlock was fiddling with his microscope trying to analyze and document the different types of human hair. John had tried to push him to eat something without much success.

"Sherlock eat your toast", said John again, absentmindedly flipping through the paper.

Sherlock looked up at him and noted how a broad beam of sunlight fell on John turning him golden. His fair hair appeared to glow. He supposed it was natural to want to feel like touching that hair when he was doing an experiment on human hair.

On the other hand, John might not react too well if he said he wanted to run his hands through his hair. Even if it was for science.

"John, I need your hair!" Sherlock said throwing caution to the winds.

"What?!"

Sherlock walked up to him, "I need a sample of your hair for testing. A few strands should suffice."

Looking at the expression on John's face, he added, "I'm doing an experiment on different types of human hair".

"Well you're not getting it unless you eat your toast", John said with a smug smile, folding his arms across his chest.

"What are you, my mother?!" Sherlock grumbled but picked up a slice of toast and began munching.

"There's a good boy. And have a cup of tea too", John said unperturbed as Sherlock glared at him.

When he was done, Sherlock proceeded stealthily towards John.

"Don't think I'm letting you pull my hair out by the roots. Get a pair of scissors please", John interrupted.

Armed with a pair of scissors and huffing in annoyance, Sherlock stood behind John finally grabbing his chance of touching John's hair. He felt his way from the nape of his neck where the texture was so soft to the top of his head where the hair was long enough for him to run his fingers through it. There was some grey mixed with the blond in the hair of John's short fringe while the hairs at the nape of his neck were a lighter blond. His ears were small and perfectly shaped marveled Sherlock. If he looked closely he could see the soft downy hairs on the shell of John's ear…

"Err, Sherlock? Are you planning to cut off my ear by any chance?" John's voice jolted him out of his reverie. He realized he had been running his finger down John's ear and blushed deeply, glad that John was not facing him.

"Ahem, no. I was merely checking on the best place from where to snip off a few strands. For the experiment", he said quickly snipping off a couple of strands from the top of his head.

He strode off towards his microscope just as John's phone pinged.

Sherlock sat down at his microscope relieved that the awkward moment hadn't been stretched more than necessary. What HAD he been doing? Playing with John's hair, touching his ear!

If he thought about it, he would have to admit that the tendency to touch John had increased quite exponentially over the last few weeks. He stood too close to him at crime scenes, he sat too close to him in the taxi and he brushed against him every day at home when reaching for something. It was inexplicable. The only thing that made it a little better (why should it?) was that John never shied away.

John was smiling as he read his text and he then began typing enthusiastically. Sherlock snorted - must be another one of his attempts at having a girlfriend. Sherlock didn't know why he bothered. No woman could provide John the danger and excitement that he could.

As he was wont to do in these situations, Sherlock surreptitiously swiped John's phone to check who he had been texting and to figure out how best he could sabotage a meeting if one was being planned.

He was surprised to see that John's last ten messages had been from Lestrade. And they had been sent over the last couple of days. They were mostly casual in nature asking if he was coming to the crime scene or if he had seen the football match or something equally inane. The last message had made a derisive comment about the team John supported and John had made a suitably offensive reply. Sherlock had been worried about nothing.

It was just John's smile when he had been texting which had misled him…