Disclaimer: Any characters herein belong to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and the BBC. The only thing I own is the the concept of the grocer's.
Notes: Written fr Gen in January prior to watching any of Series 2, so there's no spoilers whatsoever involved. However, I can hardly resist a bit of John/Mary...

The prompt was Sherlock Holmes, shopping.

Tea and Biscuits

It was truly a marvelous thing to have a flatmate like John. Nine times out of ten, he could open a cabinet and find that there were biscuits or bread that wasn't stale or that tea he liked best of all on hand when he wanted it.

Then there were times like today, when John was on a date (and while he hadn't been overly fond of Sarah, the woman he was currently seeing was annoyingly likely to be the future Mrs. John Watson, and he couldn't decide if he hated or admired Mary for that) and the only thing in the pantry was a jar of eyeballs from one of his experiments last month.

There was no other option, really. Sherlock had been quite looking forward to a cup of his favorite tea and a packet of chocolate biscuits, and since there weren't any in the flat he would just have to brave the grocer's on his own.

Plus, he'd already tried to sneak into Mrs. Hudson's pantry, but she'd caught him at it and run him off before he could even see what brand of biscuits she had on hand.

Sherlock sighed to himself as he grabbed his scarf and coat before heading down the stairs. Calling out a goodbye to Mrs. Hudson, he stepped out into the afternoon and turned towards the nearest busy street. Although he hadn't had the greatest luck with cabs of late, he decided his task would go much quicker if he could catch one anyway for at least the trip out.

Lady Luck was apparently pleased with him today, because it was surprisingly easy to catch a cab where the driver didn't want to kill him (or at least, the driver didn't want to kill him any more than he would other passengers) and make it to the grocer's much faster than he would have made it walking. Sherlock paid his fare and slipped into the shop before abruptly realizing that he had no idea where anything might be located. His options now were to either ask an employee for assistance or to find the tea and biscuits on his own.

Of course, being Sherlock Holmes, he decided to look for himself.

Astonishingly enough, the two items that he needed were not located anywhere near each other. After twenty minutes of walking the aisles and assuring the clerks that he didn't need help, he found the tea situated next to sugar substitutes and flour, while the biscuits were on the other side of the shop in the same aisle with the crisps. Obviously the shop planner was sorely mistaken in putting complimentary items so far from one another.

Sherlock nearly mentioned this to the cashier when he rang out, but decided that it was hardly her fault that the shop was mixed up and backward. Instead, he paid his bill, smiled charmingly when the woman thanked him for his patronage, and walked out of the grocer's once more.

The trip back to the flat took a bit longer since he didn't want to try his luck with a cab for a second time today, but he still made it home without incident. He called a greeting to Mrs. Hudson as he climbed the stairs, dropped his purchases on the kitchen table, and put the kettle on before removing his outerwear. For a moment he wondered if he should save some biscuits for John and Mary when they returned from the cinema before taking several out of the pack and stuffing the remainder behind the sofa.

After all, they were his biscuits; he could store them wherever he pleased.