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"Our parents were not good parents."Mycroft spoke in a soft tone, even and calm and never anything but perfectly controlled. His hands didn't flex, his shoulders didn't slump, his feet didn't tap. He sat in a hard plastic chair with poorly designed cutouts with as much apparent comfort as if it were a plush leather wingback.It was one of the things, Greg thought, that made him so otherwordly. Mycroft Holmes, he imagined, didn't do mortal things like lose his temper or feel discomfort. Reality didn't touch Mycroft the same way it touched everyone else. Mycroft didn't let it.Having now met them both and based on Sherlock's often unkind description, the elder Holmes, Greg thought, was as if someone had removed a figure from a 17th-century painting and just left them behind. Seeing him in a public setting seemed both fascinating and a little cruel, like a piece of another country's history that a museum had laid claim to and refused to give back. You looked at it and marvelled at where it had been and what it had seen, and you felt a little guilty that it wasn't where it was meant to be. And one never expected it to interact with you.So these words, spoken in the brittle silence of the sterile white room were unexpected.Greg wasn't really sure how he was meant to reply to that statement, and so he didn't. He just turned himself towards his companion and left his body language open and easy and as welcoming as he could. There was silence for a full two minutes, then Mycroft spoke again."They weren't especially awful people. Father was a high-ranking civil servant and ran a successful business, mother was... Well, the daughter of an upper-class family, which is a profession of its own kind. There's a family seat in Cornwall, Musgrave, which is a manor house and grounds, and another townhouse in Kensington. They were that sort of a family.They weren't good people, either. They certainly weren't kind, or patient, or any other positive adjectives. They barely tolerated each other, but children are a requirement in upper-class families and so within a year of being married, they had me. And I was a boy, which was ideal, and then they realised that I was... clever. Which, in some respects, was wonderful because they could gloat about how they had made this perfect heir.But no head of an aristocratic household really wants to be the stupidest member of their family. And so our father really rather hated me, loathed me ever. Mother really didn't care one way or another, and definitely didn't care enough to intervene in any of his corrections, so I quickly learnt how to avoid them both and that was all fine."None of that sounded fine to Greg, who had five siblings and who had grown up on an estate with very little to hand, but had always known that his mum and dad would give him the moon on a string if they could. So he took a sip of his water - both to stop himself from saying something that would break the moment and to try and settle the leaden weight that had settled in his stomach. The one that told him he was going to wish he never heard what came next in this story."They did realise that they did not want any more children. Typically families like ours go for the heir and a spare set up, but given how I was they reasoned I would be enough. But then when I was six mother was pregnant again. It was all a bit dramatic really, father had gotten a vasectomy you see, and he thought Mother had fucked up with one of her various affair partners. For a few months, there was an awful lot of fighting.Father wanted her to leave for good but she threatened if he made her she'd take me, and he couldn't have that. So he sent her away to Scotland for her pregnancy and did a paternity test on Sherlock as soon as he was born. Literally had a private doctor do the test in the delivery room while he was being washed down. Naturally he was fathers, such operations are never completely foolproof, and so mother stayed three days in the hospital, and then came home."Greg wasn't a detective inspector for no reason. He hadn't been promoted out of nepotism or internal politics but on merit. Of course he wasn't a Holmes, but he had a much better-than-average intelligence and an even better emotional intelligence. He solved riddles and puzzles in unconventional ways, he thought around problems and developed unusual solutions.As well as that he had well-directed, powerful, and well-used instincts. And those told him there was a monster lurking in this story, stirring behind every word that fell out of Mycroft's mouth. It was in the black night outside the window, and the shadows under their chairs and the bed. It was huge and ugly, and it would hurt him deeply when it was bare before him. But he was Greg, and he'd always been the bravest of his parent's children, and so he readied himself to stare into its eyes with a challenge.He wondered just how much of this story Mycroft had heard about or deduced over the years before realising what an idiotic thought that was. This was Mycroft Holmes. All of this had been deduced at the time of the incident and was remembered with crystal clarity even now, so many decades later. So instead he thought about how it must have been to be six years old and know your father hated you, and your mother didn't care about you, but that your whole world as cold and sharp as it was was imploding and there was nothing you could do.It wasn't a nice thought."We had this nursemaid come back with Mother. Her name was Beryl, and she was from Manchester, and I'd been given strict instructions not to talk to her or bother her or touch the baby. But I wanted to see him. I'd been reading all about babies so I'd know what to expect, but it had been over a week and I didn't even know his eye colour.So I snuck into his nursery, and there he was, fast asleep in this huge lacy bassinet that rocked. He had all these dark curls on his head, which seemed surreal because all the pictures in my books had shown babies to be bald or fair-headed. He had such pink cheeks, almost red. And his eyelashes were so long, he had seventy-eight on his lower lids and ninety-nine on his upper lids.He was the most perfect, beautiful thing I had ever seen. And he was in this huge lacy bassinet, in the middle of this grand, perfectly decorated nursery, and he was all alone. I remember thinking - what if he wakes up? What if he wakes up, and there's no one here and nothing to do? He'll be so bored and lonely. And so I stayed.I don't know how long for. It felt like hours, but it was probably one at most. Beryl was a very good nursemaid.She came in and she saw me and I was sure I was going to get into trouble but she smiled at me and came over and crouched down so she was at my height. She said -
'I've been waiting for you.'
And I told her that Mother and Father had said that I wasn't to come, and she put a hand on my head and said
'But I knew you were going to. I knew when I saw you peeking through the stair railings when he arrived. And I'm very glad you've come.'
And she sat me down on this rocking chair, and bundled up this tiny, perfect human in a shawl that probably cost more than all her clothes put together, and she helped me hold his head and his body. Then she sat down next to me, touched my head, and told me
'Mycroft, today is a very important day. You've become a big brother today.'And I told her that no, I'd become one eight days, nine hours and twenty-three minutes ago. I told her that that's when the baby had been born, that he'd been three weeks premature exactly, and that he'd weighed five pounds six ounces, which was a little under average. She said
'No Mycroft, that's when you became a sibling. Being a brother is very different.' She said 'First we introduce you. Mycroft, this is your baby brother Sherlock. Sherlock, this is your big brother Mycroft.'
And I thought she was maybe a bit mad, but she stroked my hair and told me things that only I seemed to know, only I had ever acknowledged. She said
'Mycroft, I've been here a week now and there is not much love in your house. But that's all about to change, because of him. You are going to love him with all your heart, every day, for the rest of your lives.
It isn't going to be easy, I'm afraid. He's going to cry, and scream, and make a smelly mess. When he's older, he's going to follow you around and get under your feet, and sometimes he'll want something you can't give him or he'll accidentally break something you kept special. When he's even older than that he'll do things you won't want him to, maybe even things that will get him into trouble.
But you are going to be the lens he sees the world through. He's going to use the path you walk to see where it's safe to tread. He's going to look at the person you become and see who he can be. And it's going to be your job to make sure he knows that even when he's annoying, even when he's naughty, even when you're cross with him, you will always love him. With all your heart, every day, for the rest of your lives. To know that no matter how much trouble he gets into, if he comes to you or calls for you then you will do your best to help him, to do right by him.'
And I was terrified, because what did I know about what she was talking about? She was talking about love, devotion, patience, gentleness, kindness, and there was no place for any of that in our house. We didn't even have a pet. If we didn't have servants I doubt our parents could have kept a plant alive, how was I going to do what she said? So I told her I didn't know how, and she said
'That's why I'm here, Mycroft. I'm going to teach you to love him.'
The styrofoam cup with weak, unsweetened tea that he cradled in his long, slender fingers didn't tremble, and that perfectly smooth voice didn't crack, but Greg could hear the heartache in it all the same. The power of it made his eyes burn but Mycroft was on a roll now and even though the pacing and tone remained even, and he never stumbled over a word, the story came gushing out of him like a cork had been popped."And she did. For the six months she stayed with us she taught me how to care for him. She taught me how to feed him and bathe him and change him and play with him. She taught me about how he had grown inside Mother, from his heart outwards, and how he would grow in the future. She taught me to tell the difference in his cries, to tell what he needed based on the tone of his squalling. And god above did he squall.Mother and Father knew of course but because Beryl never complained they didn't actually care. She was gone after that half year, and while there were other nannies they mostly let me take care of him because I was best at it. It was an easy job for them, to just make sure we were both available if our parents wanted to trot us out for any reason. I think they all thought it was rather cute.I thought it was important. I spoke to him and read to him and told him everything I knew. And I fell in love with him, a little more every day. And before I could even blink he was understanding what I was saying. Sherlock held off on talking for the longest time, but only to everyone else. I learnt to interpret the frowns and smiles and tilts of his head, and I knew he was like me. Different. So I was glad he didn't talk, so Father wouldn't hate him too.But then Sherlock was four and I turned eleven. And it was time for me to go to Eton. It was impossibly hard and I hated every moment, and our parents never came up on the weekend so I was gone until Christmas. And when I came back Sherlock was gone, and in his place was an angry, vicious, half-feral thing with knotted hair and a grubby face and bad breath. Mother and Father were fighting each other constantly, about him and anything else they could fight over.You get about a month off at Christmas from Eton. It took me nearly a week to figure out which bruises were from his wild ramblings and which were corrections. And I realised that when I left I took all the love in this house with me. And Beryl had told me that people needed to love and be loved as much as they needed food.So on the 19th of December, I asked to speak to Father in his office. We went in and he sat down behind his desk - it was a horrible, ugly piece of furniture, all very bulky and utilitarian and with this dull green leather inset - anyway, he poured himself a glass of scotch from his decanter and asked me what I wanted.I told him I wanted him to never again raise a hand to Sherlock, and that he was going to get Sherlock a dog for Christmas. In return, I would resume looking after Sherlock during the holidays and keep him out of the way, and I would do whatever he wanted me to do regarding the family.He stared at me for a moment, laughed, and went to drink from his tumbler. I told him he shouldn't, because that morning I had walked into Mother's rooms, taken enough of her pillbox of cocaine to kill someone four times over and stirred it into his decanter that afternoon. And if he didn't do as I asked, I wouldn't warn him what I'd done, and the next time he raised a hand to my brother would be the last time he raised it at all."The leviathan that had been rousing throughout this story had opened one eye and was staring him down, and Greg choked on his water."Jesus Christ, Mycroft! You can't -" He swallowed thickly and shook his head. "You were eleven!""Our father stared at me and, I assume, saw the same thing in me that I saw in myself. That I was serious. He sent me out, and on Christmas morning there was a brown and white springer spaniel puppy running around the house. Sherlock named it Redbeard. I made sure it knew how to protect him before I left for school again at the beginning of January.And for a long time, that was the cycle. I'd be away for several months, then back for one. Redbeard helped Sherlock while I was gone, it wasn't what he needed but it was something. He'd get a bit better while I was home only to fall back when I was away. It killed me, to see him so desperate for attention, for affection. He was touch-starved every time I came home. But at least he wasn't... Our father hadn't...I rushed my schooling and I went to university at sixteen rather than eighteen, and there were two almost blissful years between nine and eleven when Sherlock and Redbeard spent almost the entire time at my flat and he was almost... himself again. But then he had to go to Eton too. I didn't want it, Sherlock didn't want it, me and Father had a tremendous row. But I gave in. I should never have given in. It is the single biggest mistake I ever made.I'd managed alright at Eton, I suppose I inherited more of my father's temperament than I'd have liked or maybe I'd been luckier with my year mates. Eton had been a chore, a stepping stone for something better for both of us. But I'd not raised Sherlock to see the world like that, to see people as tools to use to better yourself. Eton taught him exactly that, as well as that there was something wrong with his mind, how fast it was. Eton taught him that nothing he did was inherently special, only how he and others could use it.After that, it was one endlessly long estrangement broken up by smaller tragedies. When school was out he went back to the house instead of coming to me. At least until Redbeard died when he was fifteen. Our parents didn't even write to tell him, he found out three months after it happened when he went home for Easter and Redbeard was gone. Then he'd just vanish. I wouldn't be able to find him until he showed up for the next semester.He went to University the next year. Our parents died when he was eighteen, car crash, very surprising and sudden. He was high at the funeral, it was the first time I'd seen him in three years. He pocketed my wallet, my phone, my damn watch and a few expensive pieces of jewelry from the house and vanished into the night."A hush fell that was claustrophobic and dragging. Greg opened his mouth to say something, anything, but the monster of Mycrofts grief was too big to put words to.In the silence, the medical equipment made quiet hums and louder beeps. The thin, bruised, fragile man in the bed beside them lay motionless, still kept under by drugs. The case had been a mess from start to finish but the conclusion had been a doozy, and Sherlock had been shoved out of a third-story window onto a gravel drive by the perp. John had been there of course, ever by Sherlock's side, faithful and loyal.It had been Greg who'd asked about Mycroft, about Sherlock's mysterious brother who he hadn't ever met personally. John had called him after a dumbstruck moment, and twenty minutes later a man in a three-piece suit worth a month or more of Greg's salary was in the hospital room, speaking politely to the nurses and assessing the situation in a way Greg had found frankly attractive.That had been... God, twelve, thirteen hours ago? John had gone home to rest. Greg should have gone too, but for some reason, it seemed cruel to leave the man silently sitting at Sherlock's bedside. He'd seemed so stoic, so removed. Ethereal. Otherworldly.Lonely. He'd been so incredibly lonely, sitting there with a long cold tea in a styrofoam mug, on a blue plastic chair."And I think that's why he hates me now," Mycroft said, the first hint of a crack in his voice. "Because I love him. With all my heart, every day, for the rest of our lives. But it wasn't - isn't enough.Because I encouraged him to be soft, to love freely and openly and to think everyone would want to hear what he thought because he was marvelous, and that wasn't true for him. The world is not kind to people who are soft, and love freely and openly.Because I told him the world was wonderful. And that was a disappointment he could never forgive."The beast of Mycrofts grief was gone as quickly as Greg had felt it stir. He opened his mouth to say something - anything - that might make the man hurt less. But there was nothing to say, "I think it would be alright if you returned to the Yard now, Detective Inspector Lestrade. Thank you, for being here for Sherlock. I'll let you know if there are any changes. "Greg let out a slow breath of his own, and genuinely considered the idea. He could go back to his flat and order a takeaway. He could get fresh clothes and have a shower. Maybe he could even sleep. But he was quite sure of his response after thinking it over."If it's all the same to you Mycroft, I'll stay a little longer. For my own peace of mind."The only thing he wasn't sure of, was which Holmes brother that peace of mind was needed for.