The Red-Headed League: "Last Year" and "Almost Famous"

[inner-v0ice.livejournal.com]

I couldn't make a decision, so here are two fics for REDH, one depressing and one not.

Canon Story: The Red-Headed League
Title: Last Year
Author: Inner Voice
Rating: G
Author's Notes: Word count is excluding the 8 words by ACD. The Final Problem takes place in April-May 1891, The Red-Headed League was published in August 1891.


“One day in the autumn of last year,” I write. I stare at the words, which seem as strange and bewildering as if they had not come from my own pen. Last year? It feels like an agonizing decade since—

I cannot even think the words.

And yet it also feels like I could walk to Baker Street at this very moment and find Holmes there as always.

---
Canon Story: The Red-Headed League
Title: Almost Famous
Author: Inner Voice
Rating: G

A shilling is good money for half-a-day of play-acting, and so we made a family outing of it: fourteen cousins in all, including Lucy who insisted that she made a passable young man with her red pigtails tucked into a cap.

We’d forgotten it until, months later, Lucy ran in waving a magazine and yelling we were in the Strand!

Comments

[thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com]

The implications with "Almost Famous" are brilliant. Nice one.

[inner-v0ice.livejournal.com]

Thank you! :D

[spacemutineer.livejournal.com]

You and I were totally on the same track with your (and my -- I did two as well this week for just the same reason!) first 60s this week. It was so bright, funny, and cheerful, and to know what devastation is around the corner is very affecting. You hit the nail on the head with it. Painful.

And the second, adorable! Love the girl the cap!

[inner-v0ice.livejournal.com]

I saw that! Yours has an interesting twist/angle, too. And yeah, I was going over the chronology and feeling more "ow, my heart" every time.

Thanks! :D

[hisietari.livejournal.com]

Ahaha, I love the idea of a whole family having the fun of their life together. Those events must have coincided with a Weasley family reunion. XD

[inner-v0ice.livejournal.com]

Hee, thank you, I'm glad you liked the image of the family! :D
Oh my goodness, yes, there must have been a Weasley family reunion going on somewhere in there. Either John Clay hired some Weasley ancestors as he went around hiring random red-haired people, or they just happened to be strolling through Muggle London when they stumbled upon a whole street full of fellow redheads...

[hisietari.livejournal.com]

God knows they could do with a bit of extra money...

[shadowycat.livejournal.com]

These are great! The first is heart-wrenching while the second is a very interesting and amusing take on that crowd of red-headed men. Nicely done! :S

[snycock.livejournal.com]

Oh, poor Watson - the first one makes me sad for him. :-(

But I'm glad that someone wrote about the mob of gingers in Fleet Street!

[methylviolet10b]

What a lovely pairing! The first one is just gut-wrenching, which makes the lighthearted sweetness of the second all the more welcome. Nice job!

...and I totally sympathize about not being able to choose just one idea. Some weeks (and some stories) - a single 60 is not enough!