"It would be safest," says Sherlock.

"Okay. I can do that. Are you usually home? Is anyone liable to come by? Do I have a cover story if someone does?

"At least one of us usually is. Very few people ever visit. I suppose we should invent a cover story in case someone encounters you."

"Is Three big and loosely-knit enough that I could be your orphaned second cousin from another town who talked you into taking me in?"

"It'll hold," she decides.

"Okay then." Pause. "Do we need to - I don't know, process anything, about the holiday thing?"

"Yeah, me either." Bell sits on the guest bed. "I guess I could talk at my recorder for an hour or three and see if that gives me an idea, but somehow I don't think it will."

"And I lack that advantage to begin with."

"Well, I assume you can afford paper, you could write instead. I would probably do that if I'd gotten a bunch of notebooks before I got the recorder."

"I am not very... talkative."

"Not even when no one's listening?"

"Not even then."

"Why not?"

"...I am not sure."

"I couldn't stand not knowing something like that about myself," Bell says, drawing her knees up to her chin and hugging her legs. "I'd never know if I had a good reason."

"Maybe. I don't know. I don't think I realized it was unusual to care about what I was thinking so much until I was... at least fourteen. It didn't occur to me to explain what people around me said about themselves with the hypothesis that they didn't know, and weren't just hedging or being secretive or lying."

"There is not very much to me, I don't think," Sherlock says quietly.

Bell blinks at her. "You don't think so?"

"I am very good at killing things, finding things out, and looking beautiful," she says. "Apart from that—" A slight shrug.

"I'm good at controlling my fire stick, talking to myself, and convincing people in Milliways that despite the fact that I have no accomplishments I'm a valuable source of advice, and apart from that -" Bell also shrugs. "You could probably trivialize anyone that way, reducing them to a list of three skills. Tony's good at charming people, building things, and looking like he's not miserable on stage."

"You and Tony are the sort of people that other people miss. I am, with one exception, not. And my main accomplishment is a stack of murders I did not want to commit. I don't believe it compares."

"I'd miss you," Bell volunteers.

"Why?"