Title: All Perfectly Logical
Fandom: Lewis
Rating: G
Length: 444 words
Summary: There has to be a reason why James Hathaway has fallen asleep on the garden bench.

James Hathaway woke up to the sound of someone calling to him out of the kitchen window.  Groggily he sat up on the garden bench and swivelled round to face the house.

“Hi!” he called out.

“I’ve made you some coffee,” Robbie said.  “I’d bring it out to you, but I can’t find the key and you seem to have locked the kitchen door.”

“I think the key’s under the fridge,” James called back.  “I’ll go round and come in the front door.”

He unbolted the garden gate and walked round to the front of the house, to be greeted by Robbie saying, “What exactly is going on?”

“I’ll explain once I’ve got my coffee.  It’s all perfectly logical.”

They took their coffee mugs into the lounge and sat down on the sofa.

“Go on then, I’m longing to know what happened.”

“When I got home this afternoon,” James began, “I realised I had forgotten my keys and I could see you were out.”

“I thought you kept your door keys with your car keys.”

“I do, but I’d picked up the spare set because they were on top of the tray as you’d driven my car yesterday.”

“Fair enough.”

“So I thought I’d climb over the gate into the back garden and stick my arm through the cat flap to unlock the back door.”

“What would you have done if one of the neighbours had spotted you climbing the gate, and rung the police?”

“The neighbours all know me, so that was unlikely.”

Robbie nodded.  “Okay, so far so good.”

“I managed the gate with no problem.  I put my arm through the cat flap and Monty pounced on my hand.”  James displayed the tooth marks rather ruefully.  “I told him to go away, but he seemed convinced it was a game.  Added to which, I’d realised I couldn’t quite reach the key, even without Monty’s assistance.  So I removed my arm and hunted for a suitable piece of wire in your shed.”

“Plenty of bits of wire in there,” Robbie agreed.

“Quite.  I went back and Monty had obviously tired of the game, so I was able to use the wire to pull the key out of the lock.  It fell down and I was about to reach for it, when Monty discovered a wonderful new game and batted the key out of my reach, and eventually I think he knocked it under the fridge.  At which point, I gave up and decided to wait for you.”

“It does make sense, I suppose,” Robbie said.  “But next time, why don’t you ring me and I can come home and let you in.”