Blue Sunday

Sherlock was not ok. He strutted around the room with tense shoulders. Mumbles filtered through his doorway, nonsensical rambling about cases and murders and killers. The smell of tea wafted to through his vents. He hadn't noticed her yet. This more than anything bothered her.

"Sherlock?" He continued his pacing, glancing at her from the corner of his eye. She saw it, barely concealed beneath the deductions and racing thoughts. The Great Sherlock Holmes was shattering.

"Not now, Molly." The order was quiet, hissed against teeth.

"Sherlock, Mycroft is waiting on you downstairs." She stood strong, trying not to crumble under his narrowed glare.

"Mycroft can piss off." Louder, angry. Usually she understands the animosity between them but not today. Not right now.

"Your family needs you right now." He turned wild eyes on her, nostrils flared. He crossed the room in three quick strides. He towered over her and for the first time she feared him. The realization dawned visibly on him and he leapt back, as if the knowledge scalded.

"I don't want to go." The confession stopped her stumbling backwards steps.

"Sherlock, it's not about what you want to do." The space between them is too great to close smoothly. "We went to your funeral."

He didn't cry as he walked out, back straight and black suit impeccable. She pretended not to hear the tremor in his voice. "Not quite the same, was it?"

The ceremony was tasteful. Mycroft had held nothing back to a reasonable degree. Flowers wreathed the stone. Red rimmed his eyes. Neither brother moved from their pew or spoke while the verses were read or the few speeches were given. John and Mary sat solemn faced. She felt distinctly out of place here. Molly wasn't even sure why she'd been invited. She hadn't known Sherlock's mother, after all. They'd never been introduced.

Sherlock was not present after the funeral. The moment the speeches were over he had vanished. Worry invaded her thoughts and she could not concentrate on whatever it was Mycroft muttered about. She knew his hiding places. And she knew where he'd go if he wasn't hiding. Sherlock was grieving. Armed with that information she headed first to his hole.

She found him with a sinking in her stomach. His slick black suit stuck out sharply against the grunge, curls tangled in fingers. He had just finished, a red ring circling the exposed upper arm. He was well practiced, no mess and only one entrance wound. Blue eyes hid behind fluttered lids as she struggled to lift him.

"I'm sure this is exactly what your mother would have wanted, Sherlock." He sags against her, his long legs dragging across the tattered mattress she'd wrestled him from.

"Doesn't matter now, does it?" His voice slurred in her ear, his breath rotten as it heated her cheek.

"It does." Writhing bodies around them keep her focused on the door. Someone grips her ankle, an inappropriate comment calling for her heel to crush the gripping hand. Her burden chuckles beside her, but the sound only makes her sick.

Baker Street will be no good. Mycroft and John and Mary all wait for him to return, expecting no doubt for him to be at least as put together as he'd been at the funeral. Angry as he made her, she couldn't subject him to more. So it was her flat she pulled him into, her couch he slept on, and her couch he woke up on with eyes still dilated and words still slurred.

She brewed tea, set up a dinner if he'd want it (she knew he wouldn't, but keeping busy helped.)

"Molly." It was an order dressed up as a request. Despite her mixed anger she felt the tug of sympathy pull her all the way to his side. The tea rippled in the glass as she brought it to him. He ignored it.

"Never again." She whispers it to him, his arm wrapped around her knees. He was always grabby when he was high.

"What?" She could almost pretend he was half asleep if not for the dull light still in his eyes. Sherlock's brain never stopped. Not even when under the heavy weight of heroin was she safe from his scrutiny. "You're angry with me?"

"Of course I'm angry with you Sherlock. You will never do this again, do you understand me?"

"Of course not, John'd be mad." A slim arm crosses over his face, a deep frown pressing his lips.

"And what, I wouldn't?"

"I didn't know you'd follow me." His arm slings away, bright blue shocking her. "Don't follow me anymore Molly."