CHAPTER 1

-"Molly?" his voice came from the speaker.

She could feel the desperate plea and….fear? But it was an experiment, he had said. Yes, an important one, but what kind of experiment had made him frightened? Or probably she was reading more than what it actually meant. It might be just his anxiety for the results.

"Molly, PLEASE!" he begged again.

Out of all people, Sherlock bloody Holmes was begging to Molly Hooper! As if his life was at her mercy, as if it would dispose a bomb off! (Only if she knew! Irony!) She brought her phone near her mouth. She hated herself for how she could not resist herself from it. She should hang up let him deal with his experiment all alone. Instead, she gathered all her strengths together and replied.

"I love you."

Her eyes squeezed shut. She felt as if all her muscles had turned to jelly. Molly leaned in and put her hands on the kitchen counter for support. She had been expecting Sherlock to explain the proper reason why he had to do it, but the connection was already dead.

"This is what he does." she thought "His business done and 'Who is Molly Hooper?' His business done and 'why be bothered for anyone but myself?' " . Deep inside, she knew that she wasn't right. Sherlock did care, too much sometimes. You don't shoot a man straight on the head because he was a threat to your friends if you don't care. You do not jump off a roof because somebody threatened to kill your only friends, if you don't care. Sherlock obviously did care. But who did he care for?

Rosie. He was completely different man when he was with her. Molly had seen him with Rosie a couple of times. He had been too human, too normal to believe! He would talk to her for hours about how he could teach her to deduce people once she had grown enough, how clever of a child he believed (he knew, as he would like to phrase it) she was. He would play Disney songs for her, whisper lullabies in her ears to make her fall asleep… He would go to any lengths to ensure the safety of his goddaughter.

He had cared for Mary as well. Molly remembered how thorough he had been about John and Mary's wedding planning. He had almost singlehandedly handled each tiny details. He had offered to help her even after she had put a bullet through his chest.

Mrs Hudson, Molly thought. She was more of a mother to Sherlock than his own. He had beaten a burglar into a pulp and thrown him out of the window because that piece of utter shit had dared to lay a finger on her. Mess with his landlady, and he will show you the doorway of hell!

There was Greg Lestrade too. Sherlock might never remember (or did he do it just to annoy him?) his first name, but he would be furious if somebody tried to stand in his way.

No matter how much Sherlock would deny it, he cared a lot for Mycroft too. The Holmes brothers had their own queer way to show affection and love for each other.

And then there was John. John Hamish Watson. Molly knew it very well that Sherlock was perfectly capable of feeling emotions, but he did not allow himself to admit that fact usually. The first emotion he had allowed himself to feel and admitted it as well, was JOHN. Literally, he would shake hands with death for John. What had he not done for his best friend? He has jumped off Bart's rooftop (though it had been staged and Molly had been an essential part of it.), he had run into a bloody bonfire to get John out of it! One word from Mary, and he had gone off his tits in drugs. He had taken John's beating in that mortuary (Molly winced at the memory of the stitch on Sherlock's eyebrow, his bloodshot eye, and the hiss of pain he used to release while moving because of his bruised ribs.) without a single word in his defence. And she was quite sure that he would take John's beatings again and again if that would save him.

So, contrary to the popular belief, the world's only consulting detective did care, far too much for those who were in his inner circle of intimacy. But that was exactly the point, Molly thought. John, Rosie, Mrs Hudson, Greg, Mycroft- that was his circle. Molly had no place in there! He had said that she counted, even during that devastating phone call he had said that she was his friend, he had said that she was the one person who mattered the most while they had been solving cases, but Molly wasn't sure anymore how much of those he had actually meant. What kind of friend puts you through such distress?

Of course she counted. Need body parts? Ask Molly. Need access to the lab at 3 o' clock in the morning? Just send Molly a text. Need a bolt hole? How about the pathologist's bedroom? - That's how she counted, in the hour of needs. She counted when his wounds had to be stitched, or he needed a helping hand to run experiments on kidney decomposition after death due to poisoning. But apart from that, she was hardly an acquaintance! In the very private circle of Sherlock's emotional intimacy, Molly was not a member.

That's why he had had the guts to make her say those words even after she had said that she couldn't. It would break her soul to the extent of dust. He had been indifferent even after those heart-twisting pleas to stop whatever he was doing, because he had not known how she felt. Molly was feeling just like that Christmas at Baker Street, when Sherlock had shattered her in front of everyone, when all she had wanted to do was to let him know the truth of her heart. He had apologised, but the damage had already been done.

That was the moment Molly had decided that she would never let him know that no matter how hard she tried, the small palace of her heart would have one and only one king, Sherlock Holmes, who didn't even bother to explain after making her go through such vivisection. (If only she knew that the man in accusation was going through none the less than vivisection!)

But when it came to Sherlock Holmes, nothing ever went according to her wish. So she had had to speak her heart out once again. But this time, she had turned the table to him also. "Go on, say it like you mean it"- He had done as told. He had said it, twice. This fact was unsettling Molly even more. The first one, Molly knew, was tactful; he had done it because he had to do it. The second one, though, Molly wasn't sure how to interpret. It had sounded so very real and heartfelt! As if he had really meant each syllable of it! As if he had said it because he wanted to! - Now that was something next to impossible.

Sherlock would never mean it. Not to her. Not for her. Had it been that woman, Irene Adler, (Molly had known her name and Sherlock's inclination to her from John's blog and then she had googled about her. Quite a woman, she had to admit. Clever, beautiful and wicked. Obviously Sherlock would be interested in her!) he would have meant it. But he would NEVER mean it for Molly Hooper, the pathologist with too small mouth and complete absence of sense of clothing and womanly skills.

Molly realized that she had been standing in the kitchen all along. Her head was throbbing and was clouded with thoughts. She really needed a break. She needed to feel absolutely blank for God knows how long and then only she could wrap her head around something this bizarre. She needed some rest.

But one thing she knew for sure, it was time to really move on. She could not unsay what she had said. She could not pretend that it had never happened. She definitely could not look into Sherlock's eyes knowing that she had spoken the absolute truth of her soul and it still didn't matter to him.

She had to move on. More precisely, move away, from this life, from Sherlock, from London.