They were watching telly when their worlds parted company, although they weren't to realize that was what was happening until after Molly got up to see who was pounding so insistently on the door to her flat. Tom made to get up first, of course, being a gentleman, but she waved him away. "It's probably Mrs. Fischer, you know how she is."
Deaf, was what she meant. Deaf and apparently unable to remember that other people could hear someone knocking on their door with no problem. Sighing, Molly pasted a friendly smile on her face as she unlocked and opened the door, expecting to see her elderly neighbor in the hall, asking for help with something or other as she did every few nights.
The smile vanished as Molly let out a gasp of surprised shock at the unexpected sight of Sherlock Holmes standing there, as if he'd never left London two years earlier. "Hello, Molly, as you can see, I'm back," was all he said as he brushed by her and entered the flat.
Tom had risen to his feet and was also gaping at Sherlock, although his surprise was tempered with outrage. "Oi!" he said indignantly. "Who the hell do you think you – urk!"
The last was said because Sherlock, having reached him, had grabbed Tom around the throat and shoved him back down so he was once again sitting on Molly's hideous floral sofa. "Molly, do tell your ex-fiancé to pack up his things and get out," he said arrogantly, eyes boring into those of Tom. "I'm glad you found someone to fulfill your sexual needs while I was away but the time for playing house is over."
"Molly, who the fuck is this?" Tom demanded, although he kept a wary eye on the man towering over him. The vaguely familiar looking man, now that he thought about it. His eyes widened as he said, "Say! Aren't you that detective chap? The one who offed himself?" He couldn't help it, his eyes darted over to his fiancée, who was nervously twisting the ring on her finger and still not saying anything. "Molly! This is him, isn't it? Sherlock Holmes?" He looked back up at the other man and frowned. "Why the hell aren't you dead?"
"Yes, I'm Sherlock Holmes, and why the hell aren't you doing as I asked and packing your things?" Sherlock countered in a bored voice. "Really, Molly, I understand your need to be with someone who reminded you of me physically, but did you have to pick such an idiot?" He smirked and stepped back, unwinding his blue Cashmere scarf from around his throat and carelessly dropping it onto the low table sat in front of the sofa where Tom still, sat gaping like – well, like the idiot he was. "Don't answer that, I know the reason of course; no one could even come close to matching my intellect – well, except my brother Mycroft and we both know you're far from his type – so you settled for the merely physical instead. Makes it easier when you're in bed together, in the dark, doesn't it? To pretend?"
Tom glanced uneasily at Molly, wondering why she wasn't saying anything, why she was just standing there, arms wrapped around her waist as if she had a stomachache, nibbling on her lower lip the way she did when she was nervous. Why wasn't she telling this git to shut up – and why, Tom wondered with a heavy feeling in his gut, wasn't she denying any of the things Sherlock Holmes was saying?
"You don't know what you're talking about," he finally blustered, rising to his feet but keeping a wary eye on the surprisingly fast – and violent – intruder.
"Oh, don't I?" Sherlock said, his voice a dangerous purr as he walked a circle around Tom, hands tightly clasped behind his back as if he needed to restrain himself from once again choking him. "How long after you started dating did Molly convince you to cut your hair?" He nodded at the photo of Molly and Tom taken six months ago, when his hair was still down to his shoulders. "And when did she buy you that coat I see hanging by the door, the one that looks remarkably like the one I'm wearing right now?" His voice took on a mocking note as he stopped, standing between Tom and Molly, blocking her from his sight. Not that he could take his eyes off Sherlock; Tom felt frozen, as if the man's words and piercing blue-green eyes were combining to pin his feet to the floor. "Did she teach you to wrap your scarf the same way I was just wearing mine, hmm? And are you aware she only agreed to marry you because she'd finally given up hope that I was ever coming back?" He lowered his voice and grinned unpleasantly as he added, "Does she make you keep your mouth shut during sex to make it easier for her to pretend you're me?"
"Sherlock, please, stop it!" Molly finally spoke, moving into the room and wringing her hands together as she came to a stop between the two men. Tom was shaking and red-faced with rage and embarrassment – no doubt because that last taunt had struck a very, very personal nerve – and Sherlock was smug and gloating, although his eyes were blazing with contempt. "Tom, I'm sorry...yes, this is Sherlock Holmes, he's not really dead, well, obviously not," she said, rambling like she always did when she was nervous. "Anyway, um, I kind of helped him but…"
Tom's eyes widened as he stared down at Molly incredulously. "You helped him? Molly, that's fucking illegal, you could go to jail for shit like that! And for what, to save a fake? Are you fucking crazy?"
Two large hands were suddenly fisted in his shirt, hauling him closer to a face that had gone very, very cold and scary looking. "Don't speak to Molly like that," Sherlock growled. "She saved my life, and the lives of three other people who are very important to me that day. You, on the other hand, mean absolutely nothing to me, and Molly can tell you what I'm like when people who mean nothing to me do things I don't like to the people who matter to me."
Molly's hand on his fist caught his attention; Sherlock glanced down at her, his eyes still glacial, but then he did as she was silently asking and let Tom go. But the next time the moron said or did something to set him off, Sherlock knew he wouldn't just stop at manhandling him. He'd just spent two fucking years taking down a criminal empire; he certainly had no problems dealing with a loser like Tom Whiting, bank clerk with no prospects of promotion due to his excessive stupidity and complete lack of ambition, who fancied himself fit but could be taken down by Molly's cat Toby if said cat was pissed off enough.
Tom, unaware of Sherlock's thoughts but obviously understanding his contempt, glared at the other man then glanced down at Molly angrily. "Molly, tell him to leave," he ordered her. "We need to talk about this. Alone."
She sighed and lowered her eyes, but when she looked back up with a beseeching expression on her face, it was at Sherlock. "Please, I know you've just got back, Sherlock, but Tom's right; the very least I owe him is to explain things a bit more, well, diplomatically than you've just done. Just give us tonight, please? Are you…have you moved back into Baker Street?" Then, as if it was just occurring to her: "Does John know you're back?"
Sherlock nodded, looking sullen, and Tom didn't bother hiding the triumphant smirk as he met the bastard's gaze. Yeah, sure, seeing him back from the dead and knowing Molly had helped him was a shock, but there was no way his sweet little lab mouse could possibly be want to be with someone so freaking violent! God, he should call the cops and have him up on charges, but Molly seemed cowed by him – yeah, that had to be it. She was afraid of him, and as soon as he left, she'd explain that that was why she hadn't denied any of the ridiculous things Sherlock 'the fake detective' Holmes had said. He'd assure her he forgave her, they'd find some way to keep the lunatic out of their lives, and…
The fantasy Tom was happily spinning within his mind faded to nothing as he caught a glimpse of Molly's face as she escorted Sherlock to the door. She didn't look frightened or angry or anything but – well, dazzled was the word that came to mind. Lovestruck. She even tiptoed up and planted a quick kiss on the other man's cheek, and Tom felt a flush of anger and hurt overcome him as he bent closer so Molly – his Molly, dammit! – could hurriedly whisper something in his ear. Then he nodded and left, not bothering to look back.
As the door closed and Molly clicked the lock, Tom could only sit there and stare at her. She took a long time before turning around, and when she did, he saw her square her shoulders in that way she had when she was about to do something she didn't want to do – or say something she didn't want to say.
"No," he choked out as she moved to join him on the sofa, reaching out as if to lay her hand on his leg. He pulled away and stared at her. "Don't fucking touch me right now. Not until I hear from your own lips that he was making all that shit up."
Molly's hesitation was brief but noticeable; in spite of what her 'friend' had just said, Tom Whiting wasn't a complete idiot. Sure, not the brightest bulb in the box, he knew that, but not a complete idiot.
For example, he knew damn well when he was about to get dumped. "Don't bother," he snapped as he heaved himself up to his feet. "Don't bother with the 'it's not you it's me' crap, or the 'I really do love you, it's just that now he's back and I love him more' or, 'I love you both in different ways', or whatever you're about to say." He held out his hand, avoiding her eyes. "Just give me back the ring, Molly."
"Tom, no, please," she said, and he finally looked at her, seeing the pleading expression in her eyes as she twisted the ring around on her finger. Another nervous habit of hers, one that had grown more noticeable every time they talked about setting a date for the wedding. "It's not that…I do love you, please don't think I was just using you or something…"
He ignored her, finally recognizing the desperation in her voice had nothing to do with her actually wanting him to stay, and everything to do with her trying to convince herself that she did. "The ring, Molly. It was my grandmothers and I'd appreciate having it back. Now." He continued to hold out his hand until she suddenly pulled it from her hand with sharp yank.
"Fine, take it," she spat at him. "Don't believe me. But for fuck's sake, Tom, do you really think I'd have said yes when you proposed if I didn't intend to marry you? Even if Sherlock came back?"
He gave a bitter laugh as she dropped the ring into his outstretched palm, closing his fingers around the small gold band with its simple solitaire diamond. "Molly, since until tonight I never even knew the two of you had a thing before he supposed killed himself – in fact, since you repeatedly told me you didn't have a thing with him before then – how the hell was I supposed to know anything? God," he said in disgust as he reached for his coat, "the two of you honestly deserve one another. You let him say all that crap and never even opened your fucking mouth to deny it. So much for our honest, loving relationship."
Molly flinched at the bitterness in his voice, he noted with some vindictive satisfaction, but didn't try to defend herself or deny anything. Which meant he was right. No, which meant Sherlock fucking Holmes was right; he'd been nothing but a poor substitute to warm Molly's bed and give her the fantasy of the ordinary life she insisted she wanted to live when Tom proposed.
Hah. So much for that. Clearly his quiet little fiancée with her grisly job was a lot less 'ordinary' than she pretended to be – and Tom didn't like that. Not one bit. He didn't want to marry a woman who helped someone fake their death…and why, exactly, had he done it in the first place? Should he ask her?
No, Tom decided as he reached for his scarf – and then dropped it to the floor in disgust. It totally sucked that the style he'd adopted in the past few months, which Molly of course had helped him with, was just to make him look like someone else. He'd go back to his denim jackets and parkas, fuck the long dramatic coat and the expensive scarves Molly had gifted him with. He was damn well going to grow his hair out again, too, and the sideburns he'd sacrificed in the name of love.
Molly wasn't crying, which surprised him a bit and disappointed him a lot. He felt angry that she didn't seem more upset with what had just happened, that their breakup wasn't hurting her the way it was hurting him, but then again, why should it? She was still getting what she wanted, the man she really wanted to be with, so he, Tom Whiting, was the only loser in this deal.
With those and other acrimonious thoughts swirling through his head, he started to slam out of the flat, muttering something about picking up his things in a week or so. He heard Molly say something about mailing them to him, and something inside him just snapped.
"I said I'll FUCKING PICK THEM UP!" he screamed, storming back into the flat, shoving the door shut and kicking her coffee table over. Molly yelped and started to rise to her feet, but he shoved her back on the sofa, feeling a complete sense of freedom as he let his rage just take over. "Jesus, Molly, can't you even fucking let me break up with you the way I want to? Or do I have to ask Sherlock fucking Holmes for permission to get my own shit when I want to?"
"Tom, please," Molly started to say, but he didn't want to hear it, didn't want her to try and reason with him, and his hand was up and across her face in a stinging slap before he even realized what he was doing.
The slap shocked them both; Molly gasped and raised her hand to her face, staring at him as if he was a stranger, and Tom felt a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. Before he could do more than open his mouth to try and stammer out an apology, the sound of the flat's door banging open behind them caught both their attention, and once again Tom found himself facing an enraged Sherlock Holmes.
Only Molly's pleas and insistence on placing herself between the two men saved Tom from being beaten to within an inch of his life. "Just go," she said as she threw herself into Sherlock's arms after he'd landed a few blows that left Tom's lip bleeding and would lead to some spectacular bruises in the morning. "I'll send you things to you, Tom, but don't ever come back here again. I don't ever want to see you again, and if I do, I promise, I won't stop Sherlock next time."
Tom took her words to heart and left, knowing himself to be in the wrong. He'd crossed a very important line, and had no interest in ever finding himself in such a position again.