A/N: So, I have no idea where this angsty fic came from. Just a little blip that formed when I was listening to the old 1D song "Moments." Hope you like, and as always, the characters belong to BBC and ACD.
The bold italics are the song lyrics.
-AAG1D
/
If we could only have this life, for one more day…
/
"I'm sorry, Dr. Hooper."
Molly clutched the paper in front of her, unable to read the words as her life came crashing down around her. It didn't matter though – the neurologist's words were still ringing in her head clear as day.
Terminal.
She couldn't breath.
"Is there someone we can call to pick you up?" The other doctor looked at her pityingly. Molly shook her head, the weight of her future – or soon lack thereof, to be more precise – crushing any attempt at a smile.
"No, there's no one," She whispered. Then she looked up, her eyes sad, but that ever-present smile trying to make the best of the situation. "It's okay though. It's always been that way."
/
If we could only turn back time…
/
Molly kept the revelation to herself for the first couple of days, in a somewhat state between denial and acceptance. It was hard to believe a few headaches and a random call to the Doctors looking for pain medication, had resulted in something so much more severe.
She told Mike first.
Other than being her superior and teacher, Mike had also been a friend, a father-like figure for her after the death of her own. He had always kept an eye on her, and she had always appreciated it.
Which was why she felt sick putting her two-weeks in.
Mike had looked at her in confusion at first, immediately asking what Sherlock had done, trying to assure her they could remedy everything.
She just gave him a small smile.
It didn't reach her eyes.
"Actually," She tittered, "Funny thing is I have to. Something wrong up here," She tapped her head with a small laugh, the urge to sob building in her throat. "I suppose we always knew that though – what kind of woman likes to cut up dead people? – but this is a bit more terminal than that, I suppose. I have three weeks they say, so I don't think it'll be fair to leave it much longer," She gestured to the note in Mike's hand.
He gaped for a moment, before she burst into tears and he wrapped her in his arms, crying, and asking all the questions she didn't have an answer for.
It was a bit easier telling the few others in her life, after that.
She let it slip to Greg when he came around for an autopsy report the day following. He stared at her for a long time after that, while she continued digging in the chest cavity of a man, trying to pretend nothing was wrong. When she looked up again, the look on Greg's face was one of the deepest sorrow she had ever seen.
Mrs. Hudson had immediately started crying the day she had told her, after the realization of the fact that it wasn't Molly's morbid humor showing, but actually the truth. The old woman cried for hours, and in the end, Molly regretted informing her.
The landlady had already had to deal with so much loss in her life.
Molly felt selfish for burdening her with a bit more.
John and Rosie were a little more complicated.
Molly Hooper had always liked John. He was kind to her when so few in the world were. After Sherlock's fall though, something had changed between the two of them. After Mary's death it was forced to heal, since Molly had been spending so much time with Rosie.
But it never was quite the same.
Three days after her diagnosis, John popped round to drop Rosie off, something about Sherlock needing him for a triple homicide.
She smiled at him, though without that spark in her eyes.
"Just so you know," She struggled to keep her voice strong, as she hoisted Rosie onto her hip. "I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to look after Rosie for much longer."
John froze, his brow crinkling in concern. "Are you alright?"
Her smile faltered slightly. "Actually, not really," She quirked her head, not meeting his eyes. "Afraid I've been a bit silly and got a tumor up here," She tried to laugh as she gestured to her head, even as tears threatened to take of her vision. "Only got a couple of weeks, though they expect me to start showing more symptoms rapidly. Can't really look after Rosie if I can't see her!"
She can't meet his eyes.
"I know it's inconvenient, as you won't have anyone to look after Rosie, but I've already informed Mrs. Hudson and Greg, so I'm sure they'll be understand-"
She was cut off as John wrapped her in a hug.
She all but sagged against him, a sob finally escaping her throat.
"I'm so sorry Molly," John's voice is raspy with his own tears as he pulls her close. "God this isn't fair. You deserve so much more."
She shrugs, unable to form a response.
"Do you mind," Molly finally asks when both adults are composed a few minutes later. "But could you not tell him?"
John gives her a thousand-yard look before solemnly nodding.
"You should tell him though," He finally says as he makes his way to leave. "He ought to know."
Molly offers him another sad smile.
"I hardly see him anymore. I think I scared him off with that phone call last year. I really don't want to burden him with something like this. Besides, it won't matter in the end anyways."
/
You know I'll be your life, your voice, your reason to be…
/
He finds out anyways.
It's a week later. She's digressed quicker than she could have ever imagined. Her headaches have increased to the point that there's always a constant throbbing in the back of her mind. She's lost her sense of depth perception, having dropped her favorite teacup yesterday.
Her vision comes in and out of focus, and she's terrified that any day she will wake up to an eternal blackness.
She had to call Mike and withdraw from work the day before.
Her soul felt hollow as she trudged up from the morgue for the last time, half an autopsy unfinished.
It's not really surprising that he figured it out. Between John, Greg, and Mrs. Hudson, she's actually surprised he didn't find out sooner.
She's curled up in her favourite armchair – the one he used to favour so long ago, before that call, before Mary's death, before Tom – when she hears the sound of her lock being picked.
She doesn't look up from the spot on the wall, even when he's standing over her.
He just watches for what seems like forever.
Then: "Why didn't you tell me?"
Molly moves her shoulders ever so slightly. "Didn't think it would matter."
"Why not?" His words are harsh, and makes her flinch. She finally looks up and meets his eyes, but she's already dead inside, and that's what makes him flinch.
"Because I don't matter, Sherlock. I'm no fool, despite what you've always believed."
He looks like he's been slapped.
His brow crinkles in confusion. "But you do. I told you-"
"That was before, Sherlock," Her voice is tired – she doesn't want to do this anymore.
He looks lost. "Before what?"
She stares at him impassively. "Before that phone call, Sherlock. Don't play dumb – your too smart to get away with it anyways."
Sherlock's lips purse ever so slightly. "If this is because I haven't seen you much lately-"
"You just don't get it, do you?" Molly has finally had enough, and despite the pounding in her head that makes her want to crawl into a hole, she rises to her feet, only to jab him sharply in the chest. "I wouldn't care that I haven't seen you much, if you hadn't made it abysmally clear how little I mean to you. All these years you've manipulated me and used me. And when I thought things were finally getting better you had to-"
She doesn't finish her sentence.
Instead the world goes black as her knees give out from under her.
The last thing she remembers is the panic in Sherlock's voice and his arms catching her frail body.
And then she gives into the pounding in her head.
/
My love, my heart, is breathing for this moment in time…
/
He barely leaves her side the following week.
She's confused, and hurt, and angry with him.
But at the end of it all, she's just grateful to have someone there for her.
For the most part, it's as though they've slipped back to how they were before Rosie, before Mary, and before John. Back when she was a pathologist at Barts fresh out of med school, and he was still a junkie lurking around her morgue.
She doesn't stutter and blush around him anymore though, and he doesn't cruelly decimate her with his words alone.
There are subtle differences, too. He still hovers by her elbow, though now out of concern instead of out of boredom. He brings her tea and does all the little things she had once dreamed of him doing.
It hurts, knowing that she'll be leaving it all behind soon.
One morning she wakes up without any vision in her left eye, and a constant throbbing in her skull that forces her to lie in bed all day.
Not once does he complain about boredom, merely choosing to lay beside her in companionable silence.
"I never meant to use you. To ignore you," He says one day as they both sit on her couch. It's one of her better days, and they're currently playing cards. She's winning, though she suspects that he's losing on purpose.
"I know," She murmurs, not meeting his eyes.
Then he says something that he's already said in everything but words.
"I wish I hadn't wasted our time."
And she replies in the only way she can.
"I know."
/
I'll find the words to say…
/
After another fainting episode two days later, she's moved permanently to a small hospital room in Barts.
She knows she doesn't have long. The pain in her head threatens to rip her skull apart, and she can no longer walk straight, and has trouble recalling simple things. Her name. Her job. Her friends.
She can't forget him though.
It helps that he hasn't moved from her side since she woke up.
Others come in and out of the picture. Mike. Mrs. Hudson. Greg. John and Rosie. But they're only fleeting, and she can't remember much once they're gone.
He always stays though.
Sometimes when she wakes up, she catches glimpses of something she can tell he's trying to keep from her.
He looks sad.
She doesn't know how she knows that, only that she does. Sherlock is sad, though she's not sure why.
She's sure he'll find another pathologist once she's gone.
She tells him as much one day, not sure if she's formulating the right words. He seems to understand though, as his face immediately falls.
"I could never replace you," He tells her fervently, brushing her hair from her face gently. "Because you're not just my pathologist – you're my Molly."
The following day the nurse comes in.
Molly can tell from her own body what the nurse is going to say, before she says it.
They say they can give her medication to help ease the pain.
She accepts.
Her head is nothing more than a soupy fog, and the world's as black as night.
"Sh'lock?" Her breathing is laboured.
"Yes Molly?" He sounds as though he's crying as he's beside her, a hand cupping her cheek. She directs her unseeing eyes towards the sound of his voice, trying and failing to recall the curl of his hair, and the strength of his gaze.
"I'm s'rry," She blubbers, warm tears making their way down her face. "I'm s'rry Sh'lock."
"Hush," He tries to calm her, though his wavering baritone does nothing but make her cry harder. "It's alright. It's alright."
He's crying.
He presses his forehead to hers, and she closes her eyes.
"I'm going to miss you," She feels something hot and wet fall on her cheek – a tear that's not her own. "I will miss you Molly Hooper."
A sad smile on her part.
"I'll miss you too, Sh'lock."
She feels his lips press against her cheek one last time.
"I love you, Molly," He admits. "Perhaps not in the way you need me to, but I do. I love you."
But his admission doesn't matter in the end.
Because she's already gone.
/
Before you leave me today.