Vegetable Soup and Chamomile Tea
Molly opened one heavy-lidded eye and glared that the minute hand on the wall clock.
Forty-five minutes of her shift left.
Forty-five excruciatingly long minutes.
She groaned and finally admitted that she might have been a tiny bit overly optimistic when she'd assured her boss that there was no reason to send her home early just because she'd begun to feel a little under the weather after lunch.
It had started with an easily ignorable tickle in her throat, and then blossomed into a low grade fever and a headache by late afternoon.
Molly closed her eye and longed for her bed. She was going to go straight home as soon as her shift was over-probably only stopping long enough to toss her lab coat into her locker-and then she was going to curl up under her blankets and shut out the world. Toby would join her, her own little purring (and snoring, although she'd never dare to accuse him outright) hot water bottle. If she remembered, she might even grab a couple of bottles of water and some digestives to put on the nightstand before she burrowed under her covers and tried to sleep off whatever illness was coming.
"Molly?"
She jerked awake and found herself looking straight into Sherlock's concerned expression. He frowned and leaned back. "You look horrible."
"Sherlock!" John barked from somewhere in the lab, just out of Molly's sight.
The clock read twenty minutes to the end of her shift. She must have fallen asleep sitting up. Molly put a hand up to swipe a lock of sweat dampened flyaway hair away from her forehead and nodded. "I'm starting to feel horrible."
She pushed herself to her feet and swayed slightly. Perhaps she'd splurge on a cab ride home rather than braving the tube, Molly thought.
Sherlock, she realized, was watching her closely. As if she were one of his experiments. It was strangely reassuring.
"Sit back down before you fall," Sherlock ordered as he pulled his mobile out of his coat. "You're obviously ill. Tell John your symptoms."
Suddenly John was by her side, one hand on her elbow to help ease her back down into her seat. "I'll be fine once I get home. I really don't want to be a bother, I just- "
Sherlock grumbled out her name in warning just as John reassured her that she wasn't being a bother in the least.
Five minutes later John and Molly had agreed that an early night was in order, and Sherlock had finished sending off a flurry of texts.
"Give me your lab keys." Sherlock held out his hand expectantly.
Her own was already in her lab coat pocket before she thought to question him. "Doctor Hanson has made it clear you're not to be in here overnight unsupervised anymore. He's still rather cross about the rude notes you left his intern last month."
"If he'd hired the man for his brains rather than his father's political connections than I wouldn't have had to leave notes detailing the intern's incompetence in the first place. I'm not planning on staying, Molly, I'm going to lock up while John escorts you down to the locker room to gather your things. Keys." He wiggled his fingers.
Even without looking she could tell Sherlock and John were engaging in some sort of silent conversation over her down-turned head as she drew out her keys and dropped them into Sherlock's waiting hand.
John hovered at her side as they slowly made their way to the locker room. By the time she had switched her lab coat for a light jacket Sherlock had joined them.
"Come along, there's a cab on its way." He took her elbow and began to guide her down the hall.
"I'm not dying, you know. Just a little sick. You didn't have to get me a cab." Molly saw the look he gave her from the corner of his eye and grimaced as she registered how ungrateful she'd sounded. "But thank you."
"It's not for you. Well, not only for you. I'm afraid you're going to have to share with John and I." The cab pulled up as they exited the building; Sherlock couldn't have timed it better if he'd tried.
He helped her into the backseat while John quietly spoke with the cabbie. Molly barely kept her eyes open long enough to see Sherlock slide in next to her and John settle onto the small seat across from them. The gentle starts and stops of London traffic soon lulled her into a light sleep.
She briefly came to when the cab pulled up to the kerb in front of Baker Street, but Sherlock put his arm around her and pulled her close to his side. "Not our stop, go back to sleep."
Through half-open eyes she saw John crawl out of the cab and disappear into 221b for a moment, before reappearing with a bulging grocer's bag that he passed through the cab window to Sherlock. John ducked down low enough so that he could see Molly through the open window. "Mrs Hudson sends her best and hopes you feel better soon."
He popped back up and tapped the top of the cab; and then they were in motion once more.
Whatever was in the bag smelled delicious.
"Vegetable soup. Most likely from a can. But I suspect there will be homemade chicken noodle ready by tomorrow, knowing Mrs Hudson." Molly tilted her head up from where it rested on his shoulder and looked at him. Sherlock watched the passing traffic but continued to talk as if she'd asked her questions out loud. "I sent her a text while we were still at Barts. She's grown rather fond of you over the last few years, you know."
The feeling was mutual, as far as Molly was concerned. It wasn't often that she ran into the older woman during a visit to Baker Street, but they always spent a few minutes catching up and giggling about whatever mess Sherlock had dragged one of them into most recently.
"John?" she asked, her voice a bit hoarser than she had expected.
"He'll graciously endure a cup of tea and a slice of cake; and then I imagine he'll go pick up Bethany from the sitter and be home when Mary's done with her shift."
"Case?" Again with the rough voice. First order of business when she got home was going to be some soothing tea with honey, Molly decided.
"Hmm?" Sherlock finally looked down at her with a carefully blank expression. "Nothing that can't wait until the morning."
She narrowed her eyes and studied his face. He fidgeted under her scrutiny. "Just a burglary, nothing pressing. Graham may even be able to figure this one out on his own, given enough time."
Content that her illness hadn't pulled Sherlock and John away from something involving a missing person or a murderer, Molly let her body relax against his for the rest of the ride to her flat.
இڿڰۣ-ڰۣ—
Eventually Molly found herself in bed, leaning against a small mountain of pillows, wearing her most comfortable pyjamas (worn, slightly faded, covered in frolicking puppies, and so incredibly soft it should have been a sin). She kept hearing ominious thumps and a few muffled curse words coming from her kitchen, but Sherlock had forbidden her from getting out of bed.
She nibbled her lower lip and played with a wrinkle in her blanket while she waited for him to finish making the cup of tea he'd insisted she needed. Honestly, all Molly wanted at this point was a nap, but she wasn't about to argue with Sherlock while he was being so . . . sweet.
Was that the right word? Sweet?
That wasn't normally a word she would use to describe Sherlock but he'd been particularly attentive since they'd left Barts. Attentive and caring and, yes, sweet.
Her bedroom door eased open as Toby softly padded his way into the room. He hopped onto the bed just as Sherlock nudged the door open the rest of the way. He had her old tea tray in hand, loaded down with a steaming bowl of Mrs Hudson's vegetable soup and a large mug of tea that smelled of honey and chamomile.
"Careful, it's hot." He set the tray on her nightstand and handed her the mug. Molly took a cautious sip and hummed in appreciation.
Sherlock switched the tea for the soup, then made himself comfortable on the edge of the bed near her hip.
"Why are you doing this?" Molly asked.
He frowned. "John said you should eat something if you could, so . . . soup."
"That's not what I meant." She watched Toby wiggle across the blanket until his head was next to Sherlock's thigh.
"I know." Sherlock took pity on the attention seeking cat and scratched him behind the ears. "Just eat your soup, Molly."
She did as she was told, then let him make sure she was properly tucked in under the covers—not unlike he might have done with little Bethany, she couldn't help but think—once the bowl was empty. As he stood and gathered up the dishes Molly reached out to grasp his hand.
"Thank you. You didn't have to do all this for me."
Once again his frown returned, but this time it was quickly chased away by a gentle softness around his eyes and lips. "Isn't that what people do when someone they care about is sick? Take care of them."
"Yeah?"
"Well, there you go." He reached for the tray again but Molly refused to let go of his hand, not quite sure if she understood what he was saying. "Yes, Molly, that means what you think it means."
Part of her couldn't help but wonder if she was having some sort of fever dream. Perhaps she was still propped up on her chair in the lab at Barts, waiting for the clock to finish ticking down the last few minutes of her shift.
"We'll figure out where to go from here once you're feeling better." Sherlock leaned down to press a chaste kiss against her cheek. "Now go to sleep."