Disclaimer: This fanfiction is not written for profit, and no infringement of copyright is intended. First posted as a series of one shots on tumblr.
MAP OF THE WORLD
Molly can't understand it.
The bigger her belly gets, the more fascinated Sherlock becomes with it.
The baby was a shock, not something she thought he'd want. When she first told him he'd stared at her for a full five minutes- screen-saver mode, John calls it- then argued with her for five more, and only then had this beautiful, wide, delighted smile had split his face.
It had almost made him look a different man.
He'd picked her up and spun her around, demented, it seemed, with joy at the thought of her having his child.
He'd dropped to his knees and pressed his ear to her stomach. Listening. Kissing. Crooning. Grinning.
He'd splayed his fingers around her still-flat belly and a love affair had begun. A love affair which grew deeper and more passionate the larger, the rounder she became.
It seems he loves her bump; the bigger it grows the more it fascinates him.
His devotion is single-minded and ardent- Something which for Molly is both bemusing and surprising in equal measure.
She asks him one night, when she's sore and tired, and feels the size of a whale, what the big deal is? Why he's so taken with it, when she often feels it embarrassing and unsightly. When she has to waddle, and she can no longer see her feet, and using the toilet has become a gymnastic event.
For once, he looks at her like she's mad.
"Your body's so lovely, Molly," he tells her. "And now it's changing, and I get to watch.
What man with sense wouldn't want to witness that?"
And he leans down, kisses her bare, rounded stomach. Runs his tongue and fingers along the grooves and callouses of her pregnant skin. He calls them rivers and ravines, his tone hushed. Worshipful. They are proof of topography, he says, and of a life lived well. They're proof that she's, well, her, and that she's chosen him.
"My world is here now," he tells her. "Never doubt it." He kisses her belly, breathes in her scent. "And you in there, little bean, you never doubt it either."
Though she feels the size of a planet, Molly can't help but smile.
So she winds her fingers through his curls and lets his voice lull her to sleep.
Provenance
"What did you do?"
And Mummy Holmes narrows her eyes at her youngest, who is sitting in his chair projecting an air of innocent bafflement that she doesn't buy for a minute.
While he may be a talented actor- like his brother- he has never been able to fool her, and she intends to keep it that way.
Besides, the only reason a man asks for access to a valuable family heirloom- particularly one which dates back to the period of the Tudors, and which nobody, theoretically speaking, actually knows the Holmes family own- is if he's done something to his other half.
Something spectacular.
Something relationship destroying.
Something even sweet Molly Hooper would get annoyed about-
In short, the sort of something which Alexandra has no doubt her son is capable of, given that he takes after her.
And that being the case, she feels it her duty to a) get to the bottom of what he's done before he cocks everything up, and b)offer him the really big gems in the family vault, the sorts of ones that could probably get a man forgiven for anything. There are, after all, rubies and emeralds aplenty. There's gold and jade and coral too. Why, before great Uncle Thaddeus fell out with the Crown, he had amassed himself quite the collection of gem stones, and his daughter only added to it when she took up with that Caliph in Rome, much to the family' s consternation-
But though she has asked him, Sherlock says nothing.
He merely cocks his head at her, clearly having decided to wait her out, rather than tell her what's wrong.
Internally, Alexandra sighs. "So you don't want to talk about it?" she asks, and to her surprise, her son smiles.
"I never mind talking about Molly," he points out mildly. "I just find it amusing that you assume my giving a gift meant I must have done something wrong." His eyes turn impish. "It never did, for you and Daddy."
Alexandra cocks her head, willing to concede the point. Gifts between spouses had been a regular feature of her relationship with his father, when Sherlock was growing up. "So you are not, in fact, trying to finagle your way back into Molly's affections with jewellery?" she asks and he shakes his head.
"If Molly were angry with me," he says, "then no amount of pretty baubles would get her to forgive me. Her affection isn't for sale." And again he shakes his head, blushing slightly at the amused (pleased) look this prompts from his mother.
She can tell that it is only with great difficulty that he's preventing himself from sticking his tongue out at her.
"But that said," he continues, "I wish to give Molly a gift. With the child on the way..." He shrugs, tries to affect a nonchalant pose.
His delight at becoming a father nevertheless oozes out of every pore.
"I had planned to give her my fee from the Sultana for finding her husband," he says, "but unfortunately the pearls she sent aren't suitable: They're far too dull to complement Molly's colouring. And then I remembered the piece you have, and I thought I could swap them..." Again, the shrug. "If you'd rather they stayed with you, however-"
"No." Alexandra shakes her head. "It's not that. I just... We have far more impressive jewellery than those little pearl drops. The emerald combs from great grandmamma, perhaps? Or the ruby ring your great-great grandfather managed to smuggle out of Petersburg?
Wouldn't you like to give something like that to Molly?"
Sherlock's smile grows soft. "Mummy," he says, "the point of jewels is not to emphasise the beauty of the gem, it's to emphasise the beauty of the wearer. Dousing Molly in diamonds would be like covering a Stradivarious in gold filigree: Utterly pointless."
The older woman smiles. Nods. Now she understands her son's thinking. "So in other words, you have no wish to gild the lily?" she says.
He nods. "Molly is the lily," he says, a small, secret little smile tugging at his mouth. "She will always be the lily."
It makes his mother's heart glad to see it, and so Alexandra makes a call to her banker that day. Sends Sherlock in to see him.
Those little pearl earrings make their way back to Baker Street in an inconspicuous paper bag, tucked tightly into Sherlock's inside pocket.
The detective grins the whole way.
End of an Era
"But isn't there anything you can do?"
And Molly looks miserably down at lavender the shirt in Sherlock's hand. The shirt now stained with GSR and blood-spatter. The shirt now missing a sleeve and almost all of its buttons. The shirt which had miraculously survived Moriarty, Magnusson, the bombing of Baker Street and John's repeated attempts to clean up his friend's flat, only to come to an end in front of her very eyes, courtesy of some common-or-garden thug-
At seeing the legendary Purple Shirt of Sexy destroyed, she can't help it.
She does what any heavily pregnant, recently bereaved, completely hormonal woman would do: She bursts into tears.
The man responsible for this shirt-slaying carnage- one William Drury, of the Peckham Druries- is on his belly on the ground in front of Baker Street, screaming for a solicitor, or the police, or, at least, the chance to get up. On seeing Molly' s tears however he grows awfully pale. He even stops yelling. Everyone knows how Holmes reacts to seeing his bird upset, after all: Billy doesn't fancy getting a first-hand look at it
Unfortunately for him, however, what he fancies is of no interest to Sherlock at all.
The detective doesn't hesitate: He smashes a nasty, well-timed knee into the small of Drury's back, knocking the breath out of him. Another dig, this time in his side, makes the younger man gasp and knocks the home-made billy-club he was carrying out of his hand. His point regarding the dangers of attempting to ambush his family made, Sherlock releases Drury to John and goes over to Molly. Gathers her into his arms and gently wipes her tears away.
She looks almost comically small next to him, despite the size of her baby bump.
As Watson phones Lestrade he watches his friend with a wry, amused smile.
"There, there," Sherlock tells Molly softly. "No need to worry: I'm sure I can find another ridiculously tight shirt in the same colour." He smiles. Kisses her forehead. "Your days of perving over me aren't done, my darling.
Trust me, there's no need to fret."
She blinks up at him with eyes as wide as saucers though. Her lip wobbles and oh, the things that does to Sherlock's heart.
"But that was the first shirt I perved over you in," she sniffles. "It's, it's the sentimental value of it, Sherlock. That one was special. That one was ours. A new shirt won't have all the happy memories that one does." She wrinkles her nose slightly. "I know you think it's silly but-"
"I don't." Holmes' tone is very certain. "It's the same for me, with some of your clothes. Your cherry-patterned cardigan, for example: Oh, the ideas that used to give me." She gives a small giggle and he kisses the tip of her nose. Both Drury and Watson roll their eyes in disgust. "But, if a thing is destroyed then it's destroyed, Molly, and I rather fear this shirt has completely had it." He stares down at her, his expression grave.
"Are you alright hearing that?"
Molly nods sadly, seeing his point. The upset in her eyes though, it doesn't lessen, and that cuts him to the quick.
"All things end, I suppose," she says tremulously. She throws a glare at Drury. "I hope you're pleased with yourself," she tells the young thug. "You've made a very pregnant woman very, very unhappy." She shakes her head, crossing her arms over her recently-enlarged chest.
"And you've ruined all my plans for Valentine's this year- I'll have to go with Plan B, even though I have these-" she gestures to her breasts- "to work with.
What a bloody waste."
And with a final, sad glance at the Purple Shirt of Sexy (RIP) she turns away and waddles up the steps to 221B. Her shoulders hunched. Her expression sorrowful.
It breaks Sherlock's heart to see it.
He glares at Drury, who at least has the good grace to look chastened, and with a heavy heart follows his wife-to-be inside.
The Purple Shirt of Sexy is laundered and put away. Laid to rest.
Valentines Day comes around and a good time is had by all (including Molly's breasts). Eventually it seems to everyone that Molly's forgotten about it-
Which is why she's so happy when it reappears, this time inside the jacket of Sherlock's wedding suit.
"It's our wedding day, darling," he tells her. "Perve away."
So that's exactly what she does.
Footsteps
She's so small.
Sherlock Holmes curls his fingers around his daughter's tiny, perfectly formed foot.
Feels the weight of it, the warmth of it, press against his palm.
Quite without his consciously deciding to, he brings it to his mouth to kiss and as he does he finds his throat has suddenly grown tight-
She is small, and vulnerable, and perfect, his daughter, and the knowledge of this fills him up with more feeling than he can possibly articulate.
So he closes his eyes. Doesn't even try to. Molly lies asleep to his left, breathing softly, her hair matted against her head and bedraggled, her face pale from tiredness. She still smells vaguely of blood and sweat; The birth had been hard on her, harder than Sherlock had prepared himself for, and now she needs to rest-
As he thinks this, as he remembers this morning's panic, the fear that his Molly would be taken from him, he has to force himself not to grip the baby tighter-
He has, after all, learned the hard way about holding onto things too tightly.
And for that reason he makes himself loosen his grip. Makes himself breathe deeply and calmly. He doesn't want to alarm his daughter, or her mother: The danger from both is past. In the morning, he tells himself bracingly, in the morning Molly will wake up and he'll show her the wonderful little being they made together. They'll talk about a name, though personally Sherlock's rather set on "Mary." They'll coo and smile at their child, and be thankful for her presence, and when he imagines that Sherlock's heart feels so great and mighty and full in his chest that he fancies it might burst-
And so he holds his daughter close.
Breathes in the scent of her.
She gurgles slightly in her sleep but doesn't wake; Feeling thankful for her continued slumber, Sherlock returns his investigations. He feels the delicate porcelain of her skull and marvels that it take up little more than a quarter of his palm. He touches her toes. Her pudgy little hands. In length, each one matches his thumb, they're so small. They flex reflexively, even in sleep. He runs his knuckles gently over ten miniscule, perfect toenails, their edges scratching slightly against his skin, and smiles at the marvellous symmetry of it all-
Beside him Molly turns in her sleep, murmuring his name. Reaching out for him. He takes her hand and feels, for the first time in his life, that he has something truly precious in his keeping.
He is glad of it.
When John finds him later that night, he's fallen asleep.
One hand is in Molly's, and his little daughter is curled in against his chest.
Newborn
"You're having a what now?"
And Sherlock blinks at Molly.
Frowns, as if she'd spoken in another language.
Behind him, she can see John Watson staring at the back of his head, little Rosie pressed to his chest. He raises his eyebrows at her in question- Problem?- and she shakes her head, causing Sherlock to frown more and turn. Look at his friend askance.
"Molly just told me she's having a baby, John," he says, his voice oddly... detached.
"She says it's mine," he adds helpfully, "which is... Surprising."
He looks down at his tea mug, nonplussed. "Really bloody surprising."
"Surprising? What's bloody surprising about it?" Molly snaps, insulted. By now she is beginning to regret just blurting this out in front of John. But she's been trying to tell Sherlock for two weeks now and she hasn't been able to bring herself to say it. She'd thought that just getting it out, willy-nilly, would be better than never saying it at all.
So much for that notion.
Sherlock looks back up at her however, that same nonplussed look on his face.
"It's surprising because I assumed that if you wanted children then you would choose someone else to father them," he says, his tone as mild as if he were pointing out the unsuitability of a bit of wallpaper, and not his own unsuitability to reproduce.
The very reasonableness of it cuts Molly to the quick.
"Why wouldn't I want you to be the father of my children?" she asks. "I love you. You're clever, kind, perfect- Even if you are a great, lumbering clot of a man sometimes.
What on Earth about that translates to you as "not father material,"?"
He looks at her as if she's mad. "I'm an emotionally repressed trauma magnet with a past of addiction and murder, who has never been able to sustain a relationship besides my friendship with John," he says in that same reasonable tone. "I come from demonstrably unsuitable genetic stock- Any child I have could be another Eurus. And you are loveliness and kindness personified- Why would you want that for yourself?" He shakes his head decisively. "No, you deserve better."
Now it's her turn to look at him like he's mad. "But I love you," she says softly. "I love everything about you- Even the bad things. There is no "better,"."
And, her decision made, she pulls him to her by his dressing gown's lapels. Kisses him soundly. To her amusement, John covers his daughter's eyes with one hand, causing Rosie to gurgle in delight and try to pat his hand away. When they pull apart and come up for air, Sherlock is staring at her in wonder, as if she were some sort of wondrous, magical being.
"You want..?" He doesn't seem to have the worlds to explain.
"I want," Molly nods in certainty. "I really, really want."
And then, to her utter delight, he lets out this loud, fearsome, joyous whoop and picks up her. Spins her around. When he sets her down he drops to his knees, lays his ear to her still-flat belly and splays his long fingers across it. The words he says are soft. Gentle. Fast. He speaks of taking care of her, she thinks, of taking care of them both. Molly tangles her fingers through his curls and holds him to her, thinking of him. Thinking of how this is her family now.
She may soon have two newborns on her hands, but she wouldn't have it any other way.
The Beginning