As the weeks pass achingly slow, Molly grows used to waking to the peach coloured walls of Mary and John's spare bedroom. To different tea bags, and to John's croaky morning voice, to the cries of a new born baby girl.

She hasn't seen St Bart's since the day of Moriarty's return, and that was a fact that was weighing heavily on her mind. Her job was a vital part of who she was, and to be denied it-'I'm sorry Molly, but it's too dangerous just now, they said'- was disheartening.

Molly tried to stay upbeat, John and Mary hardly needed another crying baby in their house, but as time marched on, her gloominess grew. Even the presence of Sherlock Holmes did nothing to elevate her weariness, if anything, he aggravated it.

"John and Mary have informed me you are somewhat unhappy with me," He says late one night he is over at the Watson's. Molly suspects Mary has all but forced him into the room with her, to break the tense silence that has been brewing between them since she slapped him in the lab.

She sighs, momentarily pausing from the process of her bedtime tea routine. "I'm unhappy about my life being on hold," She spits, whirring her around to glare at him. "I'm furious with you."

"Why?" He asks, confusion evident in his furrowed brow and pouted lips. "I apologised about the drugs."

She has to give out a shuddering, disbelieving laugh. "Oh the drugs were just the start, Sherlock," She bites back. The kettle comes to a boil, the water bubbling angrily as she turns back to pour the liquid into her cup. "Then it was getting engaged to someone to break into an office, then it getting then yourself shot, then leaving your hospital bed to do god knows what-

"It was for-" Sherlock interrupts. His hands were clasped behind his back like a chastised child.

"- A case, I know," Molly finishes mockingly, a petulant edge to her tone. Milk and sugar are thrown into her cup with an annoyed flair. She spins back to face him once again. "But I haven't even finished yet. Then to top that all off you manage to get yourself a death sentence."

"I had my reasons for that." Sherlock defends. His posture is suddenly rigid, and the same inclining she gets when she questions the Watsons too much about Magnussen appears. They're all hiding something, something big, something important enough to kill for.

"I'm sure you did," She mutters, trying to keep her voice steady and her hands from shaking. "Was there a reason you couldn't say goodbye to me before you left?"

"Ah," Sherlock breathes out.

Molly bites down on her lip. "You don't have to bother with an excuse. I know what that means..." She stops for a second, the pain in her chest blooming. Tears collect at the corner of her eyes, threating to reveal the extent of her sorrow. "To not even be worth a goodbye."

It's unspoken between them, but somehow he instinctively knows what she's thinking, what his recent actions have made her believe.

I don't count, her tired brown eyes scream, devoid of their customary sparkle. The usual light that exuded from her was all but diminished, that used to be as bright as that pretty dress she'd worn to the Watson wedding, a beacon of yellow that Sherlock's eyes kept returning to.

"Molly," He whispers, his fingers tips reaching out to bridge an impossible distance.

Molly wipes a hand across her face. "Just go and find him, Sherlock," She pleads, trying to deflect from a painful subject. "Find Moriarty so we can all go back to our lives."

Sherlock shifts forward, head tilted, and Molly can guess how this scene could play out. Her full name uttered out of his perfect lips, a promise to find the villain and return to her, a sweet, chaste kiss on her cheek to sate her anger.

She withdraws, because for once, she thinks that even a speck of kindness from him could break her. He already has, in his recklessness and his unintentional cruelty.

"And when this is over, I'm done," She whispers. It's a quiet, sad, admittance of defeat. All these years, putting up with hurried demands and rude comments, but in the end she was always going to fail against a hurricane of a man. "I'll be your pathologist, help you with your cases. But that has to be it.. I can't-"

Sherlock stops her struggles with a nod and step back. "I understand," He answers, head still bowed, his curls falling limp on his forehead. He stares at her for another moment, a sad melancholy to the tilt of his lips. "I should be going."

A goodbye tries to claw its way up her throat but the silence hangs in the room. Sherlock waits longer than necessary, for what, Molly isn't sure. Forgiveness? A withdrawal of her previous statement? Whatever it is he abandons any hope of it with a swirl of his coat, leaving Molly with a fading view of the back of his head.

This confrontation was meant to be Molly's empowerment- finally calling Sherlock out on his stupid, brash decisions- to make the decision to step back from an impossible man, and her impossible love for him.

She's left to sip at her forgotten tea- wincing at it's weak flavour- as she trudges back to a strange bed. The image of returning to her quiet flat and her unusually morbid job are coupled with a terrifying realisation- that this muted, peaceful life she depicts in her mind when she shut her eyes at night- has a black, gaping hole the size of a consulting detective.