Author's Note:
This is a double-post. If you haven't read Chapter Three yet, I suggest going backwards and doing that now.
WARNING: POSSIBLE TRIGGER ALERT
After her difficult day, Molly decided that the best way to relax would be to take a hot bath. She had spent the entire afternoon cleaning her flat and ignoring accusatory texts from her co-workers, all of which claimed that she had left them to deal with all the work while she got a break. She also avoided reading the text from John, which presumably apologised for Sherlock's actions earlier that day.
She slipped into the bathtub and almost immediately fell into a trance-like state. She allowed her mind to blissfully wander, skirting over memories of times she had lost. She made cookies with her mother. She went to the zoo with her parents and her little magnifying glass to study snakes. She played Cluedo with Sherlock. She went to prom - by herself, of course. She went into a drug den and dragged out Sherlock. The last memory made her tense up considerably, so she climbed out of the now-cold bath and wrapped a towel around herself.
She had pushed the memory out of her mind for years, yet she could still remember every tiny detail. Sherlock's rumpled shirt. His uneven breathing. His glassy eyes. She remembered talking to him the whole way home, prattling about unimportant things and praying aloud that he would be alright.
It had happened so fast. She had dragged him out of the old building and driven him back to the university, and, when they got there, he'd said quite happily, "You're too good to me, Molly Hooper." She'd ignored it and tried to get him cleaned up when he leaned over and kissed her full on the mouth. It tasted like cigarettes and pot and who knows what other kinds of drugs, and he wasn't in his right mind, but still… her first kiss. "I love you, Little Molly," he had giggled. That was the turning point for her.
By that time Molly had as good as fallen in love with him, but he seemed to have no memories of that night, and she knew she would never bring it up again. The next day he had approached her to tell her that he was planning on leaving. He was planning on leaving his education and he was planning leaving his friends and he planned to leave her, too.
Here she was now, by herself, all because she was too scared to talk about that day. She was too scared to remind him of how close he had been to death. Too scared to tell him about their not-so-passionate moment. Too scared that he would laugh it off and tell her it had never been real.
Molly didn't realize she was crying until she opened her tightly closed eyes and found herself on the floor. The towel was still wrapped around her, very tightly. Too tightly. She tore it off and cried even harder, looking at her legs and the scars buried so very deeply in them. Those cars had been there for decades, and they had never faded. They where thick and white against her skin, and Molly knew they would be forever. She traced them with a bitter fondness.
She ran her finger over the words 'IM SORRY' that she had etched into her own skin. She remembered all the events that had led up those words. Her father leaving. Her mum dying. Sherlock, telling her goodbye for the last time. She had cried so hard. She hated herself then for not recognizing the pain of the lost souls around her, and she still hated herself now.
Being rejected. Being left in the dust. A friendless orphan. Being abandoned by all she had. She was left alone - alone forever and alone for always. Nobody would ever recognize her as the girl who had once been beautiful, who had once been loved. She didn't have a story that mattered, her life wasn't important.
If Molly disappeared today, who would notice? Nobody, that's who. The police would search for a few days, a week at most, before a few people would be notified to a get-together in her honour. Toby would be sent to a shelter somewhere, her few possessions would be donated somewhere or other, and her flat would be rented out to someone new. John would go to a funeral for her. Greg Lestrade might go. Denise, her partner at work, would. Anderson might. Sherlock? No. He would think it below him, he would say that she wasn't going to care. Molly smiled a little as she almost heard him whining, "She's dead anyway, what does it matter if I was invited to go to her funeral?"
Molly paused for a moment, and removed the thick wooden bracelet from her wrist, revealing the deepest scars of all. She traced their familiar pattern, the thick marks. She remembered the night they had appeared.
It was the week after Sherlock had kissed her. He had left two days earlier, but Molly had been so absorbed in the stress of exams that she didn't really process it until that night. His leaving had broken her heart.
Molly had no idea what to say. She didn't know what she had done to deserve this cruel abandonment. She replayed all her memories of him over and over and over again. Nothing much was certain about Sherlock Holmes, but one thing she knew for sure was that he was an entirely rational, logical human being. It made sense to her that he must have had a reason for leaving her, and, by extension, she must have a reason for leaving herself.
That night, she had cut deeply into her skin with a small dagger he had once bestowed upon her. 'Self-defense,' he had said it was for. 'Not that you need it,' he had said. 'Not with me here.'
Molly once again traced the old scars, and remembered the terror her roommates had conveyed as they drove her to the hospital. 'Keep her head up,' they said. 'Hold her arm up.' And the hushed whispers that they tried to keep from her. 'Did they break up?' 'I don't even think they were together.'
Molly, quickly bleeding out, hadn't paid much attention the rumours that spread as she was rushed to the A&E. The doctors there had done a fine job in stitching her up, but the scars were permanent. Molly was fine with it. She didn't see anything wrong with having Sherlock's name etched into her skin forever.
If Sherlock had heard about the whole thing, he never said a word. Molly tried not to care. Eventually, she graduated and moved on with her life, reliving the scars almost every night. Molly assumed Sherlock had moved on, and he never said otherwise. She tried to as well, but she had more than just the physical marks to deal with.
