A new love –

Though I know there's no such thing as true love.

It was hardly an unusual thing for Sherlock Holmes to be wide awake in the very early hours of the morning before the sky had even begun to grow light. His sleeping habits (as well as his eating habits) were anything but regular, and he only ever really indulged in both when he'd finished a case.

One such time in early December found Sherlock sitting on his bed, his back against the headboard and his laptop open on his lap. He'd solved a particularly interesting one just this afternoon, and had fallen asleep as soon as his head hit his pillow after devouring anything edible in Mrs. Hudson's refrigerator. Sherlock had woken up half an hour ago completely energized and ready for something new for his huge brain to work on.

He had just finished answering an e-mail about a missing husband (honestly, were all bored and neglected housewives this stupid?) when his Skype icon began to bounce with an alert. Opening it, Sherlock saw that Molly had just come online. He grinned without restraint, glad that his pathologist had unknowingly provided him with the perfect form of rescue from such mundane problems. Yes, they were beneath his intelligence level, but sometimes desperate times called for desperate measures when trying to fight off boredom. Without hesitation but with great excitement, Sherlock clicked on Molly's name and made a call. She answered after three rings.

Her image filled the screen. From the position of her own laptop, Sherlock saw that the device was seated at the desk in her bedroom there. Molly herself was sitting in the desk chair, clearly just home from a day at the university, judging by her neat bun and lilac blouse. The small smile she had been sporting widened when she got a good look at Sherlock. "Hello, sleepy-head."

Sherlock ignored the increased heart rate at the term of endearment and narrowed his eyes at her as he asked, "How did you know?"

Now Molly laughed (Sherlock's chest filled with a pleasant warmth at the sound) and replied, "Your hair is even more poofy than usual, so unless you've used a blow-dryer on your hair at the highest intensity level…"

Sherlock smiled at his pathologist's deduction skills - a very easy one to deduce, yes, but since Molly's hair was straight…wait – Sherlock's smile faded as he asked, "How would you know this is how my hair looks after I've been sleeping?"

"Well, Tom had even curlier hair than you, and his head was always an amusing fright in the morning."

All warmth and happiness that Sherlock had felt upon seeing Molly on his computer screen was dampened considerably at the mention of Mr. Meat Dagger. The fact that her reply was spoken in a completely casual and offhand tone only made it worse…no, wait, it wasn't that…it was that barely detectable note of melancholy, of wistful sadness, in her voice. Which reminded him of something he (really) wanted to know.

"Molly, why did your engagement end?"

For a moment, Molly looked surprised. Whether it was because he was actually asking or that he didn't already know, Sherlock wasn't sure. A moment later, Molly had composed herself and answered him in an even tone that did not lose the melancholy note that Sherlock had detected earlier.

"Well, it was about a week after John and Mary's wedding. Tom and I were visiting his family in Northampton for the weekend. We ran into someone there, a woman that Tom had known since childhood and had dated seriously before she'd moved to Edinburgh for University. Turned out she had just moved back and…well, it took less than twenty-four hours for them to realize that it wasn't nearly over between them…I just wish I didn't have to find out by walking in on them making out behind his parents' house."

A white-hot impulse to find Mr. Meat Dagger and tear his internal organs out one by one began to boil in the pit of Sherlock's stomach. His hands had clenched into shaking fists, but they loosened as Molly continued in that sad, resigned tone. Why did she not sound as furious as he felt?

Her next words gave him the answer to that question. "When I saw them, and they saw me, my first thought was asking myself why I didn't feel at all angry. I barely remember handing him back the ring he gave me and telling him to gather his things from my flat while I was at work on Monday. He had left a letter with his spare key when I came home that day, full of apologies and explanations and farewells. And that was that."

A few minutes of silence passed. The sadness in her eyes was more wistful that anguishing, which Sherlock was glad of. It helped to calm his own rage, and made it easier for him to eventually say, in a quiet voice, "I'm sorry, Molly." And he truly meant it. The last person who deserved to be betrayed like that was Molly Hooper. As Sherlock had once told her, Molly Hooper deserved to be very happy.

A small smile lifted Molly's thin lips momentarily, for she could tell that Sherlock was sincere. "It's all right, really. It just wasn't meant to be. I think I always knew that, and it's why I never felt angry. I know he was sorry it ended like that, and the last thing he wanted was to hurt me. We did love each other, but not the way we deserve to be loved. I hope that he will be happy now. She can give him what he wants and needs in a way I never could. He wanted to move back to his village, live the quiet life with his family away from the big city. In his letter, he said that I wouldn't be happy outside of London…" Molly's small smile reappeared as she looked at her interlocked fingers sitting atop her desk. "I believed him until recently…"

"What do you mean, Molly?" asked Sherlock almost sharply. He began to feel afraid of what she meant. Did she regret losing Tom? Did she truly want that quiet life.

Now Molly looked back at Sherlock on her screen with what could only nervousness. Her interlocked fingers tightened around each other. "Today, Dr. Carlisle asked me to come to lunch with her and one of the deans of UOC. They told me about what a phenomenal job they think I'm doing in the position, and…asked if I would consider accepting a…a permanent position with them."

Sherlock's entire body became numb, except for the feeling of his stomach suddenly feeling as heavy as his microscope. "…Permanent?"

Molly nodded, and now spoke in a bit of a rush. "Yes. You see, the professor that I'm filling in for this semester is taking a sabbatical in India, but they've just heard that she'd like to settle and help develop a new college there. And they really seem to think I'm doing a good job here, so…"

"And…" It suddenly became very difficult for Sherlock to speak past the lump in his desert-dry throat. "And you're…you're seriously considering accepting."

Molly slowly nodded, looking torn between being apologetic and defiant. "Yes, I am. Look, I never expected or imagined how…how amazing my time here has been. I have a job that I love, and that has really helped my confidence in my abilities. I'm learning to do things that I thought I would only ever dream about, like surfing. The friends I've made here, Hugh and Addie especially, are two of the best people I've ever known. I think I could be really happy here, Sherlock." She paused and sighed. "As much as you would hate my moving here would complicate your life, I know that you want me to be happy."

Sherlock knew that if he kept talking to her, he would somehow lose the ability to breathe – boring as it was, it was unfortunately essential to living. Lowering his eyes to his lap, he managed to choke out in as much of his normal tone of voice as he could muster: "Call me back in fifteen minutes exactly. This conversation is not over." Then he hung up on her, deleting her image without looking at her reaction.

The next fifteen minutes for Sherlock Holmes were fifteen of the hardest minutes he ever had to live through. Even if he spent them lying on his back on his bed, completely still with his hands folded in their customary position under his chin, inside himself was utter chaos, panic, fear, and a gathering of courage that was nothing short of a Herculean effort.

Five of those minutes were spent with him running aimlessly through his Mind Palace, not wanting to face the potential reality of a life without Molly. Each scenario he ran through was more horrific than the last. This temporary separation – or what he thought would be temporary – was bad enough. Yes, he could text her anytime limitlessly and Skype her easily from his phone or computer, but Sherlock had learned very quickly that electronic forms of communication were very shallow substitutes for having her real presence close by, always there for him, ready and willing to be there for him. He found himself not only missing her presence, but wishing she was there for him to do things he'd never done with her before, to appreciate things he'd been too stupid to notice before. A life without Molly there…it was a prospect that had terrified Sherlock like nothing had before, not even John getting married. At least then John wasn't going anywhere.

The next five minutes were spent berating himself with that feeling he hated to feel, that he managed to avoid most of the time but never when it came to Molly: guilt. He did not have to be as smart as he was to see how much Molly was thriving in New Zealand. Each time he spoke to her over Skype, she seemed to beam even brighter with quiet confidence she hadn't believed she could possess before. She truly was happy there, and though Sherlock was a very selfish and possessive creature of those select few people he held in his heart, he had meant it when he told Molly that she deserved to be nothing but happy. That had been when she had been engaged to Tom…why should that not apply to this situation as well?

The final five minutes Sherlock spent in organizing what he would say to Molly when she called back. She was a woman of her word that he trusted absolutely; he knew she would call back when he asked. She was undoubted very worried about him now, since he had not given her a reaction or opinion of her news. He knew what he had to do, but he had a long history of hurting Molly by saying the right (or wrong) thing in the worst (possible) way.

Failure was not an option anymore…not when he would lose, in his own words, the one person that mattered the most.

Right on time, Molly called Sherlock back over Skype, and he answered after three rings. Her face, once it materialized on the screen, was the epitome of confusion and worry. "Sherlock, please talk to me and be honest. Don't say you're ok when I know you're not."

Hearing an echo of those words she had spoken to him so long ago, the words that had helped him really see her, gave Sherlock the last drop of desperate courage he needed to say what needed to be said – the right way.

"Ask me again."

Molly furrowed her brow. "Ask you what again?"

"The question you want me to answer that I couldn't answer before you left."

Molly realized what he meant in a few seconds, and her confusion was replaced with a wary fear. This subject had not been addressed by either of them since the day she had left England. Molly had not wanted to push him for an answer he wasn't ready to give confidently and willingly; Sherlock had not wanted to answer her question over an electronic device rather than face-to-face. But now that he was faced with the possibility of not having that option, well, desperate times called for desperate measures. And Molly knew that he would ask for her to ask unless he had the answer she needed to know.

So she took a deep breath and asked: "How could you make me believe that I didn't count again?"

Hearing it phrased in the worst possible way, Sherlock had to close his eyes and gather himself for a moment. Finally, he opened his eyes again and gave a long overdue answer:

"Because I was a coward. Because the thought of saying goodbye to you believing I would never see you again terrified me more than jumping off that roof. I was afraid of watching you go through the denial this could be happening, the anger at the situation, the pleading to be able to somehow help as you once did, and most of all the devastation I knew you would feel. Not only that, I was terrified of how I would react to that, because I knew that I would not be able to hide anything from you, especially emotions I could not define."

A tear had fallen onto Molly's cheek hearing all of this. Her hand came up to her throat to touch her scar, remembering the message from Moriarty that had saved him, and nearly losing her life so shortly thereafter. "Is that why you pushed me away after…"

"Yes. I didn't want anything to change now that I had gotten my life back. But then you got that offer, and you learned everything I had kept from you…There was no going back after that."

Molly wiped away the tears freely falling from her eyes and asked in an unsteady voice, "Why couldn't you tell me this before I left, Sherlock?"

Sherlock ran his fingers through his hair, his own throat tightening. "Because I did not want to give you a reason to not go on your adventure. You deserved it after all you'd been through. As much as I didn't want you to go…I knew that you needed to." He met her eyes through the web cameras. "I am sorry, Molly. I am…so…sorry…for everything."

Sherlock had given Molly the explanation and apology she had needed and deserved long overdue but not too late (hopefully). He watched her take a big, relieved breath as she closed her eyes and wiped her face with a tissue.

But before she could say anything, Sherlock spoke again. There was one more thing that he needed to say to her. Again, he really would have preferred not to have to do this over an electronic form of communication, but…

"Molly, before you can make the decision of where your life will go, you need all of the information that you can get with each option. I'm sure you are getting all of the information you need about your option of staying in New Zealand…but there is one crucial piece of information you need to know about your option of returning to London."

"About you?" asked Molly weakly.

"Yes." Sherlock took a deep breath, for the first time wishing that he had John's brain instead of his own (only for this situation, of course), and spoke his next words very carefully. "Molly, you need to know that, if you return to London, I do not want our relationship to be what it was: before or after the Fall, before or after your engagement, before or after you left. If you come back…I want you to be…What I mean is, I want to be…with you."

Molly seemed to freeze on the screen, though Sherlock knew the connection had not been lost. He saw her gulp and her eyes widen before she managed to squeak. "Be with me? In what way?"

Now Sherlock gulped and took the plunge. "In every way."

Molly's hand flew to her mouth, which then slid down to her heart. "Really? Are you sure?"

"Molly…I would rather have you on the other side of the world having a happy, fulfilling life, than have you close to me again but knowing I couldn't have you completely…I wish I could say you don't know that kind of pain, but since I'm the reason you can…"

Silence followed for a full minute. Molly's shock was still clearly visible, and Sherlock felt suddenly drained after revealing so much he had denied, fought against, and hidden from everyone, let alone Molly, for so long. It was Sherlock who broke the silence, his voice a quiet plea.

"Now you have all of the information you need to choose what new life you want, Molly Hooper. Whichever you choose…well, I hope you will let me know by the new year, because yours is not the only life which will be decided."

Molly looked at him through the camera for seconds that seemed to last hours. Finally, she seemed to gather herself until she looked at him calmly and with quiet strength.

"I forgive you, Sherlock…Bye."

It wasn't until she clicked her mouse and her image disappeared from his screen that Sherlock realized how…final…those five words had sounded.

Even so, although I never knew love,

Still I feel that one dream is my due…