A/N: Title taken from a book by Elizabeth Glaser. Many thanks to Quarto for reading this over, offering encouragement and suggestions, and most of all for providing huge chunks of the Mary/John dialogue in this chapter. She also suggested I continue on instead of stopping where I did but as you already know, I'm evil and so it ends on that specific cliffie.
Six Months Later
"Well, so much for sobriety."
Mary sighed and turned to face her husband as he tromped tiredly into the kitchen. "What did he take?" Damn, Sherlock had been doing so well, at least they thought he had.
"Cocaine," John replied, threading his way past a pile of Rosie's toys and books to allow Mary - soapy marigold-clad-hands and all - to take him into her embrace as best she could. "Said it was only so he could stay awake long enough to wrap up that case we've been working on.
"The one with the snake and the paint-spattered stripper?"
She felt him nod against her neck. "He swore up and down it wasn't a relapse, it was a deliberate choice, blah blah blah, all the usual crap addicts spew when they're in denial. He's sleeping it off back at the flat with Mrs. Hudson keeping an eye on him."
"I really wish he'd stop fighting about getting a therapist," Mary said, feeling a bit helpless. Not a feeling she was used to. But Sherlock had refused to even consider such a 'crutch' as he termed it, so they'd been forced to let it go.
Well, it was bound to be two steps forward one step back, she counseled herself as John finally removed himself from her embrace. Sherlock was still finding his feet after losing Molly, as were they all. At least he and John had been cleared of any wrongdoing in her Ascendance, as the journalists and religious nuts (but not, significantly, any of the established religions) had taken to calling it.
Even though she wasn't overly fond of social media, given her past life and the secrets she still held, in this one case Mary found herself grateful for the dozens of witnesses who'd uploaded video for all the world to see and marvel at. And argue over. But at least those witnesses had shown that Molly's fall from the roof of St. Bart's had been immediately followed by her being lifted back up in a purely supernatural manner (if that was the right term, which neither John nor Sherlock would or could verify).
And now Sherlock, who had been so steadfast in his desire to live a life worthy of Molly's (temporary, they all hoped and prayed) sacrifice, had misstepped and taken a fall of his own. Far less dramatic, true, but one that could be just as damaging if this single misstep led to another.
She just wished they'd been able to see the signs, to stop it from getting this far - was it really only one incident, or had there been others, while she and John were busy sorting out their own lives?
Sorting them out. That was one way to put it. "So," she said briskly, "any really good cases on the horizon? Anything above a five, I mean?"
Sherlock had created a case rating system, numbering from one to ten, and his dive back into drugs meant there'd been nothing above a four for at least a few months, no matter what he'd told John. Poor John; he'd known Sherlock far longer than she had, in both his lives, and yet he still couldn't seem to figure out when his friend was lying about something.
John shrugged. "I mean, I think so? I hope so? But then, I thought the last bunch were sixes and sevens, so what do I know? A couple from the website look pretty promising, and Greg said he'd call as soon as anything cleared his desk we might be able to help with."
"That's all we can do, make sure he has really interesting cases and remind him that he isn't alone, that he has family to turn to." She couldn't help the rueful grin as she glanced down at her was-it-really-slightly-larger-than-yesterday-or-was-it-just-her-damn-imagination baby bump.
John's gaze moved to the same location, his hands immediately following to tenderly cup flesh housing the next (pair of!) Watson progeny. Three months gone and she looked and felt as if she was already six months pregnant. Blech.
"Been giving you a hard time today, have they?" John asked. Then, glancing upwards with a wry grin, he added, "Any of them?"
"Nope, the only problem child today is Sherlock," she assured him, then sighed. "I wish I could say I was surprised this happened, but I'm really not."
"Me either," John sighed, finally stepping away from her to get the electric kettle ready. It had taken almost a decade to get him into the habit of making his own tea, but he was much better at such domestic tasks than he had been during her pregnancies with Harry and Mike. "Should've seen it coming, the last couple of months, but, well." He grinned ruefully down at her middle and back up at her. "Still find it hard to believe, some days."
"I don't," Mary replied somewhat tartly as she turned back to finish up the last of the dishes. "It was all your fault, you know."
"Mine!" John protested, craning his neck to look at her in mock outrage. "How was it my fault?"
Mary snorted as she pulled the marigolds back on. "Don't play the innocent with me, Mr. 'I'm Randy After That Scary Case So Let's Have Life-Affirming Sex'."
"Says the woman who can be directly quoted with, 'Oh, never mind the damn condoms, I'm sure it'll be fine'," John shot back good humoredly.
"Six," Mary said as she stared at the load of unwashed dishes. "Who even has six children nowadays? That's - that's one more than a basketball team."
"Our kids would make a pretty shit side at basketball, let's be honest."
Mary laughed despite herself.
"Ad infinitum."
And then had to explain to her confused husband exactly what she was talking about.
oOo
Sherlock woke up, his mouth tasting of cigarettes and cottony dryness. He coughed, slung his legs over the side of the sofa on which he'd essentially collapsed the night before, and sat up.
As always, there was a steaming cup of tea set on the coffee table; as always, he gulped it down, cursing the stinging burn against his tongue but savoring the warmth as it slid down his throat. Then he stood up, stretching and grimacing before shambling off to the bathroom for a long, hot soak under the spray. The case was solved, the second murder prevented, and all because he'd managed to stay awake long enough for the last clue to fall into place in his mind.
The second murder would have been prevented even if you'd skipped the cocaine, some annoying part of his mind murmured as he stripped out of his clothes, dropping them in a careless heap on the bathroom floor.
The fact that it sounded more like John than Molly allowed him to ignore it, at least until he was cleaned, dressed and settled back in his chair, contemplating the violin he'd taken up playing in the past few months. He'd discovered a talent for music on an undercover case, and both John and Mary had very enthusiastically urged him to pursue that talent, at least as a hobby. Something for him to do to pass the time while he waited (less and less patiently) for Molly to return.
He shifted uneasily in his seat. Molly would not be very happy to find out he'd gone back on his word, that he'd relapsed (he hated that word, he hadn't been addicted in the first place, how could this one deliberate decision be considered a relapse?).
Well. He would just have to make sure she never found out. And the best way to ensure that, was to never do it again. Simple. Easy. More than doable.
Having thus resolved his moral slip to his own satisfaction, he replaced the violin and bow on the floor - carefully, he had a respect for things that he didn't always have for people - and instead took up his laptop. Molly's laptop, actually, but she would hardly begrudge him the use of it. After all, he reasoned, if she hadn't wanted him to use it in her (temporary!) absence, then she wouldn't have made her password the anniversary of their first, incendiary meeting in that dingy alley into which she'd been dragged.
Those thugs had been his last righteous kills as an angel, he recalled as he flipped through his emails. He'd been too preoccupied afterwards with the mystery of his missing sigils - and Molly - to be arsed to look for evildoers after that. He found that memory rather pleasing, knowing that his last deliberate act of meting out divine justice had been on her behalf. More than pleasing, actually, and he looked forward to sharing that information with her upon her return. Because he hadn't thought to do so, before.
Another mistake to rectify, one of far too many he'd made when he'd first become human.
Once Molly was back, he'd do his damndest to keep such mistakes to the barest minimum.
Six (More) Months (And One Rather Embarrassing Incident Involving Irene Adler) Later
She'd been a puzzle, and he enjoyed puzzles so very, very much. And this one - ah, this one had been (almost) engrossing enough to make him forget that Molly had been gone for a year. That it had been twelve months since he'd last laid eyes on her. Fifty-two weeks since she'd been given both a second chance at life and a pair of dazzling, rainbow-colored wings that matched her equally dazzling soul.
Three hundred and sixty five days since she'd promised to find a way to return to him.
He might not have faith in a lot of things, but he had faith in Molly Hooper. She would be true to her word.
Would he tell her about The Woman, when she came back? At least, as anything other than the puzzle she'd presented him? He pondered that very question while John and Mary continued to rattle around in their kitchen.
The various Watson offspring were either in bed (Rosie and Charlotte) or staying the night at friend's houses (Harry and Mike), thus leaving the grownups free to socialize. And await a client, whom Mary assured him was in desperate need of help with her employer. Janine- what was her last name? Hawkins, that was it. She and Mary knew each other through some vague, very likely unsavory connections...he'd have to dig into that if her case turned out to be interesting.
Another interesting case involving a woman - and there he was, back where he'd started. Musing on Irene Adler.
What, he thought as he nursed his glass of (mediocre) red, had he been thinking, to get involved with her? Not, he hastily reminded himself, that he'd been 'involved', per se. She'd been a client and a case, all rolled up into one fascinating package, but there had been no emotional connection between them. She'd interested him on a purely intellectual - and yes, all right, he was only human now, nothing wrong with admitting it - to a certain extent on a physical level as well.
But that was all. His saving her life, even after all the trouble she'd caused him and the British government operative who'd tried to convince him to stay out of it (shouldn't Hart and his crew be called Queensmen, rather than Kingsmen?), had been strictly a way to end things between them. To return the favor she'd granted him - said favor being the way she'd reminded him that he needed to live his life the way Molly had taught him to. Full barrel, no-holds-barred, life to the fullest, etc. etc.
And that included being true to his promise and staying away from drugs. He hadn't touched them in any form since the case of the (ugh, John and his blog titles) Speckled Blonde. Until The Woman had drugged him, but that hardly counted; as someone had once said, people did silly things when they were in love. And even if he hadn't been in love with her, Irene Adler had most definitely been in love with him.
If he was being honest with himself (much as he hated to do so, especially when it came to The Woman), there had been a potential for...something to happen between them. Especially after he'd saved her life (Harry Hart would be livid if he discovered that fact, which thought gave him much satisfaction at times like this). Between the adrenaline and the intensity, he might very easily have given into temptation and taken what Irene had offered that night in Karachi.
But he refused be unfaithful to Molly.
He took a sip of his wine, made a face, and put the glass down. This thing of Mary and John's was beyond tedious, but he'd been promised a potential client and so he chose to wait things out.
It was, it would appear, what he was best at these days.
oOo
"How's he doing?"
Mary turned back from where she'd been peeking around the edge of the kitchen door. "Not even pretending to enjoy himself, making faces at the wine, so…"
"So pretty much exactly as expected," John finished for her.
She nodded. "Janine should be here soon, I told them both eight, knowing he'd be bang on time and she'd be fashionably late, which means she should be here any minute." She gave him a bright smile and walked (not waddled, she wasn't calling it waddling no matter how awkward her movements now that her due date was just around the corner) over to where he stood, pouring crisps into a bowl.
"Remind me again - Janine is your friend with the -"
Mary arched a brow and quipped, "Large breasts, yes, please don't make that hand gesture."
John crumpled up the now-empty bag and lobbed it at the bin, missing by a good three feet. "Yeah. Tell me again why she needs Sherlock's help?"
Mary watched as he walked over and picked up the bag, stifling a grin as she thought back to his comment about their family and basketball. It wasn't just their heights that would have them at a disadvantage. "It's her boss, the newspaperman Magnussen - John, I told you this already," she interrupted herself, suspicion rising as she studied him. "Why does it feel like you're having cold feet all of a sudden?"
"I'm not," he assured her. "Not about taking her case."
"What, then?" Mary asked, reaching across the table to lace her fingers through his. "What's bothering you, John Watson?"
He let out a loud huff of air, looking down at their interlaced fingers. "Nothing. I'm just hoping - she's the friendly one, yeah? Met her at that party we had a few years ago?"
Mary nodded, getting an inkling of where this was leading. "You did. Not only is she friendly, she's brunette, really pretty, loves dancing, and is a bit of a tart who'll flirt with a lamppost if there's nothing better available." Her expression turned troubled. "John, are you hoping she and Sherlock will...hit it off?"
He shrugged, glanced toward the kitchen door then back down again. "Would that be so bad? I mean, no one could ever replace Molly, of course, but at least Janine would be better than certain other really pretty brunettes that have involved themselves in our lives in recent months."
"You mean better than a beautiful domme-y lesbian psychopath bent on blackmailing the British government?"
John nodded, clearly ignoring the sarcasm in her voice. "I know he's stayed off the sweeties, but I'm still worried about him," he admitted lowly. "He's… spinning plates, these days. I think he doesn't know what else to do to keep himself going. And I think maybe if he met somebody… I dunno, kind, and pretty, he could start letting go a bit."
"Yeah, but he's not going to go for that, is he?" Mary scoffed, "Molly said she'd find a way to come back to him, and it's only been a year."
John sighed.
"Molly didn't know this back then, but… angels see time differently. We- they," he flinched and corrected himself, but all Mary did was nod to have him continue. "They're working on geological scales. A year is nothing to her, now. Sherlock's whole life is going to be basically an eyeblink."
John wrapped his arms around Mary. "He loves her. But she's never coming back. And he knows that."
They stood silently in each other's arms for a moment.
"He gave up… everything, for her," Mary began, hesitating over her words, "Is it even possible to get over someone you did that for? Could you?"
John smiled. "If I lost you it'd be a very different situation. I'd be a scruffy sad-eyed old GP with a criminal record and four-soon-to-be-six hellion kids… much less catnip than a genius arsehole with really good hair."
Mary couldn't help but laugh at that description - and then, right on schedule, the front doorbell rang. "Sherlock, could you get that?" she called out, stealing a moment to give John a quick peck on the lips. "All right then, showtime!"
She took up the bowl of crisps, leaving John to follow with the wine and three more glasses as they joined their guests in the front room.
End note: Many many thanks to everyone whose ever left a review. Your words mean the world to me!