After all the drama of the last chapter, here's a little breather before the drama ramps up again. :)

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Molly needed to put aside her personal issues and focus on the job in hand. Despite missing her morning break – and the latte that Parmina had brought for her being lukewarm by the time she got to drink it – she was still half an hour behind schedule. And Mr Stevens had been lying on the examination table for far too long, waiting for his post mortem to begin. She drained her cup of the last dregs of milky foam and tossed it into the recycling bin then pulled on a fresh pair of surgical gloves and set to work.

Mr Stevens' sudden demise, it transpired, was also heart-related - an unfortunate case of cardiac arrest – but that is where any similarity to Dawn's case ended.

Whereas Dawn's sad passing was down to a life of abject poverty and deprivation, Mr Stevens' could be directly attributed to forty years of excess and over indulgence. The state of his digestive tract and brain were evidence of a life-long poor diet – far too much red meat and nowhere near enough green vegetables and fresh fruit – and his lungs identified him as a heavy smoker. Mr Stevens had been a ticking bomb which finally went off. If he hadn't had a heart attack, Molly concluded, he probably would have suffered a severe stroke in the very near future.

She put the last stitch in the hairline incision, just behind his ear, to secure the scalp that she had peeled back earlier in order to remove the top of Mr Stevens' skull and take out his brain for examination. Everything was back in place now and his body could be released to his family for burial. There was nothing further to be done but catalogue and store the tissue samples, write up her findings and sign the Death Certificate. She covered Mr Stevens with the sheet and asked one of the mortuary assistants to return him to cold storage.

She looked at the wall clock. It was half past midday. She really should go to lunch now and spend the afternoon completing her paperwork. But the thought of going up to the canteen was too daunting. It was quite possible that all the staff in this building had seen either the posters on the notice boards or the video on Facebook or possibly both. Even if they disapproved of the trolling, people would still be curious. She didn't want to walk into the canteen and feel all eyes on her. She hated being the centre of attention under any circumstance but especially under such as these. Molly considered her options.

She had already arranged to take tomorrow off for her trip to Edinburgh with Sherlock and his dad. By Wednesday, people would surely have forgotten about all this and moved on to the next local scandal? So, all she had to do was maintain a low profile for the rest of the day. That settled it. She would nip out and grab a sandwich, from one of the delis in St Paul's Churchyard shopping centre. She returned to the changing room, stripped off her scrubs and donned her own clothes. With her lab coat over her arm, she took the stairs to the Pathology Department rather than the lift, to reduce the likelihood of meeting anyone, and slipped into the staff locker room to hang up her lab coat and collect her outdoor clothes and bag.

'Ah, there you are!' Sherlock exclaimed, from his seat on the locker room bench. 'I was beginning to think I'd got it wrong and you had gone up to the canteen, after all.'

'What are you…? How did you…? I thought you were…' Molly stuttered.

'I'm here to take you to lunch,' Sherlock replied, answering her questions one at a time and in the same order. 'I assumed you'd come here because…well, I know you. And, yes, I now know who's behind the posters and the video on FaceFacts, or whatever it's called. But, since you only have an hour for lunch and five minutes has gone already, shouldn't we get a move on?'

Molly had to agree with that. She collected her things and followed Sherlock from the locker room and along the corridor towards the stairs, which he by-passed in favour of the lift.

'I'd rather use the stairs…'

'No, we're using the lift

When it arrived, it was already almost full of people also engaged in the daily lunchtime exodus from St Bart's. They all shuffled aside to let Sherlock and Molly in. Molly felt her cheeks begin to burn, convinced that everyone was staring at her and would start gossiping about her the moment they stepped out of the lift, but Sherlock took her by the hand and stepped inside, nonchalantly staring straight ahead as the lift descended to ground level. The only indication he gave that he was aware of her discomfort was the gentle rubbing of his thumb across the back of her hand. When the lift stopped on the Ground Floor, they were the first to exit and stride out of the building, through the arch and up the road towards St Paul's.

'We've done nothing to be ashamed of, Molly. Why should we hide away?' he asked, as they walked along.

'We shouldn't,' she agreed. 'I just hate being stared at, that's all.'

'Well,' he sighed, 'if you're going to be hanging around me for any length of time, I'm afraid you're going to have to get used to that. For some strange reason, people find me interesting. I don't know why. So, do you know a Nurse Phillips? Stella Phillips?'

Molly thought she recognised the name from somewhere but couldn't put a face to it.

'What about Jess Creasy? She's a physiotherapist.'

That name rang a bell, too, but it was the combination of 'nurse and a physiotherapist' that lit up the lightbulb in Molly's memory.

'Those two women who gate-crashed my table in the staff canteen, the other night…' she mused. 'They were a nurse and a physio. The ones who were fantasizing about jumping you in the Mortuary and the Path lab.'

'What?'

'Yes, they asked if the seats were free, like they were just looking for somewhere to sit, but I realised after a while that they were on a fishing expedition. They wanted to talk about you.'

Sherlock scowled. As he had already commented, people seemed to find him interesting. But since they had just arrived at the deli, their conversation had to be put on pause while Molly found a table and he went to the counter to order lunch. Moments later, he joined her, with two coffees. Their sandwiches were being toasted and would be brought over presently.

'So, these two members of my fan club - assuming it's the same ones, of course - decided to troll you. I wonder why?'

'Probably because I challenged them over something they said. They claimed it was just a joke. I told them it wasn't funny.'

'Hmmm. I suppose that might annoy them. A bit. However,' he huffed, and took a sip of his coffee, 'they're not terribly bright.'

'No?'

'No. They used a Follow-Me printer, in the hospital, to print all those posters so, obviously, it left a digital trail that led straight back to Nurse Phillips' works email account. And the video they uploaded on Fat Face…'

'Facebook'

'…whatever… was traced back to the Cloud. Ms Creasy filmed it on her works phone, which is registered to the Physiotherapy Department, so the hospital authorities have access to all the Cloud data attributable to that phone. She could have just disabled the Cloud connection and the video would not have been uploaded but…well, she didn't.'

'So, it wasn't the paparazzo who filmed us, then!' Molly was surprised and also relieved, though she wasn't quite sure why. 'It was her? The physio?'

'Yes, it was her, not him. I assume she just happened to be passing and spotted us. I hope she wasn't actually stalking us. But I suppose one never knows. If she can fantasize about having sex in a morgue…' He frowned.

'Yes,' Molly agreed. 'At least the other one only wanted to do it in the Path lab.'

Sherlock shook his head, completely baffled.

'So, have they been reported to HR?'

'No, not yet. I've asked the IT technician to hold off for a day or two. I want the culprits to think they got away with it. It'll make the shock all the greater when they realise they didn't.' He flashed his psychopath smile.

'Well, thank you for getting to the bottom of it. At least we now know who did it. And probably why they did it.' But it still hurt Molly to think that someone disliked her enough to target her like that. 'I suppose Parmina was right.'

'Hmm?'

'Not everyone who works at a hospital is an angel.'

'Hmm,' he nodded.

Lunch break ended all too soon and Molly needed to be back at St Bart's.

'Will I see you later?' she asked, as they left the deli and headed back towards the hospital.'

'You're seeing me now,' he replied, smiling at her.

'Yes, but I have to get back to work.'

'So do I.'

'Oh! What are you up to this afternoon?' she enquired.

'Analysing carrots,' he replied, enigmatically.

'Oh, OK,' Molly nodded, none the wiser. 'For a case?'

'No, for a monograph.'

'Ah,' she replied. 'I wondered why you bought all those different coloured carrots. I might have known they weren't for eating.'

'We could eat them, after I've finished analysing them,' he suggested, though Molly wasn't so keen on that idea.

'So, will I see you later?' she repeated, still not getting it.

'You'll see me right now. I'm working in your lab,' he chuckled.

'Oh! Is that why you came to St Bart's this morning?'

'Indeed. I needed a spectrometer and I knew you had one.'

'Oh, I see,' she replied, with a tiny eyeroll. It all made sense now.

'Don't worry, I won't be a nuisance – no more than usual, at least.'

'Well, as long as you clean up after yourself,' she stipulated. 'Don't be leaving any mess for my staff to have to deal with.'

'As if I would!' he exclaimed, in mock indignation.

'Well, yes, you would…' she retorted.

As they turned the corner into Giltspur Street, Sherlock reached out and took her hand. Molly looked up to meet his gaze.

'Cat's out o' the bag, now,' he declared, with a little shrug.

ooOoo

Molly spent the afternoon in her office with the door firmly closed. It was the only way she could avoid being distracted by the presence of Sherlock in her work place. It was ridiculous, really, since she had been sharing lab space with him for years, first as colleagues and then as friends. But this was a whole new ball game, now they were…lovers. She felt the need of a physical barrier in order to focus her mind.

Over in the corner of the Path lab suite, Sherlock had requisitioned a work bench and gathered together a little collection of lab equipment, including two racks of test tubes, a batch of pipettes, several bottles of chemicals, a dissecting plate and a box of scalpels. He was completely absorbed in the task he had set himself, dissecting his various colourful carrots into tiny pieces and subjecting them to a variety of processes. Every now and then, he would get up and cross the floor to access one of the specialised lab machines – the centrifuge, the freeze drier, the incubator, the spectrometer – and then return to his work space and scribble something in his pocket notebook.

The department staff were accustomed to having Sherlock in their midst, doing his own thing and, generally speaking, they managed to work around him quite well. He was pretty much part of the furniture, like an eccentric family member who lived amongst them but didn't really interact. Occasionally, one of the technicians would have to jump out of his way as he barged past, or stand aside to let him use the machine they were about to use. Since he didn't seem to even notice they were there, it was easier for them to avoid him then expecting him to take evasive action. At one point, however, he came face to face with Parmina, in front of the floor-standing autoclave, and his eyes snapped into focus with a flash of recognition.

'Oh, sorry,' he exclaimed, stepping back to let her go first.

'Can I help you with those?' she asked, indicating the tray of instruments in his hands.

'Dr Hooper says I must clean up after myself and not make extra work for her staff,' he informed her.

'Well, as I'm loading the autoclave anyway…' she shrugged.

'That's very kind of you. Thank you,' he said and relinquished his tray to her, with a polite bow, then about-faced to return to his bench but then turned back.

'Sorry, what is your name?'

'Parmina,' she replied, feeling the heat rising in her face, ears and neck as the capillary vessels dilated and flooded with blood in the classic 'blush' response.

'Ah, yes, Parmina, that's right,' he nodded, as though just confirming a detail he already knew. 'Parmina, could you possibly help me with something?' He graced her with his most charming smile.

'Well, if I can…I mean, if it's possible…you know, if I'm able...'

'Oh, I'm sure you're able,' he replied, with a broad grin and proceeded to outline what he required her to do.

Four o'clock came around and the Early shift said their goodbyes and toddled off home, leaving the Late shift to carry on the work of the department, like a well-oiled machine. Molly emerged from her office, stretching her arms above her head and arching her back to relieve the stiffness brought on by sitting at her PC for nearly three hours. She scanned around the room and her gaze settled on the empty lab stool where Sherlock had been sitting. His work station was completely clear and free of clutter, wiped down and sanitised to within an inch of its life. Molly's face fell and she felt a pang of disappointment that he had left without saying goodbye.

'He said to tell you he'll text you later,' volunteered one of the lab techs. 'Said there was something urgent he needed to do but didn't want to interrupt your work to say goodbye.'

'Oh,' Molly replied. 'OK. Thank you.' Well, that was considerate of him, she supposed, though she would rather have been interrupted…

She walked over to the rack of clipboards, ending her working day where it had begun. Removing each board, one at a time, she scanned the attached paperwork, flipping through all the pages and, when satisfied, signing in the box at the head of the top sheet; removing the set of notes from the board and placing them in a filing tray, ready to be collected and taken on to the next stage of the process. As each clip board was cleared, she attached a new file from the box of 'work pending' and restocked the rack, prioritising jobs from the most urgent at the top to the least urgent at the bottom. This was a process repeated several times a day, day and night, in the Pathology Department to facilitate fair prioritisation and distribution of work and ensure the department ran smoothly.

Job done, she turned to the room with a smile.

''Bye, everyone. See you Wednesday,' she called, as she pulled the door open and disappeared through it.

ooOoo

Molly was just about ready for bed when Sherlock's text finally pinged into her phone. She had travelled home on the bus and arrived to find all the dirty crocks and cutlery left over from the weekend, that she hadn't had time to wash up that morning, had been washed, dried and put away in the cupboards. It was a simple thing but such a pleasant surprise. Sherlock must have done it when he came to pick up his bag of carrots. How sweet, she thought.

She assumed it must be a new case that had caused him to abandon his carrot-based research and sent him rushing away from the Path lab and, knowing what he was like when an interesting case popped up, she didn't bother waiting for him before having supper but she made enough for two, just in case he turned up unexpectedly.

Having eaten, Molly spent the evening dozing in front of the TV and was only roused when her phone pinged.

Sorry. Task took longer than expected. Staying tonight at Baker Street. Plane tickets booked; car hired. Pick up at 07:30. Sleep well.

And, much to Molly's surprise, the text was signed off with a 'smiling face' emoji surrounded by three hearts. It made her smile. He was definitely embracing emoji culture!

Nite-nite. See you in the morning, she replied, adding three 'sleep' emojis and a big red heart.

Then she took herself off to bed.

ooOoo