Happy New Year everyone. Here's hoping that you all have good health and happiness in 2022 - or at the very least that we have a bit less covid than the last two years.
Chapter 12
Thankfully when Molly woke up the following morning she was completely free of any hangover. She'd spent the evening before wrapping up some of the gifts that she'd bought, and watching the new Grinch animation film on Netflix. No wine or alcohol of any sort; her liver needed a detox.
As she made her way to work she checked her mailbox and was excited to have received half a dozen Christmas card-like envelopes along with a parcel, and she shoved them all into her tote bag so she could open them over a cuppa in the lab.
There were just a couple of weeks to go until Christmas Eve, and Molly was starting to get excited. She hadn't discussed it with Sherlock, but she really hoped there was a way for the two of them to spend it together. She had planned on going to her mum's house, but she would postpone that if she could be with him instead.
Work was busy from the get go with a staff meeting, followed by a couple of urgent autopsies, and it was almost lunch time by the time she made it upstairs to the lab, carrying the tapes and information that she needed to write up the files. As she made a cup of tea she remembered the cards and gift, and she decided to have a quick five-minute break before getting back to work.
She opened the cards first, smiling at the messages from friends and a couple of relatives, and then she opened up the gift, wondering just who it could be from.
Inside was a metal tin with a kind of Moulin Rouge picture of dancing girls on the top and a small typewritten card.
To Molly, thank you for everything that you do for us. Merry Christmas, John and Rosie xxx
She grinned and opened up the tin to find it full of sweets; they looked and smelt like pear drops and she decided she'd have one after her cuppa. She could leave them out on the desk as well in case any of her work colleagues fancied one.
She put the lid back on and scrunched up the wrapper, throwing it into the nearby bin, and she was just about to start on her first file when the door opened and Sherlock made his way in.
'Hey. How's things?'
He took off his coat and threw it onto one of the desks before he started to remove his scarf and gloves, but she could just tell there was something wrong; it had her rising to go and meet him.
'What is it? What's happened?'
'Clara Watson has been poisoned. I only heard late this morning when Lestrade phoned with the news. She was brought here yesterday morning with stomach pains and vomiting, but it was only escalated late last night when they diagnosed Fentanyl poisoning. I've just come from her ward and I'm going over to meet Lestrade at her flat so we can try and figure out how it was administered.'
'Oh God, Sherlock, that's awful. What's her prognosis?'
He shook his head. 'Not good, she's in a coma, she isn't responding to treatment and her organs are starting to fail.'
Molly sat down on a nearby stool. She didn't know the woman, but she realised just how bad this might be for John, for the case... even for her.
She hardly noticed Sherlock walking past her until he next spoke.
'What's this?'
She looked up to see him gesturing at the tin of sweets.
'Oh, that's just a gift from John and Rosie. Do you want one?'
He'd opened it by now and had picked it up, bringing it to his nose to smell it and it was only at that moment that Molly started to get a bad feeling.
'Have you had one?' He turned and held the tin out towards her a little. 'MOLLY, HAVE YOU EATEN ANY?'
'I... no, no one has. Do you... is this connected?'
'Yes Molly, dammit, yes it's connected. God, I knew this was a mistake, I knew I shouldn't let sentiment get the better of me but I was a weak fool. This...' he gestured back and forth between them. 'This is a mistake and it's one I'm correcting right now. We're through. I should have known that even being your friend would put a target on your back, anything more just makes that target bigger and brighter.'
Molly felt shock and a sick dread wash through her at both his words, and at how close she had possibly come to being hurt or worse.
'Don't be ridiculous Sherlock.'
'Me being ridiculous...me!' He slammed the tin down onto the bench making Molly jump. 'I'm not the one who was almost poisoned.'
'This has nothing to do with the case and you know it, it's to do with you panicking about getting close to someone.'
She saw him taking a deep breath, his eyes narrowing, and she knew he was as angry as she was, but she also knew she was right.
'Then we'll have to agree to disagree, either way we are finished. I need to test these sweets, but I have no doubt I'll find the poison.'
Molly moved to her files. 'Fine, well you're doing it by yourself... alone, just like you'll be for the rest of your life because of your over-reaction.'
As she came closer he caught hold of her arm, and for a moment she thought he might take it all back; she could almost taste the hope, but it wasn't to be.
'Just promise me one thing Molly...that you'll leave London...tonight.'
She shook her arm free and stepped closer, poking him in the chest with her finger.
'Oh I can promise you that, and you know what… you won't know where I've gone and you never know, I might just decide never to come back.'
With that said she grabbed her things and stalked out of the room, determined not to show him just how hurt she was.
SHSHSHSHSHSHSHSHSHSHSH
Sherlock felt like yelling and throwing something against a nearby wall, but instead he just swore loudly and picked up the tin of sweets, taking them over to a nearby microscope so he could start his analysis.
His mind was whirling though and he felt an uncomfortable, tight sensation in his chest which he fought to ignore. He was right, dammit, he knew he was right, being with him was a liability for her and he couldn't risk seeing her hurt or worse.
He spent the next two hours on his tests and was soon both happy and depressed to be proven right, the sweets were all heavily laced with Fentanyl. He picked up his phone and texted Lestrade, it was time to call in the police. He'd even found the packaging, where Molly had left it in the bin, and gleaned whatever information he could from both the parcel and the note, but now he was at something of a loose end.
A big part of him wanted to find Molly, no doubt in the second path lab or morgue, and tell her he'd made a huge mistake, but he talked himself out of it. As he sat in the lab though, waiting for Greg, he suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of sadness and aloneness which threatened to floor him. How had he grown so attached to her so fast? They'd been seeing each other just over two weeks... this made no sense.
He felt as if he was on autopilot for the rest of the day, and it got no better when he was back at Baker St; the flat felt empty without her in it, his bed too big, his sheets cold and unwelcoming. He contemplated trying to delete some of their recent interactions, but apart from the fact that there was too much to delete, he found he just plain couldn't bring himself to try it.
In the end he decided to give himself the evening to be maudlin, and then he'd be back to concentrating on work the following day. Instead, all he got were dead ends and frustrations. Frustrations with the case and embarrassingly, when he slept that night, which was fitful at best, he woke up aching for Molly's touch and it just left him feeling unsatisfied; hollow and empty.
It was, therefore, the worst possible news that Clara Watson had died during the night. John rang him, explaining that he was leaving Rosie with his sister, and coming back to help him sort this all out. He'd be back later that same day and available to help tomorrow. It was left to Sherlock to go to Barts and talk to Greg about the autopsy and the tests they sent off for the day before.
It didn't matter what the results said though, Sherlock already knew that it was the milk that had been tampered with and had eventually killed her. She was the "maid a-milking" and he rather suspected the "swans a swimming as well". There had been ticket stubs for a performance of Swan Lake the night before she was poisoned. Even Greg had been bright enough to work out that they'd probably been bought and sent by the killer, so he could be sure the house would be empty when he broke in to tamper with the milk. Greg was going to try and track who had bought the tickets, but Sherlock expected it to be a dead end, David was covering his tracks exceedingly well so far.
Molly, his Molly, was the "ladies dancing". That hadn't just been confirmed by the ladies dancing on the sweet tin, but also by a video clip that had been e-mailed to Sherlock. It was of Molly and her friends dancing a couple of nights ago before she'd no doubt led the killer round to his flat.
He'd watched that clip with mixed feelings. There was pure hatred in his heart for whoever had filmed it, knowing that they were intending to try to hurt her. But there was also an almost obsessive fascination with seeing her looking so happy and free, dancing with not a care in the world...and she looked stunning to him, so utterly beautiful. She'd been his, for such a short time, and he'd thrown it away. Already he was second guessing himself and his decision, was she right? Had he just panicked? Not knowing where she was, and whether she was safe, was eating him up inside. At least if she was here he could protect her...couldn't he?
It all came to a head later that morning, when he was standing in the morgue with Donovan, waiting for Greg to turn up.
Sherlock tried to distract himself from having to make conversation by concentrating on his phone, but it seemed Sally had other ideas.
'So, you and Molly then?'
He glanced up and rolled his eyes. 'Nope.'
'Whaddya mean no? She definitely told me you two were an item. So what? You're denying it now...classy, Sherlock!'
'I mean no we're not together anymore. We broke up.'
He went back to typing on his phone, hoping that would be the end of it.
'So, what did you do?'
He looked up and frowned. 'What makes you think I did anything?'
She gave a kind of half laugh. 'Because out of the two of you, you're the dickhead that would cock it all up.'
He sighed, knowing he shouldn't get into this, but in all honesty there was no one else he could discuss it with.
'For your information I ended it; being with me wasn't safe for her.'
At that Sally snorted in a very unladylike way, and he finally put his phone in his pocket.
She leant back against one of the autopsy tables, and folded her arms across her chest as he looked at her questioningly.
'I always knew you were a freak, but I hadn't realised you were an idiot. Molly's not safe, she's never been safe. She's a single woman living in London. Have you got any idea what that's like? Coz I do.'
Sherlock felt confused, she was not going in the direction he thought she would.
'She's probably been harassed more times than she can remember...at work, on the street, going home on the tube. I've been groped, had my bag nicked, hell I was even half dragged into an alleyway one time and I was lucky to get away. So no, just coz you've finished with her doesn't make Molly safe. Much though it pains me to say it, being with you makes her ten times safer than not being with you. So, like I say you're an idiot.'
She narrowed her eyes and unfolded one arm so she could point at him.
'Or maybe it's more that you're a coward, and safety, that was just your excuse. Yeah, that's more like it.'
Just at that moment Greg arrived, but Sherlock had had enough, maybe she was right, maybe they both were... either way he couldn't bear another day without her.
'Change of plan, I need to be somewhere. Text me any anomalies Gavin.'
As he pushed his way out of the door the final thing he heard was Sally.
'Tell Molly I said hi.'
So, quite a lot going on in this chapter. The killing, the attempt on Molly's life, Sherlock's reaction and Sally's intervention. Did you like it?
I must admit I'm getting a soft spot for Sally, it feels like she was under used in the show and she is really good at calling Sherlock out when he's being stupid. What do you think?