The six weeks unfortunately seemed to be dragging and while she had had a chat with Charles' mother; Molly wasn't sure she wanted to entertain the woman for so long especially when she knew there was a possibility that Pam could just be sucking up to her to get back to Charles and of course there was no way that he would let that happen so in the end she didn't let them get too close just in case.

Charles had called when he could but she didn't tell him about his mother turning up because the last thing she wanted was for him to think about that while he was still out there. She wanted him to come home safely and not do something stupid because he had been worried about his mother turning up. No so she kept that from him and told him to concentrate on the time he had left there before coming home to the two of them. Molly hated the thought of him in Syria but it was something that he had been doing long before he met hernplus it wasn't like she hadn't been to dangerous places too.

It was Halloween and Molly was going to be holding a party which she knew was probably silly on her part but it was Halloween and the kids all deserved to have fun. Plus it meant that she had something to focus on which was what she needed right now.

Molly had decided that she was going to dress up and of course hand out sweets when the little kids came knocking at her door. It wasn't really her favourite time of the year but Adam had given her something to look forward to. Plus she felt like she had to give something back.

Adam, she decided, was going to be a little dracula and she had even brought him a cape and he looked absolutely adorable and of course she had to take some pictures and would get them taken off so that her family could have one and she would be able to put one in the photo album. Molly was going to dress up as a cat, she even found some cat ears in the local Poundland and had decided there and then that she was going to be a cat this Halloween.

She had one of the mum's around to help her set up and for the first time in a while she felt like she could properly relax.

Molly remembered Halloween when she was younger, Belinda would dress her up in a black bag and use it as some sort of costume and it was fun until she realised that there were a lot more outfits coming out for Halloween and Belinda just couldn't afford to get all of the kids something new every year so Molly was old enough she would make sure that she didn't argue with her mother about what she would be wearing and then as she started to reach her sixteenth or seventeenth birthday she just decided to stop doing Halloween all together and go out pissing it up with her so called friends.

But she was so much better now, being in the Army had changed everything about her. She stopped drinking or at least she had definitely calmed down on the drinking and wasn't going out drinking to the point where she was passing out and she had stopped smoking which she admitted was hard for a while but training had kept her mind off of the fags to the point after a while the craving just disappeared and she was a lot more healthier for it.

Molly could honestly say that the Army saved her in ways that even she couldn't explain and like Corporal Geddings had said, they gave her a bigger family.

Molly's place was looking definitely Halloween-y and there were fake spiders all over the place and skeletons and pumpkins with those flickering t-light candles in them. It looked really amazing actually. To the point that she was looking forward to tonight and couldn't wait for Adam to actually see it, he was with a friend at the moment so that Molly could concentrate on doing this.

There were bowls of sweets for the kids and even though it was Halloween she wanted everything to be just perfect. She had that mindset for a while until the door bell rang and she smiled over at her friend, Morgan, before she moved to the door. She thought it might've been Adam returning and now that he was back he would be able to see the place and hopefully it wouldn't scare the poor boy. That was the last thing she ever wanted to do.

Molly pulled the door open to see two men there and she looked at the both of them in their uniforms. "Bit old for Halloweening, aren't we?" she asked and felt that bad feeling in the pit of her stomach. They only turned up when something bad had happened.

"Mrs James?" one of them asked and watched her.

"I haven't been that for a while, you're confusing me with my ex mother in law"

"You are Molly?"

Molly nodded and realised that Charles hadn't changed over his next of kin even after all this time and she didn't want to even receive the news that would be told to her, she looked passed them and down the walk way that they had clearly come to see some women watching them and then quickly moved on when she caught them. "You better come in then" she said and moved out the way for the two men to come in to the house and walked to the kitchen where Mo was.

Morgan looked over her shoulder and then saw Molly being followed by the two men and she knew that this wasn't her place to be but would only stay if Molly wanted it to happen. "Do you want-" Molly then shook her head and Morgan knew that she would stay because her friend would need to company, the support.

Molly stood by the table and watched the two men. "Is he dead?" she asked and put her hands into the pockets of her jeans because she suddenly felt very cold, her body then started to shake and she wanted something to warm her up but knew that even if she did have a hot drink it wouldn't make her feel any better.

"Should we sit down?" One of them asked, his name was Mark Harris, but she never asked.

Molly indicated for him to sit if he wanted but she would be standing up because she wasn't sure she would be able to get back up if she did sit down. She watched as he took a seat but the other man remained standing and kept his dark eyes on her.

"As you know Captain James led a team into Syria and this morning there were airstrikes and we have lost contact with the team"

Molly brought her hand up and pinched the bridge of her nose and closed her eyes, she wanted to get out of this nightmare; she knew it was Halloween but this really was not the way she wanted to spend today. She could feel the silence hanging in the kitchen like this weight had been put in it and she wanted for a moment before she dropped her hand and opened up her eyes to look back at them. "That's nothing you can lose contact with a team at any time especially when..."

"It's been over eight hours and we are sending in Special Forces to find them and bring them home"

Molly now felt the need to sit down and she gripped the back of the chair and sat down heavily in it. Bones would be sent in to look for Charles and right now she wasn't sure if there was a more awkward moment. Her ex was looking for her ex, it felt like one of those twisted stories about exes finally meeting and fighting over a girl. Molly knew that at the end of that sentence he meant that SF would bring them home whether they were alive or dead.

The conversation continued and even Morgan asked a couple of questions, her own husband was away overseas but not in Syria thankfully, but Molly didn't hear anything like that. What she did hear was her heart pounding hard in her ears and the feeling of wanting to throw up but she wasn't sure she would be able to even if she could.

Molly remembered that time in Afghan when she had to watch as Charles was wheeled through the hospital at Camp Bastion and the waiting that she had to go through to see if he would pull through and right now the waiting was going to be worst than that because she was in a complete other country to Charles.

It then hit her in the heart that she was going to have to tell Pam that her son was missing, the one that she had pissed off before he left. The one who had walked out of the house in Bath so annoyed that he didn't want to see her anymore and she couldn't imagine what that conversation was going to be like.

The two men stayed for a little bit longer before Molly and Mo were alone and there was silence once more before Molly got up from her seat and grabbed her car keys.

"Where you going?" Morgan asked her and knew that she was still in a cloud and shouldn't be driving anywhere.

"I have to tell his mother, she deserves that much" she grabbed her phone and put it into her back pocket and looked around to see if she had everything else.

"I'll drive, you are in no fit state to do anything" Morgan grabbed the carkeys from Molly's hand and then walked out with the dark haired woman, leaving her no choice because she was going anyway. Morgan made sure that the door was shut before they got into the car. This was going to be a drive that Molly might never forget.

-.-

While on the road Molly just looked out of the window and watched as the traffic went passed them and knew that this was the last thing she wanted to be doing but as next of kin to Charles, still, she had to do it and knew that Pam would probably hate her for them falling out and the pain that the mother would be going through. It was a conversation that she wasn't looking forward to having especially if that enters between them.

"What if he is-" Molly stopped herself and looked over at Morgan. "I never told him that I wanted to be with him, that I want to be his wife again and I may never get to do that"

"You can't think that way at the moment, Molly, not until you get confirmation that he has been killed. You need to keep strong for your son"

"I don't think that I can"

"You are stronger than you think, believe me" Morgan reached over and put her hand on Molly's and smiled softly at her. "Plus you will have me and the other ladies to help you out, we will help you"

Molly squeezed her hand back and gave a slight smile before looking ahead once more. She wasn't sure how she would cope without Charles in her life, even though she hadn't been with him for years the thought of him not being in the world anymore hurt her more than anything.

They arrived at the house and she looked up at the grand place before she took a deep breath and moved in the direction of the door and knocked on it. Pam and Robert would probably be expecting Trick or treaters but instead she would be delivering the message that they couldn't find her son. Not exactly the best Halloween news right now.

Robert opened the door with the bowl of sweets in his hand and saw Molly "Oh, Molly, dear" he said with a smile and then heard Pam come to the door behind him. The look on Molly's face was enough to stop his wife from smiling. He heard her words of no, please god no and that was enough to make him put the bowl down and Molly, and her friend, walked in and shut the door behind them.

The conversation lasted a while and just as expected Molly was blamed for the tension between Pam and her son, Robert had tried to calm the situation but in the end Molly just watched the woman and in the end she knew that she had to go because of the fact that she was wanting to say things that she would probably regret later on and Morgan drove her back home. It wasn't the first time that she felt like she was useless. She had felt it when Charles had got hurt in Afghan, when Smurf was fitting at the Football Ground and now when she couldn't do anything but wait for news on whether they would find him alive or dead.

-.-

They finally got back to her place and she opened the door and saw all the Halloween stuff was still there and cleared her throat when Morgan asked if she wanted all of this taken down. Molly shook her head "No, we're going to have the party because it will help me concentrate on something other than Charles being- no leave everything up and then we can deal with everything tomorrow"

The party that night went ahead but Molly really wasn't enjoying it as much as she wanted to. She often found her thoughts wandering to Charles and Bones and all the SF men that would be going to Syria to find their missing charges.

Molly dressed up as a cat and she even got Adam ready in his dracula costume and she wondered why she had even decided to continue this party because it wasn't as if she would enjoy it, but in the end it came down to the kids and they would enjoy it and really that was all that mattered.

She found herself dreading every time the door went just in case it was those two men back again to tell her that they had found Charles and that he would be coming back in a coffin rather than walking off the plane but each and every time it was kids in their cute outfits.

Morgan had been the best friend that she could ever ask for and was really grateful for her because if she was going through this alone then she wasn't sure if she would still be standing right now but she was right Molly had to keep going for Adam because even though he was going to need her more if in the end his father wasn't around.

She felt her phone vibrate in the back of her black trousers and reached in and grabbed it out quickly and there was a name that popped up on the screen.

Elvis

Molly answered the phone to her husbands best friend.