He tried cleaning it. He really did.
First he had to move the trey of tobacco ash he had been collecting in piles from the top of the refrigerator, lest it topple over and fly into the air. Next he moved the collection of human cartilage from the sink where he had been testing their resistance to various acids.
Oh, he had to move the acids, as well, didn't he?
He looked at his watch. It was 6 am, and he had promised he would meet up with John at 7 am to get coffee. He looked across the counter, where a Bunsen burner was still up, and various spills of powder that may or may not have been arsenic. He huffed and slid the doors to the kitchen shut.
MOLLY. I DON'T EXPECT YOU TO READ THIS BEFORE 7. AVOID KITCHEN. IF YOU NEED TO USE ONE, MRS. HUDSON WILL OBLIDGE. –SH.
With that, he picked his coat off the hanger and hurried down the stairs.
::::::::
"How's Mary?" Sherlock asked. He had met up with John at the hospital before his shift began, and was stuck drinking the brown water they called coffee. John looked like he hadn't slept all night, with his eyes sunken and his hair disheveled.
"Fine. Not going into labor any time soon, thank god."
Sherlock nodded. He had only been around Mary a handful a times since she had grown to her size, and often thought how illogical it seemed that a woman of her age had decided to conceive. The studies had shown the effects of women in their late 30's and early 40's carrying babies to term and the risks, at least to him, often out weighed-
"How's Molly?" John asked, abruptly. Sherlock snapped up.
"What?"
"Molly. Hooper. The woman who narrowly escaped murder last night?"
"Oh, right. I don't know."
John's eyes went wide.
"What do you mean you don't know?"
"I mean she hasn't returned my text," Sherlock held up his phone, as if it was evidence. "You don't honestly think that I wouldn't have checked in on her?"
John made a face before he went to drink his coffee.
"She seemed moody last night. Not very talkative. Thought she would have wanted to discuss the events but she was very tight lipped after I had met her at her flat,"
John eyes narrowed.
"Sherlock," he said. "her house was broken into; her cat was murdered,"
Sherlock's face contorted. "It was a cat, John. They're all over London. If she wants to see one, she can look outside. Some people's attachment to their pets is ludicrous,"
"Alright," John straightened up. "answer me this though, how did you feel after Red Beard died?"
Sherlock's face went blank.
::::::::::::
When Molly woke up, her back was screaming at her.
The mattress she had been forced to sleep on was just as lumpy as it had looked the night before. There was a significant slope from the head to the feet, and she could see where some springs had come loose. She sighed and reached for her phone, and gasped when she saw the time.
In neat, Sans Serif script, the time 3:49 beamed back at her.
She rarely slept this late, not since med school. Quickly, she threw the covers off, instantly steadying herself on the dresser. The bed must have ruined her back more than she thought.
After flipping the lamp on, she turned back to her bed and saw her phone buzz. Brushing her hair out of her face, she grabbed it off the hospital green duvet.
MOLLY. I DON'T EXPECT YOU TO READ THIS BEFORE 7. AVOID KITCHEN. IF YOU NEED TO USE ONE, MRS. HUDSON WILL OBLIDGE. –SH.
HOW ARE YOU, LAMB? – MW
MOLLY. DIDN'T FIND ANY PRINTS AT FLAT. WHEREVER YOU ARE, IF YOU NEED TO GET YOUR THINGS, LET US KNOW, WE CAN SEND AN ESCORT. – GL
ARE THEY LETTING YOU OUT? THEY'RE NOT LETTING ME LEAVE THIS PLACE. THESE BLOODY GOVERNMENT TYPES. – MW
MOLLY. YOUR SHIFTS FOR THE NEXT THREE DAYS HAVE BEEN COVERED. WE CAN CATCH UP ON TUESDAY. – MIKE
ARE YOU UP YET? – SH
MYCROFT IS COMING BY TONIGHT. WANTS TO DISCUSS SOMETHING OR OTHER. – SH
SPOKE WITH JOHN TODAY. HAVEN'T MADE MUCH HEADWAY WITH MORIARTY. MEETING WITH SOME GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS TOMORROW. –SH
WHAT KIND OF CAT WAS TOBY? – SH
PLEASE DO NOT MOVE THE TOES OFF OF THE MANTLE PLACE – SH
Suddenly, Molly felt something stir in her stomach.
She pulled up the calendar app on her phone and counted back the little pink line that drew back to when she had inseminated herself. Six weeks to the day.
Her stomach flipped again.
"Oh bloody hell," she murmured, and started for the door. At an almost super human speed she carried herself down the stairs, practically jumping three at a time, before sliding against the wood and into the living room. She quickly fixed her course and ran into the bathroom, dropped to her knees, and vomited the entire contents of her stomach up.
She pulled back only a moment to look around. The bathroom was far from clean, as she imagined would be the case-boxers on the floor, a disaster area of a sink, and she didn't even want to investigate the strange smell seeping from behind the shower curtain. In fact, the thought of looking at it made her-
Turning back to the vomit again, she thanked God that he wasn't experimenting on urban algae populations in toilets.
She heard the door open a click, and managed to pull her hair away from her face. She looked a mess. She had slept in a light blue cotton nightie that barely came to her knees, and hadn't washed her face since last night. She was sure her hair was a mess, and to top it all off, she was in between vomiting bouts.
"Molly?" she heard him call from the other room. Reluctantly, she answered.
"In here," she coughed before repositioning herself. "Don't come in,"
He of course didn't listen to her, and she heard his footsteps echo in the hallway before abruptly stopping.
"Already sick?"
She nodded, not breaking eye contact with the white porcelain bowl.
"How many weeks?"
"Six, today." She said. She inhaled deeply, and reached up to flush. "Think it's finished. Sorry about all that," she stood up and exhaled, before turning around.
There, standing in the doorway, was the most stoic, tall, logical man she had ever met, holding the fluffiest, white, adorable kitten she had ever seen in her life.
She looked at the kitten, then back at Sherlock, her mouth only slightly agape.
"Are you going to brush your teeth?" he asked.
"Sherlock…what is that?"
He looked slightly uncomfortable, shifting his weight before answering.
"I spoke to John today, about recent events," he said, looking down at the kitten. "We couldn't discuss the Moriarty case, of course, or your condition. But we talked about last night," he paused a moment, before extending his arms and holding the kitten out to her. She took it. "I don't understand the need to keep a pet. They're loud, they get into your things easily and make a mess, and of course they inevitably will die, leaving you sad and thirteen years older," he stopped himself before digging the hole any deeper. "But…I also had a pet. Crushed me when he died. Wouldn't come out of my room for days. I thought maybe if I had had a distraction, or…"
Molly let out a little cry, and hugged the kitten's soft fur to her face.
"Sorry, did I do something wrong?"
"No," Molly whimpered. "This is….the sweetest thing someone's ever gotten me," she nuzzled her face into the kittens fur a little more, giggling when it let out a tiny 'mew'. "I'm sorry," Molly wiped her face. She looked back up at him and smiled. "Thank you, thank you," without thinking she went in to hug him, pressing her face into his chest. He hesitated for only a moment, and then let his hand fall onto her back, patting lightly.
She pulled away in time and looked at the kitten.
"Oh, he's so lovely," she sniffed and then looked back at Sherlock. "But, you know that pregnant women can't clean litter boxes?"
Sherlock's slight smile fell. "What?"
"The chemicals. They can cause birth defects,"
"But…Toby…"
"I had a cat door."
Sherlock went silent. Molly held the kitten a little tighter, for fear he may grab at him and correct his mistake.
"Well," Molly said. "I best go get dressed before your brother arrives. Brush my teeth and all that," she quickly moved past Sherlock, talking to her new little friend all her way up the stairs. She didn't look back in time to see his eyes follow her up the stairs, with only the slightest smile on his lips.
::::::::
Molly was filling out some medical records from Bart's that she had had faxed over while her new kitten slept on her lap. She hadn't wanted to let her employers know about her condition like this, but as she was under security measure for the next three days, she couldn't very well waltz into the hospital and demand to speak to the administrator, not without half of London's highest paid security in her wake. Tranquilly, she hummed one of the songs Sherlock had played earlier as she filled in her expected due date.
Sherlock sat at his chair, aggressively clicking away at his laptop. It had been an entire day and nothing new had cropped up with the Moriarty case. His homeless network had nothing new to report to him, and Lestrade was more useless than usual. If he hadn't seen it written on Molly's flat wall, they entire 'Miss Me' episode could have very well been written up and a nationwide lapse into hallucination.
"Come on, think. Think you idiot," he mumbled to himself. Molly didn't look up, she had become used to it over the past three hours.
There was a knock at the door downstairs, and then a quick greeting from Mrs. Hudson that was cut off by what sounded like a herd of men scampering up the stairs. Molly turned her chair around, minding the kitten on her lap, just in time to see Mycroft and a few men in suits behind him.
"Hello, Dr. Hooper." he motioned to some more of the men coming up the stairs, carrying what looked like rather heavy items. "I took the liberty of having some of my employees pack up your things and bring them over, I hope you don't mind." He looked down into her lap. "What is that?"
"Oh," she looked down, almost forgetting the kitten. "Sherlock got him for me. Because of-"
"Is that safe? In your condition?" Mycroft cut her off.
"I wasn't aware that you had become a doula, Mycroft," Sherlock finally spoke up.
"And I wasn't aware you had required a heart. Tell me, will I be receiving a hamster this Christmas?"
"I assume you didn't just come over here to drop off Molly's things,"
"No," Mycroft said, turning back to Molly. "In addition to dropping off your mattress and some boxes of valuables, I've come to discuss the new security plan and install some monitors,"
"Install monitors?" Sherlock balked. Mycroft turned to him.
"Yes, monitors. You didn't just think we'd station someone outside all hours of the day and wait for something suspicious to happen, did you?"
Sherlock scowled and sat back down. Mycroft took John's chair.
"Dr. Hooper's flat will be commandeered as a base of operations. I don't expect Moriarty would be stupid enough to believe she is still living there, but in case he slips up, he may believe that she's been kept under constant surveillance. Speaking of," he turned to Molly. "Your work at Bart's is a problem. Given Moriarty's fascination with the place, it seems incredibly unsafe for you to continue daily employment there,"
"What?" Molly and Sherlock spoke up.
"I need a pathologist," Sherlock countered.
"And I need a job," Molly said. "I'm nine months away from being a mother and my savings in pathetic. I need to be able to make money,"
"Right now your job is not getting yourself killed," Mycroft said. "As it is, you've been put on a government payroll for assisting my brother."
"No," Molly spoke up. Both men turned to her, surprised.
"I am not going to accept the government's charity for sitting around all day and growing a baby. I worked day and night through uni for my degree and I love my job. I won't run away because some psychopath sent the city a bloody text message."
"Molly, you're being unreasonable," Sherlock began.
"No. I'm going to work. Have the royal guard escort me everyday if you need to, but I am not going to sit around here all day waiting for some arseholes in suits to come home and tell me which windows to avoid sitting next to!"
The room went quiet for a moment, and Molly realized she had said all of that out loud.
"…I'll see what I can do," Mycroft said. From behind him some men came in with a large box, marked 'PHOTOS'.
"No more room upstairs, boss." he put the box on the floor next to Molly, who jumped down and began rifling through them.
"Thank you for this," she said.
"Who do you plan on seeing for your OBGYN?" Mycroft asked.
Molly was caught off guard, and stopped looking through the photos.
"Sorry, what?"
"I think it would be best if I found one for you," Mycroft said. "Never know who you can trust, and I wouldn't want one of Moriarty's men finding a way to harm you. Plus the government has some of the best medical practitioners on hand, ready to answer my call."
Molly considered this for a moment, wondering if Mycroft was implying that her baby was going to be delivered by Princess Kate's gynecologist.
"I think that's best," she said with a smile. "Thank you,"
"Of course," he said, then turning to Sherlock. "We have some things we need to discuss,"
Molly went back to rifling through the photos, letting her kitten roam around the room as she watched the brothers from the corner of her eye make their way down the stairs.
:::::::
She was looking at a particularly horrid picture from her early teenage years when Sherlock bounded back up the stairs again.
"What did Mycroft say?" she asked, pushing the photo back in the box before he could see it.
"He's got a lead on Moriarty. Telecommunications was able to trace the location of the 'MISS ME' signal. We're going to investigate tomorrow. Nice braces," he said without looking up from his phone. Molly pushed the photo down farther in the box.
"How long will you be gone?"
"A few days, maybe a week. Mycroft will have someone watching the house constantly. He was annoyed by your insistence to work," he smirked at her. "I think you shocked him."
Molly shrugged and went back to rifling through the photos. Sherlock looked down at the kitten.
"Does it have a name?" he said, watching as the kitten pawed his shoe.
"Haven't thought of one yet," she bit her lip and watched the two of them. The kitten fell onto his back on top of Sherlock's shoe, looking up expectantly as the detective considered the furry ball. "Why don't you name him?"
Sherlock's head jerked up.
"Me?"
"Yeah I mean," Molly pushed herself up, after finally having found her photo. "you bought him. You should get to name him," she reached down and picked him up, handing him off to Sherlock. "Come on, then,"
Sherlock looked down at the kitten, and Molly watched as the gears in his head silently turn. She hoped she wasn't smiling to widely.
"Gandalf," he said quickly before turning to pick up his violin.
Molly giggled. "Gandalf?"
He turned back to her and smiled. "I was once a child, you know. Even I indulged in some frivolous things like fiction books," with that, he picked up his violin and started playing. Molly smiled and picked up Gandalf, going to sit on the couch.
::::::
Sherlock didn't know when Molly fell asleep. Probably in between the Bach and Mozart pieces, but none the less she was curled up on the couch with Gandalf looking up at her expectantly. In between her fingers was an old weathered photo, which upon closer inspection was that of her and her father, probably back in the early nineties. Molly was smiling her wide smile, her brown eyes scrunched up. The man next to her was obviously her father, with the same brown eyes and hair color, and had his arm wrapped around her shoulders. They appeared to be in front of one of the Smithsonian museums- the natural history one, Sherlock guessed-caught in the middle of a stream of visitors. He plucked it from in between her hands, not wanting it to get crumpled as she slept. Without thinking, he put it on the mantle piece before turning back to Gandalf, who was staring expectantly at him.
"What?" he asked.
The cat mewed before jumping off Molly's chest and scampering over to Sherlock's feet.
"No-stop. Stay with your Mother-" He tried to pick the kitten up, but he weaved in between his massive hands three times. Sherlock sighed before looking up at Molly, with her relaxed face and gentle rising and falling of her chest. He reached over her for the blanket, and carefully draped it over her sleeping figure. She turned inward, cuddling into it.
Gandalf mewed again.
"Don't look at me like that," Sherlock scoffed, and headed back to his room, trying to keep the cat from following him.
He tried from keeping Gandalf from sleeping on his bed. He really did.
everyone's reviews are making my day!
Do you have any suggestions? I'm trying to write as in character as possible! Also, I hope you all like Gandalf.