AN: Dedicated to the canonical Mary Watson nee Morstan. Because if she was worthy enough to be loved by Dr. John Hamish Watson then she must have been awesome in her own right.

CHAPTER-9

AN ODE TO MARY

Few weeks later:

Sherly was extremely excited that in about three more weeks she would be into the second trimester where she could regain back her currently lost freedom. Well atleast to an extent one can be free with a rapidly growing belly, that is.

...

Life at Baker Street had settled into a routine by then. During the day, Sherly would do experiments on the microbes which her mom had gifted her for some time and then join Mrs. Hudson for crap telly watching till 8 or 9 in the evening. Or till Mrs. Hudson's herbal soothers would come into action and lull her into an early sleep.

John taking Sherly' earlier joke about needing more money seriously, was now relentlessly working as many shifts at Bart's as he could get hold of. This even though meant less molly-coddling hours for Sherly; also meant more hours of boredom and loneliness... She would never accept to that until her dying breath, but it was true... Blame it on crazy pregnancy hormones or anything, but Sherline Holmes was starting to crave the very human company she once loathed.

It seems now-a-days she missed everybody... her parents, her childhood house, thrill of chases and so on, to the extent that she even missed Anderson's stupidity sometimes! Yes, she surely was on the verge of losing it.

So saying that Sherly was secretly praying to the God she didn't even believe existed, to fast forward the rest of the days so that her second trimester can start as soon as possible, wouldn't be a complete lie.

***o***o***o***

Now almost everyone who knew Sherly closely, knew that if she was truly addicted to one thing, it was neither smoking nor her 7% solutions, but her addiction to her insatiable need for information.

She had the compulsion to glean every possible information about everyone she knew. And thankfully most of the times people around her were so simple that a mere thorough observation was enough to know everything about them.

But at times where her observational power was not enough to gather the complete information, she used her other special methods. Like for example, her power to find the most strategic position to join in a conversation in which mostly she is not supposed to be involved. Or as people generally called it- 'eavesdropping'. Then came her power to successfully multitask her job by outsourcing some free minded people to gather information in exchange for some sparse change. Or in simpler terms what everyone who knew her termed it - 'spying with the help of her homeless network'. Then last but not at all the least, her ability to borrow articles from others in expertly covert manner mostly with the intention of never returning the article to the rightful owner. And this last skill was the one she thoroughly enjoyed using... especially on certain annoying Detective Inspectors and even more annoying rich prat omniscient persons she was compelled to call big brothers.

But in certain conditions, even when it did not involve the most irritating people in her personal life or some clever minded thief, she still was compelled to use that particular skill of hers to glean information; like stealing somebody's personal diary for example...

...

John had shifted all of his and Mary's things from the house they shared to Baker Street few days back. And Sherly was sure that it also contained Mary's personal diary, from the way john was subconsciously trying to hide it from Sherly. And Sherly being her inquisitive self wanted to get a hand on that.

But being fair to Sherly, she really had been waiting to know more about Mary for a very long time now... almost for around 2 years or let us say from the time one Mary Morstan entered one Dr. John Hamish Watson's life to be exact.

Sherly wanted to know everything one could possibly know about Mary. She wanted to know the person whom her dearest friend had chosen as his life partner. She ofcourse had got timely information from Mycroft's minions at monthly intervals; but those never seemed to be enough. She had even made two not very successful attempts at stalking her herself.

She wanted to know what made Mary so different from all of John previous legion of girlfriends. She wanted to know everything about the person who made her only friend forget about her...

If she was somebody else, she would have categorized the odd sensation she was feeling somewhere left of her mediastinum* as what lay people generally called as Jealousy. She ofcourse brushed the feeling off as some stupid imbalance of neurotransmitters in the brain.

But the truth was that, that she had mixed feelings about the whole Mary affair. On one hand, she was extremely happy that John had reverted from the suicidal mess he was, to a relatively stable man just after few months of meeting Mary... But on the other hand there was some sort of untold fear which said that their friendship would never be the same again.

She had always wondered what would have happened if Sherly had still been living along with John? Whether he would have still left her alone and moved on with her... Because no matter what anyone wanted to call her- selfish, possessive or co-dependent... what she truly was at heart, was a small girl who did not want to lose her first and only real friend she had whole her life. The problem was not with her willing to share her friend, but with others who never really understood their pure friendship. Who always saw her as a threat which was supposed to be eliminated from John's life first and foremost. All of John's previous girlfriends had that exact line of thought and she was sure that Mary too would have been no different.

So even if it was just to confirm her pre conceived assumptions, Sherly had to get hold of Mary's diary; atleast her past 2 years diary.

...

But then what even Sherline Holmes got wrong sometimes was that, that for every rule, there was an exception. And it seemed John had at last found that perfect exception in Mary. Because when Sherly snuck into John's room and read the bundle of diaries which was so called 'hidden' on the top (roof) of the cupboard, her whole perspective about Mary changed.

...

Mary, it seemed thankfully did not have the dramatic flourish in writing like John did. She seemingly, according to Sherline, did not make drinking tea in the morning into a poetic ode to one of the favourite beverages of the English like John often did in his boring blogs. Because Sherly refreshingly found that Mary was, even if not to her extent, but still was a stickler to the basic facts. Her diary was more like a completed 'to- do list'. She had just entered important happenings of each day. And if there was none on a particular day, it seemed she did not even bother to write anything that day. Atleast that was what Sherly was gleaning through all her writings.

So Sherly did not bother to read through each day's entry as her sparse words had already given her a clear picture of Mary's personality. Sherly decided that no matter what Mary might have thought of her if she hadn't disappeared for those three years, at least one thing was clear that she had loved John to the greatest extent possible. And somehow knowing that alone seemed to lessen all the ill feelings she might have had towards her, bringing an unknown smile on to Sherly's lips.

Then just as she was going to replace the books back to its hiding place, a small sealed envelope fell out of one of them. And strangely it was addressed to one Ms Sherline Holmes.

Sherly was curious to know why somebody, especially somebody who had never seen her would address a letter to her, knowing that she was not alive anymore. So she eagerly broke the seal and read through the letter. And from then on if someone ever had asked Sherline to name one person who had made an impression on her through a single letter, she would say it was one Mrs. Mary Watson without a moment of hesitation.

The letter:

"Dear Ms Holmes,

Well I am hoping that you are Sherline Holmes since you are the one reading this letter... Because if not, then you have no business going through my personal diary and reading through a sealed letter clearly addressed to Ms. Sherline Holmes.

So anyway hoping that it is actually Sherline Holmes who is reading this letter, I am beginning the letter by not asking you how you are doing or other pleasantries like that. Because obviously if you were fine then you would not have been hiding and making people believe that you were dead, now would you? So I'm coming straight to the reason why I'm writing this letter... It is just that I wanted to say, that even though John believes I am imagining you, I know the person I saw today was the real you and not a figment of my imagination.

At first when I saw the tall man following me few months back, I did not know it was you immediately. It is only when I reached home and thought about it, I realized that it could be you. And that day when I told John he had almost convinced me that it was my imagination and not you dressed as a man .

But today when I saw you at Tesco, I was sure that it was you. I may not have ever seen you personally before, but John's colourful descriptions of you seem to be enough for anyone to know and understand you as if they had personally known you all their lives.

So I, Mary Watson am writing this letter to request you, Sherline Holmes, my husband's most dearest and nearest friend, to please come back. I know you are doing all this for a purpose, and even though I have not asked John to explain me all the details regarding your so called death, I am sure that you are doing all this for a good cause. But I just want to know whether that cause is worthy enough to sacrifice the happiness of your friend? Because from what I have heard and now seen, you seem to reciprocate his loyal friendship to an equal extent.

Now if you are thinking that I have somehow taken your place in his life and that he has completely forgotten you, then that is the farthest from the truth you could have ever been. A 'Sherline Holmes' shaped hole will be always empty in my John's heart no matter how much I try to fill that space with my love. I may be his love of his life but I know for sure that you will always be his most dearest friend. Nobody can replace you in his life Ms. Holmes...nobody.

There is even that particular lively gleam in his eyes which can be seen only when he joyfully recounts your dangerous adventures. I am not saying that he is not happy now; what I am trying to say is that he is not happy to the extent he can be happy now...

So I sincerely request you to please come back and announce that you are alive to John. And if you want, I can see to that we shift back to Baker Street and may be if Mrs. Hudson allows, we could even stay in 221 C flat so that you both can continue your adventures just like it was before.

Well, as a concluding line, all I want to say that I will never be a hindrance to your wonderful friendship and you that will be always welcome into our lives.

Yours truly,

Mrs. Mary Watson.

PS: In case you are wondering what I was thinking by placing this letter addressed to you in my personal diary, I will just say that I have learnt enough about 'inquisitive' nature from John. So in this way there would be no harm to your cause and my sanity."

...

That was also the day Sherline Holmes allocated a whole new room to the unsolved puzzle called Mary Watson in her mind palace.

Mediastinum*: Part in the thoraxic cavity where the heart is located.

AN: Sorry if the chapter was sub-par or disoriented. It might be mostly because I seem to be too sleepy most of the times recently. Caught some bug I guess. :/

Well anyway if you feel it is a totally crap chapter, please feel free to say so. I will try taking it down and repost it with better editing someday later.

So your thoughts? :)

PS: Can you suggest me a nice image for this fic? I seem to have run out of my imagination regarding that... o.o