AN - Hello again loves! yes it's been far too long since I've updated. Life has been a little more hectic than I'd like and i've been finding it hard to get into the right frame of mind to write. Things have calmed down now (and i've got a place at college again after summer. More Social Sciences and I get to take history this year too!) Normal writing service shall now resume :) As always I am unbelievably thankful to everyone who reads, reviews, favourites and follows this. This is another expansion of a head!canon I posted on tumblr a while ago. Enjoy, loves.
Something was off. Sherlock was as certain of that as he was of anything; and being who he was, Sherlock was certain of a great many things. The consulting detective sat in his chair, fingers steepled underneath his chin. To anyone looking at him it would be easy to assume he was lost in thought, or more likely his mind palace. But no, Sherlock Holmes was entirely present and focused on only one thing; watching Molly.
Molly was blissfully unaware of her husband's eyes following her every movement as she danced around the kitchen with their seven year old son. Mother and son had been attempting to bake a cake for Mrs Hudson's birthday but had succeeded only in covering each other – and most of the kitchen – in flour.
Sherlock felt a smile pulling at his lips while he watched his wife and child laugh like hyenas as they shook flour out of their hair.
Molly noticed him watching and grinned. "I thought we'd lost you to your mind palace for the afternoon." The pathologist giggled, quickly lifting the bag of flour up from the table before Dominick could grab another handful of it.
"That's not fair mum!" Dominick's protest soon dissolved into a fit of laughter when Molly upended the flour over his head.
Sherlock's smile widened into the type of smile he reserved solely for Molly and Dominick. "No. Watching you two has been much more interesting than my mind palace at the moment."
Molly leaned against the kitchen door frame for a moment, grinning from ear to ear. "You know that cake baking is not a spectator sport, right?"
Sherlock snorted a laugh. "It is when the bakers end up wearing more flour than is in the cake."
"Well, I don't see you doing a better job, Mr Holmes."
"That wouldn't be a challenge now would it, Mrs Holmes?" Sherlock asked, a glint of playfulness in his eyes.
"It just might be. What do you think, Dominick?" Molly looked towards their son, who appeared to be more flour than child.
"Mum's right, dad. You'll probably burn the cake like Uncle John said you would." The seven year old's grin matched that of his mother.
Sherlock gracefully rose from his chair, cracking his knuckles as he did so. "Well, we'll have to see about that, wont we? But first, I think we need to get all that flour off of you." Sherlock strode past Molly and swept their son up into his arms; amid Dominick's gales of laughter, Sherlock turned the child upside down and dangled him and inch above the ground.
"Dad!" Dominick got out between giggles.
"Dominick!" Sherlock laughed, matching his son's tone before he righted his child, setting Dominick's feet on the floor again.
Molly rolled her eyes, laughing at her boys and pushed off from her place against the door frame. "Okay you two, lets see about this cake."
Sherlock divided his attention between showing off his extraordinary – in his opinion – baking skills and casting glances at Molly. He couldn't put his finger on what was so different and yet familiar about her. He watched while she and Dominick iced the now finished cake with lemon icing. Molly's nose wrinkled delicately whenever she caught the smell of the lemon.
Sherlock's eyes narrowed ever so slightly; he'd seen her do that before. While Molly had been pregnant with Dominick she couldn't bare to be in the same room as anything lemon scented; Mrs Hudson had even had to change what cleaning products she used, lemon scented being her preferred type. The puzzle pieces were finally starting to fit together in Sherlock's mind. Molly's sudden – but still only slight – aversion to lemon, he'd noticed the day before that her eating habits were changing; and If he wasn't mistaken – and he very rarely was – Molly had put on about half a pound in weight.
Signs. He'd noticed them when Mary was pregnant with Lucy. He'd missed the early signs with Dominick because he'd been in Australia for a case. Signs. All of the signs.
Sherlock retreated to his chair, his fingers once again steepling under his chin. While the hustle and bustle of Baker Street carried on around him, Sherlock himself had taken on the look of a statue. The consulting detective was frozen in place in his chair, looking much like he had on returning home from Australia to be greeted by Molly holding a positive pregnancy test, or when John had asked him to be his best man.
The Watson's arrived and Sherlock barely murmured a greeting. Even Lucy Watson balancing a party hat on top of his head was not enough to break his reverie. Watsons and Holmes sang happy birthday to Mrs Hudson and still the consulting detective sat in his chair, staring into some far flung part of his mind palace.
"What's wrong with him?" Mary asked Molly while they dished the birthday cake up onto plates; Molly was glad of the distraction, the smell of the cake was turning her stomach.
"I don't know but he's been like that for hours. A case, maybe?" Molly was sure he'd been complaining that morning about Lestrade only having a run of the mill murder for him. The pathologist was baffled.
Sherlock's head suddenly snapped up, catching his wife's gaze with his own. There was something peculiar about the look in his eyes, or so Molly thought. Before Molly could even begin to wonder what had caused that look, Sherlock was on his feet and at her side. Taking her small hand in his he led her away from their chattering friends and towards their bedroom.
"Sherlock, what is going on?" Molly watched as her husband began to pace back and forth in front of her. Back and forth he went, still not saying a word to her. Finally Molly stepped into his path. "Sherlock Holmes if you don't tell me what the hell is going on right now I'm going to throw that stupid bloody skull out of the window and revoke your access to the morgue." she said in one breath, her voice seeming to increase in volume with each word.
Molly stood, hands on hips and waited.
Sherlock took her hands from her hips and held them in his own. He looked at her much as he once had not long after his return from his two year death, when she'd stood in front of him with another man's engagement ring on her finger and his own heart in her hands – at least figuratively speaking. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.
"Molly, do you remember the day I came home from that case in Australia?"
"Well, of course. I told you I was pregnant. And you went so quiet I thought you'd deleted how to talk." Molly giggled.
Sherlock rolled his eyes and sighed. "Yes, love. But what else did you say?"
Molly could only shrug her shoulders and looked confused. Compared to telling Sherlock he was going to be a father, nothing else stuck out as being particularly memorable.
"You said that If I'd been there you wouldn't have needed to waste money on a pregnancy test because I would have already noticed the signs. Which, obviously I would have."
It was Molly's turn to roll her eyes now. "Ever so modest, aren't you?" She interrupted with another giggle.
Sherlock lifted a brow, giving her that can-you-please-be-serious-for-just-one-moment look that she was so fond of. "Molly, what I am trying to say is that I'm here this time. And I've noticed the signs."
Sherlock watched as comprehension dawned on Molly's face. Her mouth dropped open and she pulled in a deep breath.
"You mean...I...but..when?" The pathologist's brows furrowed for a moment before a sheepish grin broke on her face and another quiet squeak of a giggle slipped from her lips. "Oh...Meena's leaving do."
Sherlock's grin mirrored hers. "Yes, Meena's leaving party." Too much champaign and the prospect of a child-free weekend had done for them both.
"Do you think Dominick will be okay with being a big brother?"
"Well, he can do any worse than Mycroft. He tried to bribe the postman to take me away once.."