A month later Sherlock Holmes came returned to London for good. The first thing he had to do was to tell John he was not dead. He owed him this. He expected joy and happiness though when John practically seemed to explode, he knew that this wouldn't be an easy ride. But when John hit him for the third time, he thought he had lost his friend forever.

The night when he saw Molly with that man, he told Mycroft to stop inform him about the people who had been around him while he was away. He said he didn't want the distraction.

His brother only nodded and being unable to suppress the urge he said, 'I told you so, little brother.'

If Sherlock didn't feel so worn out, he would definitely punch Mycroft. But he was too tired to give his brother the pleasure to see him being such devastated. Instead he nodded and changed the subject.

He had decided to visit Molly right after his encounter with John. He needed to see her despite his brother's every objection.

She was welcoming, and kind as ever but nothing more after she had a glance of him in her locker's reflection.

'Oh, you are back.' She smiled tiredly.

'Yes.' Sherlock nodded.

'Good. I'm glad.' Molly cleared her throat looking slightly aside. 'Are you...are you all right?'

'I'm fine. And you?'

'Me too, me too.' She nodded crisply as an affirmation.

Sherlock left after a few more awkward minutes spent with annoying, erratic casual talk.

On the third day after his return Sherlock texted Molly to come to Baker Street. He knew she would come. Always the helpful Molly. Though her rather bold suggestion to have dinner surprised him. Would it be that easy for her to leave her boyfriend for him? He became quite self-confident in the matter. He had prepared to a battle or even a war and seemingly he only had to ask Molly out to have dinner and she was about to give in. But how wrong he had been he realised at the very moment Molly took off her gloves and he saw the thin silver ring on her left hand.

The cases were dull as hell, a cheater, a stepfather posing as a romantic pen pal to his stepdaughter and an old lady whose tenant was missing.

'And he was gone without a word and never came back.' The grey haired, elegant woman frowned in concern as she finished the story about one of her young tenants disappearing from her luxury apartment house in Central London.

'Yeah, men tend to do that.' Molly murmured under her breath.

Sherlock shot a glance at her and slowly answered but his look returned to the client. 'Probably he had a good reason.'

'I can't see why he couldn't leave a note when he left.' Molly's eyes were fixed on her notes now; her voice was still small and slightly trembling.

'Maybe he didn't know if he could ever return...to the flat.' Sherlock said through his teeth now openly staring at her. Molly gulped, looking at him with wide eyes.

'Still he should have left a note or something. If he wanted...the flat back,' Molly held her opinion but didn't look up. Sherlock noticed that the pen was shaking in her hand.

Now it was his turn to strike back. 'Probably he didn't suppose that the flat would have a new, permanent tenant so soon?'

'Excuse me. Are we still talking about my case?' The lady was uncomfortably tumbling in her seat.

Sherlock turned towards the lady. 'Your tenant hasn't got in touch for six month, didn't need his personal stuff and documents, he most likely was murdered months ago. Contact the police. Good day.' With this he stood up and opened the door for the stunned lady with a wide, fake smile.

'But Sherlock this is a murder case,' Molly objected whispering the words with wide eyes, happily changing the subject to the case.

'Yes, yes. Lestrade will find me with this one, I am certain.' He said grabbing his coat and scarf. 'We're going out. Get your coat.'

The mood at the scene on the basement with the fake skeleton was still chilly. Neither of them spoke unless it was necessary, and then everybody was so polite. Even Lestrade sensed that something was off. Sherlock now doubted this whole let's-solve-cases-together was a good idea, and Molly felt herself quite out of place, sometimes even under his feet.

By the time they arrived at Sillcott's flat they both felt pretty bad. But a small cheeky smile Molly gave to him as they heard the client's doorbell's 'Mind the gap', Sherlock felt his heart suddenly light up, smile and hope spreading.

There was something, definitely. Molly was smiling at him a lot, they had conversation without words, Sherlock's confidence was slowly back. Therefore he was so taken aback when Molly's answer for his open dinner invitation was not a quick and enthusiastic yes. Instead she questioned his motives, nervously fidgeting with that bloody ring. She started to sputter about her extremely normal boyfriend. Fiancé. That was the moment when Sherlock suddenly realised that he wasn't the one who Molly wanted to end up with. She needed somebody stable, calm, normal, ordinary. Somebody who was not an erratic, changeable, awkward sociopath. Somebody who was not him.

Molly felt his unspoken question, but she decided not to answer it. If he wanted anything else than her not belong to anybody else he should have said it. Get the courage and express it. But he remained silent, so she didn't let him ruin everything again.

Sherlock felt a clench in his stomach, heaviness on his chest, but he smiled for her and let her go with a last lingering kiss on her cheek.

It was over. With a deep, shaking breath he knotted his scarf as he stepped outside into cold late winter evening.

Life went back to be pretty normal. As normal it could be. Only Sherlock spent significantly less time in Bart's than before. Of course nobody noticed this except Molly, but she didn't know what to think about it. She was quite content with her life, Tom was sweet, seemed to be a perfect husband material. She had long given up the dream of marrying to the love of her life and living happily ever after for so long. It simply wasn't just how life worked. And she finally was okay with that.

However John and Mary's wedding changed everything. Tom behaved like an idiot, Sherlock was horrible and wonderful and adorable, the maid of honour was hot and Molly was jelous as hell. The moment she caught herself stab Tom on the hand with a fork she knew it was ridiculous that she had ever thought she could love anybody else then Sherlock. She continued the night pretending to be a happy soon-to-bride, but after a long cab ride to Tom's flat she broke up with him. It was sort, simple and didn't surprise him at all.

'Tom, I...uhm. I think we shouldn't get married.' She spoke without taking off her coat, standing in the doorway.

Tom turned with a grimace, freezing in the movement of pulling out his tie, his mouth flinched, and then he nodded. 'I agree.'

He held his back straight but his eyes became red and he swallowed hard.

Molly stepped closer and reached towards his shoulder. 'Tom...I'm sorry!' Her throat was clenched by the upcoming crying too.

Tom shook his head. 'I'm fine.' He held his hand up to stop her. 'I am fine. I've been expecting this, really. To be honest, sooner... since he appeared.'

They were standing in an awkward silence for minutes. Molly did't want to deny the obvious.

The heavy weight of the irreversible words was getting unbearable. The routine as they used to kiss goodbye suddenly became inappropriate, a far memory, nothing else. They were not belonged together anymore; the world has turned upside down for good.

Molly took off the engagement ring with trembling fingers and with a gulp she put it down on the coffee table. Tom watched her silently and let her go with a tight and sad smile.

This was the short end of Molly's short engagement.

For the next month Molly was prepared every day to meet Sherlock who would definitely notice the lack of her ring and make a mocking comment. Every day she prepared with witty, cutting, ignorant or sometimes defensive answers. But he didn't show up. Not until that day.

Sherlock was practically dragged by John into the lab in a state she had never seen him in. The moment she looked into his eyes she knew. It wasn't even necessary to do the test; she just wanted to know how much he had taken.

It was the drug usage what made her to slap him for the first two times, the third was for the bloody puppy eyes which he wanted to manipulate her with. Again.

He stood all the three slaps. He knew he deserved each one of them. And inside he was laughing hysterically on that the day he cut himself off from her for good, it turned out that not all hope had been lost. He was so screwed up he couldn't hold back to hurt her with his hurting words.

She didn't want to allow herself to be humiliated or hurt by his comment. But she slipped back far too quickly into the role of the concerned woman in love. Always in love. Honestly? Sometimes even she was made sick by how he could do anything and she would still love him and equilibrate on front of that thin line which separated her from begging him, whining on her knees to requite it.

When Sherlock was shot, all Molly could do to stay on her feet was repeating constantly some pray to a God she had never believed in for keeping Sherlock alive. She was dizzy and nausea neared her in every half an hour. Her work seemed to be a bit of distraction but at the end of her night shift she couldn't wait to drop off her lab coat and run upstairs to see him to be alive, to breathe.

As she got out from the lift and quickly walked towards the A&E, nervously biting her nails, she was thinking over her speech to him again. She was rehearsing it during the whole day. She wanted to tell him how much she was sorry for the slaps, which he deserved by the way, but she always wanted to stand by him and she would love him and care for him, no matter what happened and how he felt. She finally got to that point where she didn't want anything just him being alive.

And then she stopped. She saw three people waiting outside Sherlock's room happily chatting. John and Mary of course... and the bridesmaid. Molly felt her blood running out of her limbs as she was watching them.

What am I doing here?

She gulped as she tried to blink the tears away from her eyes. At least he was okay, they looked happy. It was the most important, wasn't it?

Hi, dears,

Well this was a longer one. Just because I can't wait to show you ch11 and 12.

Thank you for all your kind, supporting and thoughtful reviews. They always make me happy. It's really nice to know what you think.