Eleven Weeks and Three Days Ago. 221B Baker Street
Molly had promised she'd be back tonight before she turned to leave. Sherlock calmly said goodbye and watched her leave.
Then he went mildly insane.
He paced wildly about his flat, muttering incoherent thoughts aloud. "Molly here. Molly will be here. Molly will be living here. Sleeping here." He turned to face his kitchen and groaned at the mess. Frantically, he went about trying to tidy it up as best he could. He knew from his time with her in the lab that Molly had OCD and prized neatness. That had been what drove her running from Lestrade's house, after all. As he was busily cleaning up the remnants of a failed chemical experiment on his kitchen table, he also noted to himself that he didn't have any real food in either his refrigerator or his pantry.
"Should I try to cook her dinner? No, just takeaway, right," he said, muttering to himself. "Maybe I should take her out to dinner. Or is that too much like a date? Now this—this—is why I could never be in a real relationship. All the thinking. Wasted intellectual energy." And, oh, he thought, the sheets. The sheets had to be cleaned. His room. The bathroom. The tell-tale signs of hyperventilation showed in his breathing rhythm. Then an idea came. He rushed down the stairs to Mrs. Hudson's flat, hoping that an appeal on hands and knees would convince her to help with at least some of the tasks required in the short hours until Molly would return. He knocked loudly for what seemed forever. No answer. He ran outside and into the cafe next door.
"Have you seen Mrs. Hudson?" He yelled to the shopkeeper, no fan of Sherlock's.
"Yeah, she left this morning for Ireland. Casino trip with the girls. Back in two days. Said you'd might be asking after her—said she'd told ya three times about it—but you never listen." Sherlock appeared to nod calmly and affected a dignified exit from the cafe.
As soon as he exited the cafe, however, all appearance of equanimity disappeared and he yelled out, to the astonishment of passersbys, a stream of "fucks" that lasted until he was back in his flat. He had to stave off full-on hyperventilation now. He tried to slow his breathing and, as he did, an idea came to him. To put the idea into action was an act of utter desperation and knew that once he pulled this lever, there was no going back. It was perhaps the most drastic, rash action he'd yet considered in all his years of dangerous sleuthing.
He proceeded to speed-dial the familiar number on his mobile phone. Mycroft answered on the first wring. "Brother?"
"Mycroft, I need you to fly Mummy into London today for a few hours and then immediately out again."
Mrs. Holmes appeared downright gleeful after Sherlock met her at the curb, where Mycroft's driver delivered her to Baker Street.
She was already talking before the door to the vehicle was fully opened. "Oh my sweet boy. Mummy's here. I'll fix everything." Sherlock led his mother up to his flat and laid out the tasks before her like a general ordering men into battle. Eagerly getting to work right away, Mrs. Holmes gushed "A girl. My boy is going to have a girl living with him."
"No, not a girl, Mother," he said, correcting her. "A friend."
"A girlfriend!"
"No, definitely not a girlfriend, a friend that happens to be a girl."
"Why is she going to be living with you?"
"That's a long story and I'm simply not going to tell it."
"Do you like her?"
"Of course I like her, Mother, she's my friend. People tend to like one's own friends."
"You know what I mean. Do you like her, like her?"
"Laundry, Mother. Cleaning, Mother." She proceeded to start doing both, but Sherlock found, to his great dismay, that she could talk as well as clean equally well simultaneously.
"Your father had his doubts about you from time to time, but I always knew you were a ladies' man. It just takes a very special woman to appreciate my Sherlock. What's her name?"
Sherlock sighed, "Molly. Molly Hooper."
Mrs. Holmes considered the name for a second. "Molly? Is that short for something?"
"Yes, it's short for Molly."
"What does she look like?"
"Like a female member of the homo sapiens species."
"Oh, Sherlock, you're being so difficult. When do I get to meet her?"
"Sometime around never, I should think."
"I bet she's pretty. Are you a breast man like your father or an ass man?"
Sherlock was pretty sure he'd just crossed into one of the deeper circles of Hell. And so it went, all bloody afternoon. At one point in the day, he seriously considered committing seppuku, but didn't want to mess up the lovely job his mother had done on the floors. He had to give the woman credit, the flat looked damn good and the food she'd cooked smelled wonderful. It almost made up for the irreversible emotional trauma he had endured that afternoon.
At around 5:30 pm, Molly texted him and announced that she'd be leaving St. Bart's and asked if she should pick up any takeaway. He texted back.
Sherlock Holmes: No, no need, I've cooked dinner.
Molly Hooper: Seriously? You cooked?
He then texted Mycroft to pick up his mother and transport her away somewhere.
Sherlock insisted on carrying all of Molly's bags up to the flat. When she stepped through the doors behind him, Molly had to do a double-take to make sure she was in the right flat. Everything was beyond spotless and ridiculously appetizing scents were wafting from the kitchen. While Sherlock placed her bags in his bedroom, she came around to look at the kitchen, where the table, which normally looked like a the table in a meth den, was instead set immaculately with a salad sitting in its center.
When Sherlock came back out, she said to him, "Sherlock? Is that a salad?"
"Um, yes, why?"
"I didn't think you knew what a salad was, let alone how to make one." Sherlock laughed. She continued, "What are we having? It smells delicious."
Uh oh, Sherlock thought, I don't know. His mother just told him how long to keep it in the oven, not what it was. "It's a surprise." To me as well, Sherlock thought.
They sat down to eat, starting with the salad. Molly remarked on how much she liked the salad dressing. "I think I taste Champagne Vinegar. I am right?"
Sherlock had no fucking idea, so he just said "uh huh."
Then he removed the mysterious main course from the oven and served it. Lasagna. Thank you Mother for cooking something I can identify, he thought.
"This is really wonderful, Sherlock. You are full of surprises, aren't you?"
"Well, cooking really is an extension of chemistry, really, so, it's just a matter of experimentation, you know." I'm full of something, he admitted to himself.
She furrowed her brow, but smiled. "Did you use pre-cooked noodles or the refrigerated kind?" Sherlock had no fucking idea.
"Uh . . . which do you like better?"
"You didn't cook this did you?"
"No," Sherlock admitted.
"Mrs. Hudson?"
"No, she's away."
"Takeaway?"
"No." He hesitated, embarrassed. "Mummy," he said, cringing.
"Mummy? You mean your mother?"
"Yes, I had Mycroft fly her in for the afternoon."
"Seriously? Why would you go through so much trouble? It's just me." Just you, he thought—such a Molly-like thing to say.
"Well, I wanted to make a good impression on you."
"I've known you for almost a decade, Sherlock. I think I have a fairly set impression of you already."
"But that's just it. For much of those years, I didn't behave like a good friend."
"Sherlock . . . "
"No, let me finish. You were always, always a good friend to me and I, well, I had to learn to become even an adequate friend. And I've so missed you these last few months and we had such a good talk and things were starting to look like they were getting better between us and I wanted to show you that I can put in more effort at being a good friend. I'm sorry, I'm starting to babble."
Molly didn't know what to say at first. Sherlock looked a little sheepish. But then she smiled and placed her hand on top of his, a gesture conveying her appreciation for the detective's efforts.
"Are there any developments with the case?" Molly asked.
"Some, perhaps."
"Can I know any of them?" Sherlock thought about the question, not wanting to give her any information that could upset her.
"There might be an American connection" was all he felt he could offer.
"Oh?"
"It's still tentative, though. But I promise you, Molly. I will absolutely get to the bottom of this." There's that "absolutely" again. Reminder to self: consult thesaurus tonight, he thought, making a mental note.
"I know you will. It's reassuring to have the world's greatest detective on one's case." Her trust buoyed him; nonetheless, Sherlock evinced more confidence than he really felt.
The dishes cleared, Molly and Sherlock sat in companionable silence in his living room, she with a copy of the latest Journal of Viral Epidemiology and he with his book Speed, Ecstasy, Ritalin: The Science of Amphetamines. Every now and then he would glance over at Molly when she was absorbed in her journal, making her notes in the margins, and watch her for an extended period of time unnoticed. He wondered at how surprisingly comfortable her presence in his flat turned out to be. He had expected to be constantly on edge with her here, but, when the initial nervousness died down, the same sense of ease that he felt with her in the lab took hold.
Having her here was as comfortable as living with John, he told himself. Except, he noted, that he generally didn't let his eyes dwell on the lovely lines flowing from John's ears to his chin. Nor with John was he prone to watching the swells of his breasts when he breathed in and out. And he certainly never felt his cock twitch with the unbidden memory of a photo of John in a see-through nightie masturbating. Stop it, stop it, he implored himself.
He felt slightly disgusted with himself that he would conjure the brief memory of accidentally viewing that photograph last night, let alone become a bit aroused by it. He consoled himself by turning on his scientific mind. It's a natural physical response, he told himself. No matter how controlled, how sublimated his desires were, they still reared up now and then. What mattered wasn't the physiological response or the synapses firing off in his left anterior cingulate cortex. What mattered were his conscious actions. The fact of sexual attraction alone didn't make him any more suitable for a sexual relationship. Even supposing . . .
His mobile began ringing. Mel. He was so relieved to have something to take his mind in a different, less dangerous, direction.
"Mel?" Molly looked up, interested.
"Ding ding ding and we have your wanker. This guy shared the photos."
Sherlock's anger flared. He knew it! He knew Simon Forster had been too shifty, too nervous not to be involved somehow. "Mel? Could you hold on a second?" He couldn't talk freely in front of Molly. He said to her, "I need to take this in private. Excuse me." He then proceeded to John's room. "Mel? Go ahead."
"About a week and a half ago, he or someone else downloaded the photos onto a flash drive." A week and a half ago? A week and a half ago, he was still in New York City.
"Mel? Can you somehow break into his banking records and get his transactions for the last three weeks?"
"Don't insult me, Sherlock. I can do that while making a perfect omelet with my other hand."
"Excellent. Send them as soon as you can."
"Oh, and I traced the text you got last night. Best I can do is narrow down the location from which the text was sent." Sherlock waited for it. He just knew the next words out of the her mouth. "I can say that it was sent from somewhere in either Eastern New York, Northern New Jersey, or Southern Connecticut in the United States. Best I can do."
"If I could right now, I'd bring down the British monarchy myself and hand it to you on a platter."
"Aww, you say the loveliest things."
Reviews are things of beauty and keep the demons away and the muses close by.
**The book Speed, Ecstasy, Ritalin: The Science of Amphetamines is actually one of the books in Sherlock's library, as seen in one of the episodes.
**Bonus points to anyone that can figure out the allusion I'm going for in using the phrase "even supposing." Hint: it's not to anything Sherlock Holmesian.