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rsadellePart One - Story on AO3
4.
"You have to tell Mycroft no," Sherlock says as he sweeps into the morgue.
Molly looks at the corpse open on her table, her recorder on, Sherlock trying to take up all her attention.
"I am busy," she says.
"Mycroft." Sherlock paces back and forth on the other side of the table. "You can't let him dictate Charlie's education."
"You went to public school, didn't you?" Molly drops the body's liver into the scale and reads the weight out for her record.
"Yes," Sherlock says. "I hated it. It was horrible."
Molly turns the recorder off. "Charlie isn't you."
Sherlock dismisses that with a wave of his hand. "You can't let Mycroft do that."
Molly knows better than to make any promises to him. "Is that all?"
Sherlock presses his lips together. "You're humoring me."
"I take Charlie very seriously," Molly says. "I will do what is best for him. I also take this seriously." She gestures at the body on the table, the liver in the scale, the turned off recorder. "If you're finished, I'll get back to this."
"We could home educate him. Between us, he would get an excellent education." Sherlock looks off into the middle distance for a moment. "John could teach him to shoot."
It's a terrible idea, but there is still an open cadaver on her table. "No need to figure it out just yet." Molly turns the recorder on and reaches into the body.
The look on Sherlock's face is precisely the one Charlie gets when Molly doesn't let him stay up past his bedtime.
*
The thing about Sherlock is that even when he's being horrible, he's usually right. It is time to think about schools for Charlie - any old school isn't going to work for him - and Charlie probably wouldn't like most schools.
Molly googles a bit on her own before she decides it's worth calling in an expert and invites Judy out for lunch.
Judy looks at her for a moment after Molly explains half the situation - Charlie and needing to find a school - then shakes her head. "I know you don't talk about his father, but he's some kind of politician or minor royal, right?"
Molly looks down. She hates this part, never being able to talk to anyone about it. Not even Mary, not really. She answers the part of it she can. "There's money, and influence."
"All right," Judy says. "For anything that's going to be able to handle Charlie, you're probably going to need them. How is he with other children?"
"Watchful. More so than with adults, at first. He'll play with them, and I think he likes the company, but you can tell he's treating it like a game he has to figure out." She hates speaking so clinically about him, but sugarcoating it isn't going to help her find the right school.
"Have you ever had him evaluated?" Judy speaks slowly, carefully. "If he's on the autism spectrum, that changes what he needs."
"No," Molly says. "The carers suggested it, but he's not- He doesn't fit the criteria. He's just very, very clever."
"All right," Judy says. "There are a few places in London, one in Oxford, an experimental place in Dartmoor, and one in Edinburgh."
"London," Molly says. "I'm not sending him off to school." And certainly not to Dartmoor or Edinburgh.
Judy gives her the names of the places in London. "I've worked with John McLeod Primary School, and the other two have good reputations. Good for children, willing to work with parents." She pats Molly's hand. "You'll find something. Or you can let his father pay for everything so you can leave your job and home educate him."
Molly makes a face. "That's the option I'm trying to avoid."
*
Molly makes appointments with all three schools for a Tuesday morning. She wears a smart skirt and a blouse, heels, and drops Charlie off at the nursery in the morning as usual. They're all fine, but she finds herself agreeing with Judy's assessment of John McLeod Primary School.
"We're using a modified Montessori approach," Caroline Harper, the school's head, explains as she takes Molly to see the school. "Children, especially the children who come to John McLeod, learn best when it's self-directed." Caroline takes Molly down the wide, cheerful hallway. "We do, of course, insist on social interaction as well. We have a number of genius-level children who would be perfectly happy to lose themselves in their intellectual pursuits. However, intellectual activity is not the only purpose of a school." Caroline stops in front of a door. "This is one of our younger classrooms. We accept children as young as three, and we conduct assessments to determine the proper placement for children. We attempt to best match them with both a peer group and a teacher."
Molly looks through the window in the door. There are approximately fifteen children spread across the room. The majority of them are engaged in solitary pursuits, but there are two children working together on some kind of project. There's an adult, the teacher, she supposes, crouching on the floor next to one of the desks, listening to one of the children talk to him.
"Are all your classes this small?"
"Yes," Caroline says, "or nearly. No class is larger than twenty, and we have additional teachers who spend part of the day in each of the larger classes."
Molly turns away from the window. "How do you promote social interaction?" She thinks about Sherlock, who must have been a horror at that age, and of Charlie, who she wants to grow up to have friends.
Caroline looks at her watch. "If you'll come this way, some of the older classes will be having their social hour." She takes Molly outside, where they look over what appears to be uncontrolled chaos. "We believe age is not the determining factor in children's social or intellectual maturity, which is why we have mixed-age classrooms; however, their physical development is something else. We don't want anyone getting hurt. We do have some all-school activities, but daily social time is in age-appropriate groups. We have organized activities for the physical education portion of the day, as well as this." Caroline sweeps her arm out. "Unstructured play is very important in children's development."
Molly returns to the morgue for the afternoon feeling quite good about John McLeod, despite Caroline's warning that their selection process is quite exclusive.
Sherlock, John, Greg, and Sergeant Donovan arrive at half three to look at a body. They're on the way out when Sherlock turns back.
"Heels," he says. "And you were wearing lipstick earlier. You've rubbed it off, but the traces are still there."
"Yes," Molly says. She returns the bodies to their places.
"Why," Sherlock asks, "were you wearing heels and lipstick?"
"I had meetings."
"You-"
"Meetings," Molly says. "Is there anything I can help you with?"
Sherlock narrows his eyes at her, but when John says, "Sherlock," he turns around and leaves.
*
Molly trusts the arrangements to Mycroft and ends up with a late morning appointment to take Charlie to see John McLeod. Two days before, she leaves the morgue at lunch and goes to Baker Street.
Mrs. Hudson lets her in, and the door to 221B opens at her touch when Sherlock calls, "Yes! Don't be boring."
He doesn't invite her to sit, so she stands in the middle of the flat and looks down on him laid out on the sofa. "I'm taking Charlie to see John McLeod Primary School day after next. Do you want to come?"
"You could have texted."
"I wasn't sure you'd want that in writing."
"Oh." Sherlock frowns.
"Ten-thirty," Molly tells him. He doesn't answer, so she shows herself out.
5.
Molly throws a party for Charlie's fifth birthday. She invites a small handful of his friends from school and their parents, Mycroft, Sherlock, and John and Mary. Mycroft sends a gift and Sherlock doesn't respond to the invitation; the rest of them come to the party.
Sherlock shows up just as Charlie is opening the last of his presents. He sets a final gift down in front of Charlie.
Charlie tears the paper open, lifts the lid off the box, and pulls out a case that he opens to reveal a child-sized violin. He sets it down and scrambles over the pile of presents to throw his arms around Sherlock.
"Thank you, Ock!"
Sherlock hugs him back and smiles. "Lessons, too, of course." He looks at Molly. "On a schedule agreed to by your mother."
Charlie scrambles back to his friends, and they take up a lively discussion about the mechanics of musical instruments. Molly never would have been able to follow it at their age, but she can imagine that Sherlock and Mycroft might have had the same kind of conversation when they were children.
One of the other parents, the one who's a theoretical physicist, parlays it into an impromptu lesson on particle vibration that captivates the children for the remainder of the party.
"That was quite unlike any children's party I've ever been to," Mary says when everyone but she, John, and Sherlock has left.
"But just like most of the ones I've been to," Molly says.
"Mummy." Charlie comes to Molly and looks up to meet her eyes directly. "I need some quiet time."
Molly rests her hand on the top of his head, lightly and briefly. "All right, darling."
Charlie nods at her and takes the violin and one of the books from the box Mycroft sent and retreats to his room. The door closes with a click.
"And that," Mary says, "was remarkable."
Molly laughs a little. "It's one of the things they teach at his school. The whole place is full of geniuses - well, you saw - and they tend to get overstimulated, so they teach them to take their own time-outs."
"It is quite good self-management," Mary says. "Think we could make it work with Sherlock?"
"I'm not a child," Sherlock says.
"But you could do with the occasional time-out instead of deciding to test the properties of every liquid in the flat, including my shampoo."
"I," Sherlock declares, "do not need quiet time."
"Have you ever tried meditation?" John asks.
Molly says, "I'll just make more tea," and escapes to the kitchen. It's a mess, like the rest of the flat, and she does a bit of tidying while the kettle boils. It keeps her hands busy, keeps her from thinking about an afternoon spent with her son's friends and their parents, about how much, pathology specialization aside, she is not one of them.
She hears the voices soften, and footsteps behind her, so she isn't particularly surprised to hear Sherlock's voice. "You're upset," he says.
"I'm all right," Molly says. She doesn't turn to look at him until he's standing next to her at the sink, and then she smiles, strained around the edges and in no way able to fool him.
"I don't understand," Sherock says.
Molly sighs. "He's growing up. He's five, and I won't be able to follow half of what he says in another three years."
"He's intelligent," Sherlock says with a frown. "He's in an environment to develop that. He has friends whose company he enjoys. He appears to be happy. You should be happy."
"I am. I am for him." Molly shakes her head. "I know it's foolish. I know. It's only." She looks at Sherlock. "It's only that none of it is me. They like him because he's brilliant and gorgeous, and that's you. He can go to the school because of Mycroft. He has all of this," she waves her hand, meaning the flat and the life she can give Charlie when her salary doesn't have to pay for rent or Charlie's school, "because of Mycroft."
Sherlock blinks. "I did not have friends," he says, "and I was brilliant and gorgeous." She can almost hear the quotations around it. "I did not have friends until John. You are generally considered a kind woman, and you have taught Charlie to care about others. You've taught him to value friendships. They would not have remained his friends otherwise. Mycroft," he can never seem to say it without a sneer, "would have put you in a house in Kensington with staff and furniture you didn't dare touch. He would have sent Charlie to a school of his choosing that grooms politicians. I would have put you in the basement flat at Baker Street and home educated him. You found a place Charlie would consider a home, and a school that was better suited to him." He touches her, cups her elbow with his hand. "You're his mother, and you've done all of this."
Molly turns and rests her forehead against his shoulder. He doesn't complain about the emotional messiness of it all, just lets her take comfort from it.
"Thank you," she says after a moment. She dries her hands and rescues the kettle before all the water boils away.
John and Mary stay for tea, but not for supper. Molly throws together something light - rice and veg - and Sherlock sits with them at the table and talks music and physics with Charlie. He eats more than Molly has been led to believe he does. He would have to, sometimes, she supposes, to maintain the amount of muscle she knows he has, or maybe he's being a good example for Charlie.
He shows no signs of leaving, and Molly lets him do Charlie's bedtime ritual, waiting for him to clean his teeth, tucking him in, reading to him. Molly hovers in the doorway for the last - half a chapter of A Brief History of Time. It's sometimes over Charlie's head, and Molly's offered more than once to read something else instead. He says no, and that he'll read it again if he needs to - and comes in to brush a kiss over Charlie's forehead after Sherlock does.
Sherlock doesn't leave.
Molly tidies up, clearing away the mess from the party so it isn't all there in the morning, and does the washing up, throws some clothes in the washing machine, all while Sherlock does whatever it is he does when he's entertaining himself.
She doesn't hear him come into the kitchen, only knows he's there when she turns around and he's already inside her space, so close she has to catch herself by grabbing his arms.
"Charlie will be asleep and unlikely to wake until close to morning," Sherlock says.
Molly knows Charlie's sleeping patterns as well as he does, if not better - she's the one who lives with it - and doesn't figure out why he's telling her this until he steps even closer and says, "And your door locks."
"Oh." Molly looks at him, waiting patiently for her, but he wouldn't offer if she weren't going to take him up on it. She kisses him, says yes with that instead of words.
He takes her to bed, where he is his usual competent self - he's gotten good at this, and very good at it with her - but also careful with her, gentle.
Molly does not let herself cry.
Sherlock comes back to bed after he disposes of the condom, which she isn't expecting. They don't cuddle, but he's there, warm and close enough to touch. "You're a very good parent, Molly," he says. "Much better than I would be."
"You do all right," she tells him. "He adores you. You came to his birthday, and you've seen him at every Christmas. You don't lie to or disappoint him."
Sherlock is quiet for a moment. "Do I disappoint you?"
"No. Not- No. I didn't think you would do any of this, be involved at all."
"And for you? Not for Charlie, do I disappoint you?"
"I didn't expect anything from you."
Molly can feel more than see Sherlock lean over her to turn on the light on her nightstand. He stays there, hovering over her, looking down at her face. "Why not?" Molly can't read his voice, doesn't know if he's upset or merely curious.
"You don't love me," she says. Time hasn't blunted the pain of that. "You didn't- You didn't really want me. You wanted to see someone who knew you, and everyone else you knew thought you were dead."
"If you knew that," Sherlock asks, "then why did you agree?"
Molly can't quite bring herself to tell him she loves him. "You're fit and gorgeous," she says. "I wanted you." She does touch him now, sliding her palm down his chest. "I do want you."
He frowns at her. "I am not- This is not-"
Molly shakes her head. "No. I know. I know it's not. It's okay." She lets her hand fall away from him. "It's fine."
Sherlock keeps frowning. "You haven't dated."
"No."
"Not since Charlie," he goes on. "Not since-" His mouth thins into a tight line. "Not since I jumped off the roof at Barts."
"No."
Sherlock stops looming over her, lies down next to her instead. "Why not?"
Molly shrugs. "I wanted you, and I had you, sort of, for a bit, and then there was Charlie, and you, sometimes, and it doesn't seem worth the trouble." She listens to him breathe as he thinks about it. She doesn't know if he knows the last, that she loves him and this is enough. It's the kind of thing he doesn't always figure out.
"You still want this. Me, sometimes." He doesn't make it a question, but it feels like one.
"Yes." Molly turns off the light. "I knew what this was. I know what it is. I do still want it."
6.
"Molly!" The shout accompanies very loud banging on the door.
Molly jerks the door open. "You're going to bother all the neighbors."
Sherlock looks her over, then sweeps past her into the flat, John following at a more sedate pace.
"Where's Charlie?"
"Not here. He's at a friend's for the night. What's going on?"
"Call him." Sherlock holds out his phone, which won't do her any good since she doesn't know the number.
Molly calls Laura on her own phone. "Just wanted to say goodnight," she says when she asks to talk to Charlie. She keeps her voice even, although Sherlock pounding her door down can't mean anything good.
There's a minute while Laura calls Charlie to the phone, and then Charlie's voice saying, "Hi, Mummy. Michael has blackboards on his walls."
Molly smiles. "You're having fun, then?"
"Yes," Charlie says decidedly. "We're drawing."
"That's good. Sherlock is here. He wanted to say hello."
"Okay!"
Molly passes the phone to Sherlock and isn't the least surprised when there's another knock at her door. She is surprised when it's Mycroft on the other side, but she lets him in and they all listen in on Sherlock's side of his conversation with Charlie. Molly is fully prepared, at the third interruption - the buzzer this time, no using their own means of entry into the building - to let Greg and Sergeant Donovan in just before Sherlock hangs up the phone.
The phone is still in his hand, a hard square pressing into Molly's bicep, when he grabs both her arms and asks, "Are you all right?"
"Yes," she says, trying to stay calm no matter how alarming the circumstances are. "Why shouldn't I be?"
Sherlock stares at her, holding on too tight, then his hands drop away and he leaves her phone on the coffee table as he paces.
"There's been a threat," Greg says.
Molly's knees go weak, and she sits heavily on the couch. "Charlie."
"No." Greg looks apologetic. "You."
Molly looks up, confusion cutting through her terror. "Me?"
Greg looks at Sherlock before answering. "Sherlock's been working with us on a case, serial killer, the one the press is calling The Serial Slicer." He hesitates and looks at Mycroft.
"I assure you," Mycroft says, "I have clearance for this conversation."
"No doubt," Sherlock says, "he knows more than you do about the investigation."
Greg looks as if he's going to protest, but gives it up as a lost cause. "We've held details back. We've been getting letters, before each murder. They contain clues to his next victim, but so far we've not been able to identify them beforehand. The latest letter points to you."
"How do you know it's me?"
Greg looks as if he really doesn't want to answer that.
Sherlock takes over. "The letter says, 'Quite clever involving Mr. Holmes, but I can't have him continuing to interfere. His whore will be next. Quite a pity to make her boy an orphan, but I'm afraid it can't be avoided. One does have to wonder, how did a single mother become his plaything? Perhaps I'll ask her before I slit her throat.'" He recites it all calmly, in a monotone that's nearly as frightening as the words.
"Your security detail has been alerted," Mycroft says.
Molly turns her attention to him. "What?"
"You can't imagine I would leave your and Charlie's safety to chance."
"You don't leave anything to chance," Sherlock says. "Always pulling strings. You're bothered by more than just the letter." It takes Molly a moment to realize the last is directed at her.
The letter is more than enough, but she is. There's something teasing at the edge of her consciousness. She says, "He doesn't know about Charlie."
"He knows he exists," Greg says. "And seems to think his father's dead if he expects killing you to make him an orphan."
"Everyone at Barts thinks that," Molly says. It's not what's tugging at her, although maybe close.
"Do they?" Sherlock's gaze sharpens.
"There was a man," Molly says slowly. "He came into the morgue last week, to look at one of our unidentified bodies. His sister was missing, and we had someone who fit the description. He asked me how I became a pathologist."
"What did he say?" Sherlock steps closer, intense and demanding. "What were his exact words?"
Molly closes her eyes and thinks back to the morgue. "He said, 'How did you become a pathologist? Doesn't seem the usual career for a young woman.'"
"What did you tell him?"
Molly shrugs. "That I became interested in medical school and found I was good at it. People often ask me that."
Sherlock looks past her to Mycroft. "You will-"
"Of course," Mycroft says.
Sherlock nods sharply. "John," he says, as he moves toward the door.
John looks at each of them in turn. "You'll be all right?" he asks Molly.
"I assure you, Doctor Watson," Mycroft says, "that she will be perfectly safe."
A woman Molly doesn't know, dressed entirely in black, down to her eminently sensible shoes, slides into her flat through the door Sherlock is holding open.
"Ah, Julia," Mycroft says.
That seems to satisfy John, and he leaves with Sherlock.
"Doctor Hooper," Mycroft says. "This is Julia. She will stay with you tonight."
Molly half smiles at the woman. "Hello."
Julia nods at her. "Ma'am."
"Julia is perfectly capable of handling any threats to you," Mycroft says. "Charlie will be similarly protected. I've no doubt Sherlock will have this wrapped up shortly." He nods at Molly before he strolls out of the flat, as unconcerned as anything.
"Right," Greg says after he's gone. "Should've known those two would take over my case." He doesn't look particularly put-upon by the fact. "Molly, I'm sure Mycroft's people are excellent. We'll have a patrol come by and keep an eye out as well."
Molly nods on automatic. "Thank you."
Greg comes to her and squeezes her shoulder. "You know what Sherlock's like, and we'll be following him around ready to make the arrest. This shouldn't go on too long."
Molly manages a more genuine smile for him. "I know. Thanks, Greg."
Greg takes Sergeant Donovan with him when he leaves. Molly locks the door behind them and turns around to smile nervously at Julia.
"Ma'am," Julia says, "please stay here while I do an interior perimeter sweep. Then you may go about your evening as usual."
There is nothing usual about Molly's evening, but she stays where she is while Julia does her sweep. There are always things to be done in a home with a small child, so she does some of those before she goes to bed.
Molly doesn't expect to sleep, and indeed she lies awake, staring into the dark for what must be hours. She does sleep, eventually, and wakes up in the early hours of the morning from a dream about Jim holding a scalpel to her throat. She hasn't thought of him in years.
It takes even longer to fall asleep the second time, and she sleeps only fitfully, only for a few hours, little enough that there are dark circles under her eyes when she gives up.
Julia is still awake and alert in the living room, and she accepts Molly's offer of tea and toast with polite distance. Molly leaves her to it and tidies the flat to within an inch of its life. Charlie's away, she hasn't anywhere else to be, and she won't be able to focus on anything more complex.
Sherlock is out there, somewhere, tracking down a man who wants to kill her to punish him. She's not even sure it would work. Jim had threatened John, after all, and this one can't be half as clever as him.
The knock on the door at half nine causes her to drop a stack of Charlie's books. She shoves them into a pile and finds Julia between her and the door, peering through the peephole before stepping away and letting Molly open the door.
Sherlock comes in with blood on his sleeve and a bandage wrapped around his left hand. He takes in Julia as if he's forgotten who she is, then dismisses her and turns to Molly. "You're all right."
"Yes," she says.
Behind her, John closes the door and introduces himself to Julia.
Sherlock seems to slump. "You're all right."
"Yes, I'm fine."
"You often say that," Sherlock says, "even when you aren't."
"It's a social nicety," Molly offers. Then she looks at Sherlock, really looks at him, and steps forward in case she has to catch him. "You've gone gray. Sit down before you fall down."
"He has a cut that needs stitching," John says. "Wouldn't let anyone take him to A&E."
Molly guides Sherlock to the couch and sits next to him when he refuses to let go of her wrist.
"Do you have a suture kit?"
"First aid kit, cabinet above the refrigerator."
Sherlock looks at her oddly. "You keep a suture kit."
"Yes." Molly smiles at him, just a little. "Between you and Charlie, I thought I might need it."
The buzzer sounds. Julia answers it and lets Greg and Sergeant Donovan up when Molly agrees.
"Is it over?" Molly asks Sherlock.
"Yes." Sherlock goes a little gray again. "Unless the Met has become so grossly incompetent as to lose him again." He says the last just as Julia opens the door for Greg and Sergeant Donovan.
John comes back with his sleeves rolled up and everything he needs to clean and sew up a cut. He drapes a towel over Sherlock's thigh before unwrapping the bandage on his hand. It's deep, and straight.
"I think we can keep him in custody," Greg says. "Will you give a statement now?" He and Sergeant Donovan both have notepads at the ready.
"If I must."
"I'll make tea." Molly stands, and has to peel Sherlock's fingers away from her wrist. "I'm only going to the kitchen."
Sherlock's talking when she comes back, a litany of deductions interspersed with questions from Greg and reminders to stay still from John. They take a break for Molly to pour tea for everyone but John.
Sherlock drinks half a cup in a few swallows, then latches onto her wrist again. He picks up speaking with an explanation of how he found the man's flat, and then stops, mouth snapping shut.
"There were quite a large number of photographs of you," he says to Molly, his voice entirely different, different enough that everyone stops what they're doing, even John's hands stilling.
"All right," Molly says softly. His eyes are dark and almost, she would say, frightened. She cups his cheek with the hand he's not keeping hostage. "It's all right."
Her phone breaks the moment. Sherlock's fingers tighten around her wrist when she tries to get it, so Greg brings it to her.
"There's a man here," Laura says. "He says he's picking up Charlie."
Molly's stomach tightens. "Put him on."
"Molly," Mycroft says. He's never called her Molly in his life. "Please do let Charles's friend's mother know it's perfectly all right for me to bring him home."
Molly relaxes, leaning against Sherlock to let him know it's fine. "Yes, of course." Mycroft puts Laura on the phone and Molly gives her permission to send Charlie home with Mycroft.
"Mycroft," Molly explains to Sherlock. "He's bringing Charlie."
"Good," Sherlock says after a pause. "That's good." At Greg's prompting, he returns to the story of what happened once he reached the flat, a story that has Molly wincing even before he gets to the part where he caught The Serial Slicer's knife with his palm.
He gets interrupted again when the door to the flat swings open and Charlie tumbles through, Mycroft following him at a more sedate pace.
Molly catches Charlie before he can launch himself at Sherlock.
"It's my hand," Sherlock says, "not the rest of me."
"You need to stay still so John can finish your stitches," Molly says. She pulls Charlie onto her lap instead.
Mycroft nods at all of them, and takes Julia with him when he leaves.
Charlie, mindful of Molly's words, wraps his arms around Sherlock's bicep instead of tumbling into him. "You got hurt."
"Yes, I did."
"How?"
Molly readies herself to interrupt, but Sherlock keeps it at a level appropriate for him. "I was trying to stop someone who wanted to hurt me."
Charlie frowns. "You got hurt anyway."
"Yes," Sherlock says, "I did."
"Were you scared?"
Sherlock's jaw tenses, but he answers. "Yes."
Charlie leans his cheek on Sherlock's arm. "How do you know where to put the stitches?"
John looks at Molly, but she doesn't mind; Charlie is curious about everything, and he's already calm about watching the stitches.
"It depends on how deep the cut is, and how long." John carries on talking as he sews the last few stitches, explaining how to decide where to put them, why stitches instead of plasters, and why he's making each stitch separate from the others. He covers Sherlock's palm with gauze and tape when he's finished. "Now he has to be careful. He can't get it wet, and he can't do anything that will tear the stitches." That bit seems to be as much for Sherlock's benefit as Charlie's.
"Why?"
"Because it will only take longer to heal if it tears open. And cuts that get infected can make people sick."
Charlie peers intently at Sherlock. "Will you be careful?"
John looks triumphant and Sherlock annoyed, but Sherlock says, "I will be as careful as I can be."
"You should have Mummy kiss it better," Charlie says.
Sherlock eyes Charlie and Molly. "That is not how the human body works."
Charlie frowns at him. "But it always feels better when Mummy kisses it."
"It's the placebo effect."
"What's the placebo effect?"
"Roughly," Sherlock says, "it means that if people believe something will be effective, it does have an effect, even if it there is no reason for it to be so."
There's a long moment while Charlie puzzles that out. "You don't believe it."
"No," Sherlock says.
The frown hasn't left Charlie's face. "But I do. Will that make it work?"
Sherlock says, "Most likely not," but extends his hand to Molly.
She brushes her lips over the bandage on Sherlock's palm, mostly to appease Charlie, who seems satisfied with that. It puts an odd look on Sherlock's face.
"Charlie, I saw some bananas in the kitchen," John says. "You can't ever try to sew up a person, but you could learn how to do sutures on a banana."
"Mummy?" Charlie twists to look at her, asking for permission.
Molly kisses his temple. "Yes. Go on."
"You'll need a change of clothes," John says to Sherlock, "if you're staying. I'll text Mary."
Sherlock looks just annoyed enough that John has to be right about that.
With John and Charlie in the kitchen - the sink goes on, and John's instructions about proper handwashing filter over it - Greg prods Sherlock to finish his statement. Molly stays and listens to it all, everything he did to protect her between when he showed up at her flat last night and when he came back this morning.
"What I don't understand," Sergeant Donovan says when Sherlock is done and Greg is flipping through his notes, "is how he knew you had a girlfriend when no one else did. And how did you get a girlfriend anyway?"
"I'm not his girlfriend," Molly says.
"Partner, whatever."
"Not worked it out yet?" Sherlock says. "A wonder you haven't been promoted."
"All right," Greg says. "That's enough out of the two of you." He starts in on a bunch of follow-up questions he doesn't quite finish by the time Mary arrives. Since Sherlock has once again taken possession of Molly's wrist, Greg lets her in. She brings with her a handful of bags giving off the scent of takeaway and Mrs. Hudson carrying a plate of cake.
"You didn't have to do that," Molly says.
"Oh, Mycroft did most of it," Mary says. "I assume my husband is about somewhere."
"Kitchen," Greg tells her.
"Marvelous. Are you staying?"
Greg looks at Sergeant Donovan, and puts his notebook away. "Yes. We have to have lunch sometime."
Mary drops a bag of clothes next to Sherlock and bends down to kiss his forehead. John comes out of the kitchen, and he and Mary fairly light up to see each other. They kiss in the doorway, and Mary reaches down to ruffle Charlie's hair. "Help us with the plates, will you?"
Mrs. Hudson stops to fuss over Sherlock. "Oh, Sherlock, what have you done to yourself this time?" She puts the cake down on the coffee table and hugs him, which he returns with his free arm.
"I'm quite all right," he lies. "Nothing John couldn't take care of."
Mrs. Hudson obviously doesn't believe it either, but she takes the cake into the kitchen.
Mary brings out plates for Molly, Sherlock, and Charlie, and sends Greg and Sergeant Donovan to get their own. They eat spread across the living room, Greg and Sergeant Donovan at one edge, Molly and Sherlock on the couch, Charlie on the floor on the other side of the coffee table where he can still see them, John and Mary in chairs they've pulled close enough that their knees touch, and Mrs. Hudson in one of Molly's armchairs rounding out the circle.
Greg and Sergeant Donovan leave after cake. John, Mary, and Mrs. Hudson help tidy up and put all the leftovers away.
John pulls Molly aside to say, "He's barely eaten in a couple of days. See if you can get something more into him in a bit, and for God's sake make sure he sleeps."
Molly looks in Sherlock's direction, but he's sufficiently distracted by Charlie. "I dunno that he'll listen to me."
John stays silent for a moment, looking at Sherlock. "I've rarely seen him that frightened. He was drugged once, and a few times when people were trying to kill me."
Molly just nods, because she doesn't have anything she can say to that. It seems to be enough; John squeezes her shoulder and gathers up Mary and Mrs. Hudson to share a cab back to Baker Street.
Charlie is on the couch with Sherlock, curled into his side but careful of his injured hand, still chattering away about spending the night at Michael's. Molly hates to interrupt them, but there are circles under Sherlock's eyes, and Charlie has to be completely overstimulated by now.
"Nap time," she says into a convenient pause in the conversation.
Charlie's face immediately scrunches up. "I'm not tired."
"No? Well, I think Sherlock is, so if you're not going to sleep, you'll need to be quiet."
Charlie looks up at Sherlock. "Are you going to take a nap?"
"Yes," Sherlock says, although he shoots a suspicious look at Molly, "I think that would be best."
Charlie considers it for a moment before he asks, "Can I come lie down with you?"
There's a slight smile on Sherlock's face when he says, "Yes, you may."
"You too, Mummy."
"All right. Do you want to put on your pajamas?"
"Do I have to clean my teeth?"
Molly smiles and says, "No."
"Okay!" Charlie dashes off to his room.
"John put you up to this," Sherlock says.
"Yes," Molly says. "We could all use the sleep anyway. He wants you to eat something in a bit too."
Sherlock doesn't answer her.
They reconvene in Molly's bedroom, all three of them in their pajamas. Charlie takes the middle of the bed, Molly and Sherlock bracketing him on either side. Sherlock falls asleep almost as soon as they're settled, and Charlie not long after that.
Molly isn't surprised in the least when Charlie wakes them all up by having a nightmare.
"Ock!"
Sherlock startles, but puts his hand on Charlie's shoulder. "I'm right here."
"You were hurt. Someone was hurting you." Charlie burrows close to Sherlock. "It was scary."
"It was only a dream," Sherlock says, "your unconscious mind synthesizing your experience."
"Mummy?"
Molly puts her hand on Charlie's back. "I'm right here, darling. We're all right." She keeps her hand there while Charlie cries himself out and drops back into sleep.
"He's listening to my heartbeat," Sherlock says. "I thought he'd outgrown that."
"You had your fingers on my pulse for hours earlier."
Sherlock looks as embarrassed as he ever does.
"It's okay. I don't mind." Molly holds out her hand, and after a moment, Sherlock takes it, his fingers settling around her wrist again.
4.
"You have to tell Mycroft no," Sherlock says as he sweeps into the morgue.
Molly looks at the corpse open on her table, her recorder on, Sherlock trying to take up all her attention.
"I am busy," she says.
"Mycroft." Sherlock paces back and forth on the other side of the table. "You can't let him dictate Charlie's education."
"You went to public school, didn't you?" Molly drops the body's liver into the scale and reads the weight out for her record.
"Yes," Sherlock says. "I hated it. It was horrible."
Molly turns the recorder off. "Charlie isn't you."
Sherlock dismisses that with a wave of his hand. "You can't let Mycroft do that."
Molly knows better than to make any promises to him. "Is that all?"
Sherlock presses his lips together. "You're humoring me."
"I take Charlie very seriously," Molly says. "I will do what is best for him. I also take this seriously." She gestures at the body on the table, the liver in the scale, the turned off recorder. "If you're finished, I'll get back to this."
"We could home educate him. Between us, he would get an excellent education." Sherlock looks off into the middle distance for a moment. "John could teach him to shoot."
It's a terrible idea, but there is still an open cadaver on her table. "No need to figure it out just yet." Molly turns the recorder on and reaches into the body.
The look on Sherlock's face is precisely the one Charlie gets when Molly doesn't let him stay up past his bedtime.
*
The thing about Sherlock is that even when he's being horrible, he's usually right. It is time to think about schools for Charlie - any old school isn't going to work for him - and Charlie probably wouldn't like most schools.
Molly googles a bit on her own before she decides it's worth calling in an expert and invites Judy out for lunch.
Judy looks at her for a moment after Molly explains half the situation - Charlie and needing to find a school - then shakes her head. "I know you don't talk about his father, but he's some kind of politician or minor royal, right?"
Molly looks down. She hates this part, never being able to talk to anyone about it. Not even Mary, not really. She answers the part of it she can. "There's money, and influence."
"All right," Judy says. "For anything that's going to be able to handle Charlie, you're probably going to need them. How is he with other children?"
"Watchful. More so than with adults, at first. He'll play with them, and I think he likes the company, but you can tell he's treating it like a game he has to figure out." She hates speaking so clinically about him, but sugarcoating it isn't going to help her find the right school.
"Have you ever had him evaluated?" Judy speaks slowly, carefully. "If he's on the autism spectrum, that changes what he needs."
"No," Molly says. "The carers suggested it, but he's not- He doesn't fit the criteria. He's just very, very clever."
"All right," Judy says. "There are a few places in London, one in Oxford, an experimental place in Dartmoor, and one in Edinburgh."
"London," Molly says. "I'm not sending him off to school." And certainly not to Dartmoor or Edinburgh.
Judy gives her the names of the places in London. "I've worked with John McLeod Primary School, and the other two have good reputations. Good for children, willing to work with parents." She pats Molly's hand. "You'll find something. Or you can let his father pay for everything so you can leave your job and home educate him."
Molly makes a face. "That's the option I'm trying to avoid."
*
Molly makes appointments with all three schools for a Tuesday morning. She wears a smart skirt and a blouse, heels, and drops Charlie off at the nursery in the morning as usual. They're all fine, but she finds herself agreeing with Judy's assessment of John McLeod Primary School.
"We're using a modified Montessori approach," Caroline Harper, the school's head, explains as she takes Molly to see the school. "Children, especially the children who come to John McLeod, learn best when it's self-directed." Caroline takes Molly down the wide, cheerful hallway. "We do, of course, insist on social interaction as well. We have a number of genius-level children who would be perfectly happy to lose themselves in their intellectual pursuits. However, intellectual activity is not the only purpose of a school." Caroline stops in front of a door. "This is one of our younger classrooms. We accept children as young as three, and we conduct assessments to determine the proper placement for children. We attempt to best match them with both a peer group and a teacher."
Molly looks through the window in the door. There are approximately fifteen children spread across the room. The majority of them are engaged in solitary pursuits, but there are two children working together on some kind of project. There's an adult, the teacher, she supposes, crouching on the floor next to one of the desks, listening to one of the children talk to him.
"Are all your classes this small?"
"Yes," Caroline says, "or nearly. No class is larger than twenty, and we have additional teachers who spend part of the day in each of the larger classes."
Molly turns away from the window. "How do you promote social interaction?" She thinks about Sherlock, who must have been a horror at that age, and of Charlie, who she wants to grow up to have friends.
Caroline looks at her watch. "If you'll come this way, some of the older classes will be having their social hour." She takes Molly outside, where they look over what appears to be uncontrolled chaos. "We believe age is not the determining factor in children's social or intellectual maturity, which is why we have mixed-age classrooms; however, their physical development is something else. We don't want anyone getting hurt. We do have some all-school activities, but daily social time is in age-appropriate groups. We have organized activities for the physical education portion of the day, as well as this." Caroline sweeps her arm out. "Unstructured play is very important in children's development."
Molly returns to the morgue for the afternoon feeling quite good about John McLeod, despite Caroline's warning that their selection process is quite exclusive.
Sherlock, John, Greg, and Sergeant Donovan arrive at half three to look at a body. They're on the way out when Sherlock turns back.
"Heels," he says. "And you were wearing lipstick earlier. You've rubbed it off, but the traces are still there."
"Yes," Molly says. She returns the bodies to their places.
"Why," Sherlock asks, "were you wearing heels and lipstick?"
"I had meetings."
"You-"
"Meetings," Molly says. "Is there anything I can help you with?"
Sherlock narrows his eyes at her, but when John says, "Sherlock," he turns around and leaves.
*
Molly trusts the arrangements to Mycroft and ends up with a late morning appointment to take Charlie to see John McLeod. Two days before, she leaves the morgue at lunch and goes to Baker Street.
Mrs. Hudson lets her in, and the door to 221B opens at her touch when Sherlock calls, "Yes! Don't be boring."
He doesn't invite her to sit, so she stands in the middle of the flat and looks down on him laid out on the sofa. "I'm taking Charlie to see John McLeod Primary School day after next. Do you want to come?"
"You could have texted."
"I wasn't sure you'd want that in writing."
"Oh." Sherlock frowns.
"Ten-thirty," Molly tells him. He doesn't answer, so she shows herself out.
5.
Molly throws a party for Charlie's fifth birthday. She invites a small handful of his friends from school and their parents, Mycroft, Sherlock, and John and Mary. Mycroft sends a gift and Sherlock doesn't respond to the invitation; the rest of them come to the party.
Sherlock shows up just as Charlie is opening the last of his presents. He sets a final gift down in front of Charlie.
Charlie tears the paper open, lifts the lid off the box, and pulls out a case that he opens to reveal a child-sized violin. He sets it down and scrambles over the pile of presents to throw his arms around Sherlock.
"Thank you, Ock!"
Sherlock hugs him back and smiles. "Lessons, too, of course." He looks at Molly. "On a schedule agreed to by your mother."
Charlie scrambles back to his friends, and they take up a lively discussion about the mechanics of musical instruments. Molly never would have been able to follow it at their age, but she can imagine that Sherlock and Mycroft might have had the same kind of conversation when they were children.
One of the other parents, the one who's a theoretical physicist, parlays it into an impromptu lesson on particle vibration that captivates the children for the remainder of the party.
"That was quite unlike any children's party I've ever been to," Mary says when everyone but she, John, and Sherlock has left.
"But just like most of the ones I've been to," Molly says.
"Mummy." Charlie comes to Molly and looks up to meet her eyes directly. "I need some quiet time."
Molly rests her hand on the top of his head, lightly and briefly. "All right, darling."
Charlie nods at her and takes the violin and one of the books from the box Mycroft sent and retreats to his room. The door closes with a click.
"And that," Mary says, "was remarkable."
Molly laughs a little. "It's one of the things they teach at his school. The whole place is full of geniuses - well, you saw - and they tend to get overstimulated, so they teach them to take their own time-outs."
"It is quite good self-management," Mary says. "Think we could make it work with Sherlock?"
"I'm not a child," Sherlock says.
"But you could do with the occasional time-out instead of deciding to test the properties of every liquid in the flat, including my shampoo."
"I," Sherlock declares, "do not need quiet time."
"Have you ever tried meditation?" John asks.
Molly says, "I'll just make more tea," and escapes to the kitchen. It's a mess, like the rest of the flat, and she does a bit of tidying while the kettle boils. It keeps her hands busy, keeps her from thinking about an afternoon spent with her son's friends and their parents, about how much, pathology specialization aside, she is not one of them.
She hears the voices soften, and footsteps behind her, so she isn't particularly surprised to hear Sherlock's voice. "You're upset," he says.
"I'm all right," Molly says. She doesn't turn to look at him until he's standing next to her at the sink, and then she smiles, strained around the edges and in no way able to fool him.
"I don't understand," Sherock says.
Molly sighs. "He's growing up. He's five, and I won't be able to follow half of what he says in another three years."
"He's intelligent," Sherlock says with a frown. "He's in an environment to develop that. He has friends whose company he enjoys. He appears to be happy. You should be happy."
"I am. I am for him." Molly shakes her head. "I know it's foolish. I know. It's only." She looks at Sherlock. "It's only that none of it is me. They like him because he's brilliant and gorgeous, and that's you. He can go to the school because of Mycroft. He has all of this," she waves her hand, meaning the flat and the life she can give Charlie when her salary doesn't have to pay for rent or Charlie's school, "because of Mycroft."
Sherlock blinks. "I did not have friends," he says, "and I was brilliant and gorgeous." She can almost hear the quotations around it. "I did not have friends until John. You are generally considered a kind woman, and you have taught Charlie to care about others. You've taught him to value friendships. They would not have remained his friends otherwise. Mycroft," he can never seem to say it without a sneer, "would have put you in a house in Kensington with staff and furniture you didn't dare touch. He would have sent Charlie to a school of his choosing that grooms politicians. I would have put you in the basement flat at Baker Street and home educated him. You found a place Charlie would consider a home, and a school that was better suited to him." He touches her, cups her elbow with his hand. "You're his mother, and you've done all of this."
Molly turns and rests her forehead against his shoulder. He doesn't complain about the emotional messiness of it all, just lets her take comfort from it.
"Thank you," she says after a moment. She dries her hands and rescues the kettle before all the water boils away.
John and Mary stay for tea, but not for supper. Molly throws together something light - rice and veg - and Sherlock sits with them at the table and talks music and physics with Charlie. He eats more than Molly has been led to believe he does. He would have to, sometimes, she supposes, to maintain the amount of muscle she knows he has, or maybe he's being a good example for Charlie.
He shows no signs of leaving, and Molly lets him do Charlie's bedtime ritual, waiting for him to clean his teeth, tucking him in, reading to him. Molly hovers in the doorway for the last - half a chapter of A Brief History of Time. It's sometimes over Charlie's head, and Molly's offered more than once to read something else instead. He says no, and that he'll read it again if he needs to - and comes in to brush a kiss over Charlie's forehead after Sherlock does.
Sherlock doesn't leave.
Molly tidies up, clearing away the mess from the party so it isn't all there in the morning, and does the washing up, throws some clothes in the washing machine, all while Sherlock does whatever it is he does when he's entertaining himself.
She doesn't hear him come into the kitchen, only knows he's there when she turns around and he's already inside her space, so close she has to catch herself by grabbing his arms.
"Charlie will be asleep and unlikely to wake until close to morning," Sherlock says.
Molly knows Charlie's sleeping patterns as well as he does, if not better - she's the one who lives with it - and doesn't figure out why he's telling her this until he steps even closer and says, "And your door locks."
"Oh." Molly looks at him, waiting patiently for her, but he wouldn't offer if she weren't going to take him up on it. She kisses him, says yes with that instead of words.
He takes her to bed, where he is his usual competent self - he's gotten good at this, and very good at it with her - but also careful with her, gentle.
Molly does not let herself cry.
Sherlock comes back to bed after he disposes of the condom, which she isn't expecting. They don't cuddle, but he's there, warm and close enough to touch. "You're a very good parent, Molly," he says. "Much better than I would be."
"You do all right," she tells him. "He adores you. You came to his birthday, and you've seen him at every Christmas. You don't lie to or disappoint him."
Sherlock is quiet for a moment. "Do I disappoint you?"
"No. Not- No. I didn't think you would do any of this, be involved at all."
"And for you? Not for Charlie, do I disappoint you?"
"I didn't expect anything from you."
Molly can feel more than see Sherlock lean over her to turn on the light on her nightstand. He stays there, hovering over her, looking down at her face. "Why not?" Molly can't read his voice, doesn't know if he's upset or merely curious.
"You don't love me," she says. Time hasn't blunted the pain of that. "You didn't- You didn't really want me. You wanted to see someone who knew you, and everyone else you knew thought you were dead."
"If you knew that," Sherlock asks, "then why did you agree?"
Molly can't quite bring herself to tell him she loves him. "You're fit and gorgeous," she says. "I wanted you." She does touch him now, sliding her palm down his chest. "I do want you."
He frowns at her. "I am not- This is not-"
Molly shakes her head. "No. I know. I know it's not. It's okay." She lets her hand fall away from him. "It's fine."
Sherlock keeps frowning. "You haven't dated."
"No."
"Not since Charlie," he goes on. "Not since-" His mouth thins into a tight line. "Not since I jumped off the roof at Barts."
"No."
Sherlock stops looming over her, lies down next to her instead. "Why not?"
Molly shrugs. "I wanted you, and I had you, sort of, for a bit, and then there was Charlie, and you, sometimes, and it doesn't seem worth the trouble." She listens to him breathe as he thinks about it. She doesn't know if he knows the last, that she loves him and this is enough. It's the kind of thing he doesn't always figure out.
"You still want this. Me, sometimes." He doesn't make it a question, but it feels like one.
"Yes." Molly turns off the light. "I knew what this was. I know what it is. I do still want it."
6.
"Molly!" The shout accompanies very loud banging on the door.
Molly jerks the door open. "You're going to bother all the neighbors."
Sherlock looks her over, then sweeps past her into the flat, John following at a more sedate pace.
"Where's Charlie?"
"Not here. He's at a friend's for the night. What's going on?"
"Call him." Sherlock holds out his phone, which won't do her any good since she doesn't know the number.
Molly calls Laura on her own phone. "Just wanted to say goodnight," she says when she asks to talk to Charlie. She keeps her voice even, although Sherlock pounding her door down can't mean anything good.
There's a minute while Laura calls Charlie to the phone, and then Charlie's voice saying, "Hi, Mummy. Michael has blackboards on his walls."
Molly smiles. "You're having fun, then?"
"Yes," Charlie says decidedly. "We're drawing."
"That's good. Sherlock is here. He wanted to say hello."
"Okay!"
Molly passes the phone to Sherlock and isn't the least surprised when there's another knock at her door. She is surprised when it's Mycroft on the other side, but she lets him in and they all listen in on Sherlock's side of his conversation with Charlie. Molly is fully prepared, at the third interruption - the buzzer this time, no using their own means of entry into the building - to let Greg and Sergeant Donovan in just before Sherlock hangs up the phone.
The phone is still in his hand, a hard square pressing into Molly's bicep, when he grabs both her arms and asks, "Are you all right?"
"Yes," she says, trying to stay calm no matter how alarming the circumstances are. "Why shouldn't I be?"
Sherlock stares at her, holding on too tight, then his hands drop away and he leaves her phone on the coffee table as he paces.
"There's been a threat," Greg says.
Molly's knees go weak, and she sits heavily on the couch. "Charlie."
"No." Greg looks apologetic. "You."
Molly looks up, confusion cutting through her terror. "Me?"
Greg looks at Sherlock before answering. "Sherlock's been working with us on a case, serial killer, the one the press is calling The Serial Slicer." He hesitates and looks at Mycroft.
"I assure you," Mycroft says, "I have clearance for this conversation."
"No doubt," Sherlock says, "he knows more than you do about the investigation."
Greg looks as if he's going to protest, but gives it up as a lost cause. "We've held details back. We've been getting letters, before each murder. They contain clues to his next victim, but so far we've not been able to identify them beforehand. The latest letter points to you."
"How do you know it's me?"
Greg looks as if he really doesn't want to answer that.
Sherlock takes over. "The letter says, 'Quite clever involving Mr. Holmes, but I can't have him continuing to interfere. His whore will be next. Quite a pity to make her boy an orphan, but I'm afraid it can't be avoided. One does have to wonder, how did a single mother become his plaything? Perhaps I'll ask her before I slit her throat.'" He recites it all calmly, in a monotone that's nearly as frightening as the words.
"Your security detail has been alerted," Mycroft says.
Molly turns her attention to him. "What?"
"You can't imagine I would leave your and Charlie's safety to chance."
"You don't leave anything to chance," Sherlock says. "Always pulling strings. You're bothered by more than just the letter." It takes Molly a moment to realize the last is directed at her.
The letter is more than enough, but she is. There's something teasing at the edge of her consciousness. She says, "He doesn't know about Charlie."
"He knows he exists," Greg says. "And seems to think his father's dead if he expects killing you to make him an orphan."
"Everyone at Barts thinks that," Molly says. It's not what's tugging at her, although maybe close.
"Do they?" Sherlock's gaze sharpens.
"There was a man," Molly says slowly. "He came into the morgue last week, to look at one of our unidentified bodies. His sister was missing, and we had someone who fit the description. He asked me how I became a pathologist."
"What did he say?" Sherlock steps closer, intense and demanding. "What were his exact words?"
Molly closes her eyes and thinks back to the morgue. "He said, 'How did you become a pathologist? Doesn't seem the usual career for a young woman.'"
"What did you tell him?"
Molly shrugs. "That I became interested in medical school and found I was good at it. People often ask me that."
Sherlock looks past her to Mycroft. "You will-"
"Of course," Mycroft says.
Sherlock nods sharply. "John," he says, as he moves toward the door.
John looks at each of them in turn. "You'll be all right?" he asks Molly.
"I assure you, Doctor Watson," Mycroft says, "that she will be perfectly safe."
A woman Molly doesn't know, dressed entirely in black, down to her eminently sensible shoes, slides into her flat through the door Sherlock is holding open.
"Ah, Julia," Mycroft says.
That seems to satisfy John, and he leaves with Sherlock.
"Doctor Hooper," Mycroft says. "This is Julia. She will stay with you tonight."
Molly half smiles at the woman. "Hello."
Julia nods at her. "Ma'am."
"Julia is perfectly capable of handling any threats to you," Mycroft says. "Charlie will be similarly protected. I've no doubt Sherlock will have this wrapped up shortly." He nods at Molly before he strolls out of the flat, as unconcerned as anything.
"Right," Greg says after he's gone. "Should've known those two would take over my case." He doesn't look particularly put-upon by the fact. "Molly, I'm sure Mycroft's people are excellent. We'll have a patrol come by and keep an eye out as well."
Molly nods on automatic. "Thank you."
Greg comes to her and squeezes her shoulder. "You know what Sherlock's like, and we'll be following him around ready to make the arrest. This shouldn't go on too long."
Molly manages a more genuine smile for him. "I know. Thanks, Greg."
Greg takes Sergeant Donovan with him when he leaves. Molly locks the door behind them and turns around to smile nervously at Julia.
"Ma'am," Julia says, "please stay here while I do an interior perimeter sweep. Then you may go about your evening as usual."
There is nothing usual about Molly's evening, but she stays where she is while Julia does her sweep. There are always things to be done in a home with a small child, so she does some of those before she goes to bed.
Molly doesn't expect to sleep, and indeed she lies awake, staring into the dark for what must be hours. She does sleep, eventually, and wakes up in the early hours of the morning from a dream about Jim holding a scalpel to her throat. She hasn't thought of him in years.
It takes even longer to fall asleep the second time, and she sleeps only fitfully, only for a few hours, little enough that there are dark circles under her eyes when she gives up.
Julia is still awake and alert in the living room, and she accepts Molly's offer of tea and toast with polite distance. Molly leaves her to it and tidies the flat to within an inch of its life. Charlie's away, she hasn't anywhere else to be, and she won't be able to focus on anything more complex.
Sherlock is out there, somewhere, tracking down a man who wants to kill her to punish him. She's not even sure it would work. Jim had threatened John, after all, and this one can't be half as clever as him.
The knock on the door at half nine causes her to drop a stack of Charlie's books. She shoves them into a pile and finds Julia between her and the door, peering through the peephole before stepping away and letting Molly open the door.
Sherlock comes in with blood on his sleeve and a bandage wrapped around his left hand. He takes in Julia as if he's forgotten who she is, then dismisses her and turns to Molly. "You're all right."
"Yes," she says.
Behind her, John closes the door and introduces himself to Julia.
Sherlock seems to slump. "You're all right."
"Yes, I'm fine."
"You often say that," Sherlock says, "even when you aren't."
"It's a social nicety," Molly offers. Then she looks at Sherlock, really looks at him, and steps forward in case she has to catch him. "You've gone gray. Sit down before you fall down."
"He has a cut that needs stitching," John says. "Wouldn't let anyone take him to A&E."
Molly guides Sherlock to the couch and sits next to him when he refuses to let go of her wrist.
"Do you have a suture kit?"
"First aid kit, cabinet above the refrigerator."
Sherlock looks at her oddly. "You keep a suture kit."
"Yes." Molly smiles at him, just a little. "Between you and Charlie, I thought I might need it."
The buzzer sounds. Julia answers it and lets Greg and Sergeant Donovan up when Molly agrees.
"Is it over?" Molly asks Sherlock.
"Yes." Sherlock goes a little gray again. "Unless the Met has become so grossly incompetent as to lose him again." He says the last just as Julia opens the door for Greg and Sergeant Donovan.
John comes back with his sleeves rolled up and everything he needs to clean and sew up a cut. He drapes a towel over Sherlock's thigh before unwrapping the bandage on his hand. It's deep, and straight.
"I think we can keep him in custody," Greg says. "Will you give a statement now?" He and Sergeant Donovan both have notepads at the ready.
"If I must."
"I'll make tea." Molly stands, and has to peel Sherlock's fingers away from her wrist. "I'm only going to the kitchen."
Sherlock's talking when she comes back, a litany of deductions interspersed with questions from Greg and reminders to stay still from John. They take a break for Molly to pour tea for everyone but John.
Sherlock drinks half a cup in a few swallows, then latches onto her wrist again. He picks up speaking with an explanation of how he found the man's flat, and then stops, mouth snapping shut.
"There were quite a large number of photographs of you," he says to Molly, his voice entirely different, different enough that everyone stops what they're doing, even John's hands stilling.
"All right," Molly says softly. His eyes are dark and almost, she would say, frightened. She cups his cheek with the hand he's not keeping hostage. "It's all right."
Her phone breaks the moment. Sherlock's fingers tighten around her wrist when she tries to get it, so Greg brings it to her.
"There's a man here," Laura says. "He says he's picking up Charlie."
Molly's stomach tightens. "Put him on."
"Molly," Mycroft says. He's never called her Molly in his life. "Please do let Charles's friend's mother know it's perfectly all right for me to bring him home."
Molly relaxes, leaning against Sherlock to let him know it's fine. "Yes, of course." Mycroft puts Laura on the phone and Molly gives her permission to send Charlie home with Mycroft.
"Mycroft," Molly explains to Sherlock. "He's bringing Charlie."
"Good," Sherlock says after a pause. "That's good." At Greg's prompting, he returns to the story of what happened once he reached the flat, a story that has Molly wincing even before he gets to the part where he caught The Serial Slicer's knife with his palm.
He gets interrupted again when the door to the flat swings open and Charlie tumbles through, Mycroft following him at a more sedate pace.
Molly catches Charlie before he can launch himself at Sherlock.
"It's my hand," Sherlock says, "not the rest of me."
"You need to stay still so John can finish your stitches," Molly says. She pulls Charlie onto her lap instead.
Mycroft nods at all of them, and takes Julia with him when he leaves.
Charlie, mindful of Molly's words, wraps his arms around Sherlock's bicep instead of tumbling into him. "You got hurt."
"Yes, I did."
"How?"
Molly readies herself to interrupt, but Sherlock keeps it at a level appropriate for him. "I was trying to stop someone who wanted to hurt me."
Charlie frowns. "You got hurt anyway."
"Yes," Sherlock says, "I did."
"Were you scared?"
Sherlock's jaw tenses, but he answers. "Yes."
Charlie leans his cheek on Sherlock's arm. "How do you know where to put the stitches?"
John looks at Molly, but she doesn't mind; Charlie is curious about everything, and he's already calm about watching the stitches.
"It depends on how deep the cut is, and how long." John carries on talking as he sews the last few stitches, explaining how to decide where to put them, why stitches instead of plasters, and why he's making each stitch separate from the others. He covers Sherlock's palm with gauze and tape when he's finished. "Now he has to be careful. He can't get it wet, and he can't do anything that will tear the stitches." That bit seems to be as much for Sherlock's benefit as Charlie's.
"Why?"
"Because it will only take longer to heal if it tears open. And cuts that get infected can make people sick."
Charlie peers intently at Sherlock. "Will you be careful?"
John looks triumphant and Sherlock annoyed, but Sherlock says, "I will be as careful as I can be."
"You should have Mummy kiss it better," Charlie says.
Sherlock eyes Charlie and Molly. "That is not how the human body works."
Charlie frowns at him. "But it always feels better when Mummy kisses it."
"It's the placebo effect."
"What's the placebo effect?"
"Roughly," Sherlock says, "it means that if people believe something will be effective, it does have an effect, even if it there is no reason for it to be so."
There's a long moment while Charlie puzzles that out. "You don't believe it."
"No," Sherlock says.
The frown hasn't left Charlie's face. "But I do. Will that make it work?"
Sherlock says, "Most likely not," but extends his hand to Molly.
She brushes her lips over the bandage on Sherlock's palm, mostly to appease Charlie, who seems satisfied with that. It puts an odd look on Sherlock's face.
"Charlie, I saw some bananas in the kitchen," John says. "You can't ever try to sew up a person, but you could learn how to do sutures on a banana."
"Mummy?" Charlie twists to look at her, asking for permission.
Molly kisses his temple. "Yes. Go on."
"You'll need a change of clothes," John says to Sherlock, "if you're staying. I'll text Mary."
Sherlock looks just annoyed enough that John has to be right about that.
With John and Charlie in the kitchen - the sink goes on, and John's instructions about proper handwashing filter over it - Greg prods Sherlock to finish his statement. Molly stays and listens to it all, everything he did to protect her between when he showed up at her flat last night and when he came back this morning.
"What I don't understand," Sergeant Donovan says when Sherlock is done and Greg is flipping through his notes, "is how he knew you had a girlfriend when no one else did. And how did you get a girlfriend anyway?"
"I'm not his girlfriend," Molly says.
"Partner, whatever."
"Not worked it out yet?" Sherlock says. "A wonder you haven't been promoted."
"All right," Greg says. "That's enough out of the two of you." He starts in on a bunch of follow-up questions he doesn't quite finish by the time Mary arrives. Since Sherlock has once again taken possession of Molly's wrist, Greg lets her in. She brings with her a handful of bags giving off the scent of takeaway and Mrs. Hudson carrying a plate of cake.
"You didn't have to do that," Molly says.
"Oh, Mycroft did most of it," Mary says. "I assume my husband is about somewhere."
"Kitchen," Greg tells her.
"Marvelous. Are you staying?"
Greg looks at Sergeant Donovan, and puts his notebook away. "Yes. We have to have lunch sometime."
Mary drops a bag of clothes next to Sherlock and bends down to kiss his forehead. John comes out of the kitchen, and he and Mary fairly light up to see each other. They kiss in the doorway, and Mary reaches down to ruffle Charlie's hair. "Help us with the plates, will you?"
Mrs. Hudson stops to fuss over Sherlock. "Oh, Sherlock, what have you done to yourself this time?" She puts the cake down on the coffee table and hugs him, which he returns with his free arm.
"I'm quite all right," he lies. "Nothing John couldn't take care of."
Mrs. Hudson obviously doesn't believe it either, but she takes the cake into the kitchen.
Mary brings out plates for Molly, Sherlock, and Charlie, and sends Greg and Sergeant Donovan to get their own. They eat spread across the living room, Greg and Sergeant Donovan at one edge, Molly and Sherlock on the couch, Charlie on the floor on the other side of the coffee table where he can still see them, John and Mary in chairs they've pulled close enough that their knees touch, and Mrs. Hudson in one of Molly's armchairs rounding out the circle.
Greg and Sergeant Donovan leave after cake. John, Mary, and Mrs. Hudson help tidy up and put all the leftovers away.
John pulls Molly aside to say, "He's barely eaten in a couple of days. See if you can get something more into him in a bit, and for God's sake make sure he sleeps."
Molly looks in Sherlock's direction, but he's sufficiently distracted by Charlie. "I dunno that he'll listen to me."
John stays silent for a moment, looking at Sherlock. "I've rarely seen him that frightened. He was drugged once, and a few times when people were trying to kill me."
Molly just nods, because she doesn't have anything she can say to that. It seems to be enough; John squeezes her shoulder and gathers up Mary and Mrs. Hudson to share a cab back to Baker Street.
Charlie is on the couch with Sherlock, curled into his side but careful of his injured hand, still chattering away about spending the night at Michael's. Molly hates to interrupt them, but there are circles under Sherlock's eyes, and Charlie has to be completely overstimulated by now.
"Nap time," she says into a convenient pause in the conversation.
Charlie's face immediately scrunches up. "I'm not tired."
"No? Well, I think Sherlock is, so if you're not going to sleep, you'll need to be quiet."
Charlie looks up at Sherlock. "Are you going to take a nap?"
"Yes," Sherlock says, although he shoots a suspicious look at Molly, "I think that would be best."
Charlie considers it for a moment before he asks, "Can I come lie down with you?"
There's a slight smile on Sherlock's face when he says, "Yes, you may."
"You too, Mummy."
"All right. Do you want to put on your pajamas?"
"Do I have to clean my teeth?"
Molly smiles and says, "No."
"Okay!" Charlie dashes off to his room.
"John put you up to this," Sherlock says.
"Yes," Molly says. "We could all use the sleep anyway. He wants you to eat something in a bit too."
Sherlock doesn't answer her.
They reconvene in Molly's bedroom, all three of them in their pajamas. Charlie takes the middle of the bed, Molly and Sherlock bracketing him on either side. Sherlock falls asleep almost as soon as they're settled, and Charlie not long after that.
Molly isn't surprised in the least when Charlie wakes them all up by having a nightmare.
"Ock!"
Sherlock startles, but puts his hand on Charlie's shoulder. "I'm right here."
"You were hurt. Someone was hurting you." Charlie burrows close to Sherlock. "It was scary."
"It was only a dream," Sherlock says, "your unconscious mind synthesizing your experience."
"Mummy?"
Molly puts her hand on Charlie's back. "I'm right here, darling. We're all right." She keeps her hand there while Charlie cries himself out and drops back into sleep.
"He's listening to my heartbeat," Sherlock says. "I thought he'd outgrown that."
"You had your fingers on my pulse for hours earlier."
Sherlock looks as embarrassed as he ever does.
"It's okay. I don't mind." Molly holds out her hand, and after a moment, Sherlock takes it, his fingers settling around her wrist again.