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"Will you make some more tea?"
He sits, like an owl on a perch, in the corner of the couch, bouncing on his heels with boredom, and it's the first thing he's said in the hour we've been awake. He worries his fingers over the bones of his elbow and I just take him in for a moment. He hasn't cut his hair yet, though he will have to soon. The curls frizz out around his forehead and I know he's been running his hands through his hair. In frustration? Something. He is wound up and ready to pounce. The thought makes me shiver a bit.
I nod and go into the kitchen. He'd told me the night before that he'd made tea for Moriarty, and I laughed at him before I could stop myself. It was a loud bark of amusement and I was mortified, cutting into his sad tale like that, and he'd looked at me sharply out of the corner of his eye before he started laughing too.
I go through the motions of making tea, wondering again how I found myself living with Sherlock Holmes, even temporarily. He slept in my bed last night with me (I only hid in the bathroom for a full two minutes, having a stern conversation with myself, before climbing in bed next to him) and, much to my surprise, he talked for what seemed like hours about everything leading to him being there. I am fairly sure he told me all that because he couldn't tell anyone else, and obviously it doesn't matter what I know. Maybe he didn't want to be alone. My dreams of him were never slumber parties; they were mainly vague wooing and declarations of love. Honestly, this was more like a nightmare.
"Sugar, please." Like I don't already know that. He's been in my flat for thirteen hours. We've made a lot of tea. Or I have, at least.
He was like a furnace when he slept. I remember smoothing his hair back unconsciously, instinctively muttering comforting nothings when he'd jerked awake in a sweat, and then I'd frozen, terrified he was going to say something horrible and make me cry. Or make me want to smother him with a pillow. Instead, he'd leaned up into my hand slightly, seemingly soaking up the indulgence of being petted, closed his eyes and said "Molly Hooper, you are indeed a prize."
I'd snatched my hand away from his forehead, oddly angry, and turned away from him. I didn't sleep well last night.
With a package of biscuits clamped in my mouth, I carry over the mugs of tea, setting the biscuits and his mug on the table in front of him, and backing away to sit in the armchair to his right. He is still curled up in the corner of the couch, and I just need some space.
"You need to eat something. Please?" I hate the way my voice sounds. I can feel myself reacting to his vibrations of energy and it is overwhelming and loud and all too silent at the same time. I've lived alone for twelve years and never once has the silence of my own flat bothered me. Sherlock's silence makes me want to scream.
"If you don't eat, you're going to end up on my table for sure, and what's he going to do then?"
Sherlock's eyebrows shoot up and he looks at me in mild disbelief. He didn't ask to whom I am referring.
Whatever Sherlock wanted to say, it worked. He plucked two biscuits out of the package and shoved them in his mouth, one after the other. It would serve him right if he choked.
It is Sunday, and normally I go out to the shop to pick up a few things for the coming week. I watch him eat, watch him drink his tea, and then watch him sit in silence for six minutes more before I cannot take it any more. Without another word, I grab my purse and walk out the door. He didn't want to talk and I have nothing else to say to him, at the moment. Usually, I cannot shut up when he's around, and I'm always putting my foot into my mouth.
Tesco was predictably busy with people who go shopping mid-morning on a Sunday. People who probably didn't have a dead detective sulking in their living rooms. I am suddenly irrationally angry at him. I woke up with him curled around me, taking up all the space. At any given moment in the last two years, I would have sold my soul for that, but, for whatever reason, I just want to be away from him right now.
Tom stocks the produce shelves and I smile at him, feeling more shy than I have in the last two days, more like myself. Bananas, apples. The oranges look pitiful. Tom is fairly fit, always ready with a smile and a bad joke. I keep thinking he might ask me for coffee or a pint one of these days. Right now I can't imagine talking to anyone who thinks Sherlock is dead, because I might just blurt it all out in a spectacularly awkward fashion that seems to be my trademark until recently with all things related to Sherlock. Tom probably doesn't even know who Sherlock is.
Next Sunday, Sherlock will be gone. Maybe I'll ask Tom for a pint then.
I pay for my few items, and fight the urge to run back to the flat. Mycroft had instructed me to act normal. Do the shopping, get a pastry and coffee at my local cafe. Don't run. Don't look scared. As much as I'd wanted to escape Sherlock an hour ago, right now, all I can think of is being back there with him. Tomorrow, Sherlock will be gone.
I come back in to find him yelling at the telly. He doesn't look up, and doesn't offer to help me with my bags, and it occurs to me that he must be the worst flatmate ever. I imagine John doing all the shopping, sighing with exasperation when Sherlock continues to sit on the couch as he struggles in. John's exasperated sigh is something I've seen often, though he cannot hide the fond look in his eyes when Sherlock looks away. I could write a book about the way those two look at each other, now that I think about it.
Groceries are put away, so I make two sandwiches without asking if he wants to eat and put on the kettle. Tea and sandwiches are on my coffee table now, and I start to eat, ignoring him and the blaring telly.
"Where are you going to go?" I ask, after taking a few bites.
Sherlock snorts. "You know I can't tell you that. It's ridiculous that you even asked." But he turns off the telly and picks up the sandwich. Maybe he wants to talk.
"Yeah, I figured." His tone stings. And I set down my tea and turn to face him. He looks sharp and pinched, and rather breathtakingly beautiful. But I've always thought he was beautiful. Even when he was being cruel. I'm self aware enough to recognize that it was easy to be in love with someone who would most assuredly never love me back. Emotionally unavailable infatuations were the safest of all. If I'm doomed from the start, then there's nowhere to go but up, right? My previous imaginings of him seem distant and childish at the moment.
"Are you going to stare at me every time I eat?" He sounds disinterested, normal, sarcastic, but I can tell that my scrutiny was unnerving him a bit. For a moment, I have the upper hand.
"You are beautiful, Sherlock. And dangerous. And mean. And now every one but me thinks you are dead. You're draped over my couch, sleeping in my bed and tomorrow you will be gone." I blurt this out in one long breath and then promptly bury my burning face into my cooling tea. I feel stupid, but I don't feel the need to be quiet around him right now.
"Mycroft knows I'm alive. It's not just you." Pointing out the obvious. "I can sleep on the couch or the floor just as easily. I won't be in your way much longer." Petulant. He pretzels his legs and his knee is pressing into my thigh. I feel defensive, but I don't move.
"You aren't bothering me. It's fine. I'm sorry." Oh, and then I feel angry again. And I am apologizing like I'm the one breaking everyone's heart.
I saw John Watson's face in the waiting rooms of the morgue. I watched him through the glass as Mycroft came out and put his hand on John's shoulder. John was white and pasty and he'd stumbled back into the chair behind him. Mycroft said something else to him, but John wasn't listening. He was just staring at his hands. Without any warning, he'd stood up and staggered over to the bin in the corner, vomited, wiped his mouth on his coat sleeve and walked out of the room without a backwards glance to Mycroft.
It was one of the worst things I've ever seen and my stomach roils around the half sandwich I've eaten just thinking about it.
"He threw up in the waiting room, Sherlock." My voice sounds cold and calm to my own ears and I am not feeling the stain of embarrassment heat my face as I would expect. "Mycroft went to tell him he'd identified the body so John wouldn't have to. John threw up in a bin and walked away without a word." I look at him squarely. That was cruel of me. I imagine I feel like Sherlock for a moment.
His face twitches almost imperceptibly, and he closes his eyes. "Good. He needs to believe everything."
"He doesn't believe anything, except that you are dead. He saw your hair soaked in your blood on that sidewalk, Sherlock. He probably has a concussion from your biker friend plowing him over. It barely kept him down long enough for us to finish the switch." This was the part we haven't yet talked about. What happened after Sherlock "died".
I can feel him taking in deep, even breaths. Markedly so. He was trying to calm himself down. Good. I wonder how he is acting so normal. Well, normal for Sherlock. Last night, he'd said more words to me, telling me everything that happened, than in the last two years. I was laying on my back, eyes closed, in my own bed with him curled on his side facing me, listening to his voice rumbling in my chest as he described Moriarty's game. He'd almost sounded admiring, and I have little doubt that there is a part of him that is absolutely delighted in the brilliance of it all. This is all so fucked up.
"I can tell him everything, once this is all over." He doesn't look at me when he says it. I don't ask him when he thinks that will be.
I pick up the tea and half eaten sandwiches and wash up. Sherlock turns the telly back on, but he's not shouting at it anymore. There's a recent crime thriller novel that I started weeks ago and only half finished sitting on the counter. I don't want to talk to him right now, so I pick it up and take my seat back on the couch. I don't flinch when he lays his head on my thigh, long legs stretched out over the arm of the couch; he's still staring at the television. His head is heavy and feels hot -- feverish -- through my jeans. I don't put my hand through his hair once in the two hours I sit there, reading the same four paragraphs over and over again. He looks up at me three times, and doesn't say a word.
The afternoon drags on. Sherlock finally fell asleep, probably too bored to stay conscious any longer. I stopped reading my book fifteen minutes ago, and I need to use the toilet. I look down at the head in my lap and my heart seizes up a bit and and then settles. I don't feel angry right now. I want to wrap myself around him and make things less horrible. My bones ache and the tiny lines between his eyes deepened as he sleeps. He wasn't moving at all, aside from regular breathing.
"I know you aren't asleep anymore, Sherlock."
His eyes open immediately; I give in and run my hand over his hair. It was strange how three days ago I could barely complete a sentence around him. For an ill advised moment, I want to tell him all the things I'm sure he already knows. My crush, my naive longing to make him happy in my daydreams, and how all of that had pretty much evaporated the moment he asked me to help him die. I wonder if he knows about that last part.
It's starting to become clear to me that I love the idea of Sherlock, brooding and brilliant and miserable, just waiting for the love of someone to save him from himself. I feel like I've grown up overnight, and I know he's already found someone to save him. I'm putting my childish things away and all that. It all feels rather biblical. I wonder if this makes me his Mary Magdalene. I am the witness to his fall and resurrection.
Oh god, I am getting hysterical trapped in here with him.
He lifts his head off of my leg and I take the opportunity to bolt into the loo, locking myself in and staring in the mirror. I note the faint circles under my eyes. He was right, my mouth looks small. When I close my eyes, I see John Watson's pale face, rushing for the bin in the cold waiting room. My bladder pulls me back around, a low, dull ache in my belly.
When I come out, Sherlock is making tea. He looks at me out of the side of his eyes.
"Tea?" When I nod, he pulls down another mug. I am amused that he wouldn't have thought to make me anything had I not come out right then. "Mycroft is coming tomorrow to collect me. I'll be out of your hair by lunch."
I breath in. "I wish you didn't have to go. It's…"
He arches an eyebrow at me. It's a perfect eyebrow, but I don't appreciate the smug aesthetics of it because I feel that now familiar rush of fury. I don't want him to stay for any of the reasons he probably thinks. I fiddle with the handle of my mug and take another deep breath. I wonder what he sees when I look up at him, because he seems taken aback.
"When you go, I have to stay here. I... I have to see all of them. Right now? This is a dream. A bubble. You're still alive because I can see you. When you go, I have to mourn with everyone else. I have to lie to everyone. I... I have to lie to him." I don't say John's name, because it feels unnecessary.
"Yes, you do. And you have to be devastated. Your feelings were no secret to John, Lestrade and your coworkers, so you have to keep that going. You can't let anyone know. it is imperative to the work I have to do that everyone believes me dead. Even him." Perhaps especially him. Sherlock closes his eyes again, drinking his tea deeply. It must be scalding his tongue. Good.
"My... feelings?" I feel my face flush, though surely at this point, with all that's going on around me, I should be past embarrassment about this.
"Don't be obtuse. You know what I'm talking about. Your long suffering crush on me, obviously. You have to pretend you still feel that way. And that my death has dashed your dreams. Do try not to go overboard though."
He's mocking me. "I don't..." I choke out. I come around the counter, ready to injure him in some way, and he just laughs. "I don't have a crush on you." I stand in front of him, chest heaving. It's really not even a lie anymore. It feels like last Christmas all over again and for a moment, I seriously hate him.
He steps back a bit and looks me up and down. I feel exposed and I know my face is ten shades of crimson and all I want to do is punch him in the face. And then I replay his words in my head: you have to pretend you still feel that way. Oh.
I see that he can tell the moment it clicks. He can probably tell because my pulse in my neck stopped beating as quickly or some other such nonsense. I don't know what's worse: that he knew about my crush (of course he did) or that he knows it has died an unceremonious death. I think the worst is that I even care enough to get angry about this when everything else is going on. I feel petty and scorned and irrationally confused. So I ask.
"Wait, how did you...?"
"I know because you came out of the bathroom last night, and got into bed. You wouldn't have done that otherwise. You would have stutteringly offered to sleep on the couch, or the floor next to me." He sneers a bit on that last part. He's right. He's an absolute bastard. But he's right.
Unexpectedly, he wraps his arms around me and folds me into a hug that literally takes my breath away. My arms are pinned at my sides and I struggle to pull them out so I can hug him in return. Something like hysterical laughter bubbles up in my throat as I realise that some parts of my ridiculousness are not unfounded. Sherlock Holmes appears to need a hug. Right now, in the absence of other options, that hug has to come from me.
I wind my arms up around his shoulders -- he's so much taller than I am -- and I'm picked up off my feet for a moment as he squeezes me. It's bizarre and so utterly unlike him in my experience that I don't do anything but tighten my arms around his neck in return. He sets me back down, but doesn't let me go. I can feel his entire body practically surrounding me, strong and lean, with a slight tremor.
Arousal pools in my belly for one absurd moment, because I might not feel like a silly schoolgirl around him anymore, but I'm not blind or dead. He can probably feel my nipples harden through my bra, knowing Sherlock, but, surprisingly, I don't care. I wonder what he would do if I pulled back and kissed him, and I reject the idea as quickly as it comes, because it's actually a rather repulsive thought, all things considered. My lizard brain is doing me no favors. I am slammed by irony of the fact that my feelings for him up to this point were never particularly sexual, all virginal innocent fantasy. I am many things, but a virgin I am not, and I feel a bit betrayed by my body at this moment.
I indulge myself for ten more seconds, reveling solely in the physicality of being pressed up against him: the tension in the tops of his thighs against my hips, the soft, expensive feel of the shirt sleeve covering his wiry arm under my hand, the slightly sweaty, but clean smell of his skin and hair, and then I shut that thought train down.
He buries his face in my shoulder and he's... shaking. What? Is he crying? I can't tell. I feel horrified that he might be crying because, of all the dreams I had of him, not one of them involved tears. Another crack in the wall of my built up fantasies. It's almost a relief to feel them tearing down. Relief, arousal, sadness and something else I cannot place. His breath is hot on my neck and I push my hand up into his hair and back down his neck over and over again. If he is crying, I am the only one that can try to comfort him right now. The thought brings no triumph. It shouldn't be me, and I doubt it's really comforting him at all.
He finally stops shaking and pulls back. His eyes are dry, but bloodshot. His hands are on either side of my face and his body is still pressed against mine. His eyes darken for just a moment, his hips pressing ever so slightly forward against my lower belly, and I feel sure that he's thinking about kissing me. It's gross because it's an escape and it's lazy and I cannot think of anything I want less in this moment, despite the fact that my body still incredibly aware of him. He seems to sense this, of course. He presses his lips on my forehead. I can't help but shiver as he steps away into the sitting room.
"I need to dye my hair."
I choke out a laugh at that, because I'm having trouble breathing, and he wants to dye his hair. The insanity of all of this is overwhelming. He won't look at me, and I can't stop staring at him. His head is down, hands on his hips, standing in the middle of my sitting room. I think I have some bleach in my cabinet, from a time when I thought my hair needed to be streaked with something other than the brown I was born with. It turned orange on the first go round. I got better at it until I decided to stop. It wasn't me, but I kept the boxes I'd bought in case I needed to not be me again. Right now I feel more like myself that I ever have. I know it's just adrenaline and nerves, but I feel extremely alive right at this moment. Sherlock starts to prowl around the room again.
"I think you would look terrible as a blond, but that's all I've got, so it will have to do. I don't think I should go out and buy hair color tonight." I haven't bought hair color in years, and Mycroft's warnings about being normal echo in my head. Sherlock looks up at me, finally, and his lips twitch a bit. I feel more his equal in this moment than I ever have. It's new and weird and exhilarating and almost irrelevant as my time with him is almost over for the foreseeable future. I wonder if this is how John Watson feels all the time.
Within five minutes, Sherlock is stripped to his pants, sitting on my toilet. Before I pull on the latex gloves and mix the powder and liquid that will work as his disguise for a while, I indulge myself in running my hands through his hair one last time. It's soft, and the curls separate and become poufy as I do it, and I feel a bit sad that he won't be the same when I'm finished. The bleach will make his hair straw-like and the color will wash him out. He won't look like himself anymore, which is obviously the point.
"Molly, do get on with it." He's irritable, but he grabs my hand from his head and squeezes it a bit to soften his words. He probably knows what I am thinking. Maybe he's thinking the same.
The fumes of the bleach are strong in the tiny room, and I stop mixing to crack the window. I know logically that we won't die from the small box of bleach, but I feel hysterical laughter come up again as I imagine us being found dead in my tiny bathroom from hair bleach fumes. I try to pull myself together, resting my hands on his bare shoulders, and then I begin.
I have to bleach his hair twice to bring it up to something that is not an alarming shade of orange-bronze. I think maybe I should have gone out for something else, as I see pieces of his curls break off as I rinse his head under the tub faucet for the last time. I catch his eye as he's tilted over the side of the tub. It's an unflattering angle. His face is red and his eyes look puffy as the water sluices down around his head, removing the last of the conditioner I slathered on at the end.
Afterwards, we sit back on my couch, flipping idly through the channels with mugs of tea. His hair looks horrible and we aren't talking about it. I fix something for dinner, and we try to make conversation, but we both know that tomorrow he's leaving and it's mostly just a waiting game now. After another hour or so of flipping through the telly, Sherlock snaps and hurls the remote onto the floor, and I decide that I'm going to bed. I can't sit here with him any longer, in this weird portrait of domesticity. It makes me feel sick to my stomach.
"Sherlock, I'm going to bed." He just nods and stares at the remote on the floor. I'm surprised, as I walk back to my bedroom, that I hear him following me.
He sits on my bed in my brother's old dressing gown and watches from across the hall as I wash my face, clean my teeth and brush out my hair. It should be creepy, but I think I'm over Sherlock and his weirdness, so I let him stare without comment. I'm struck again at how, a few days ago, this would have unnerved me to the point of knocking things off the sink, but he's probably just storing the bedtime rituals of a woman in her thirties in his mind for retrieval at a later date anyway.
I don't hide in the bathroom this time even for a moment. I wave my hand as I cross the hall and Sherlock rolls over to the other side of the bed with a small smile. We settle in like we do this all the time, but we don't. We probably won't ever have a reason to sleep in the same bed again. I'm glad because this is still a nightmare and tomorrow he's gone. I roll over to check that my alarm is set. I realise as I'm doing that, that when I come back from work tomorrow, it will all be over. My chest feels tight.
I roll over and look at him. He's not asleep, though he's on his back with his hands folded on his chest with his eyes closed. I can't see his blond hair clashing with his skin, but I can just make out the line of his nose and chin as my eyes adjust to the dark. He senses me looking (of course he does) and turns over to face me. His stare becomes unnerving and I reach out my hand to run over his hair and down his cheek, because I don't know what to say. Tomorrow he's gone and there's every chance he won't come back. He grabs my hand and covers it in both of his under his cheek. I feel like I'm about to cry, and the tightness in my chest gets worse. Everything has changed over the last few days. I don't look at him the same. I don't look at me the same. I never thought I could do something like this. All of this. Any of this. I'm his secret keeper for the duration and tomorrow, I have to mourn him along with everyone else. I was wrong earlier. I won't have to lie to anyone.
We fall asleep staring at each other and as crazy as it sounds, it's one of the most intimate moments of my life. I can tell, now, that he's scared and I feel good, if I can say that, that I was able to be here for him, even though I know I'm not the one for the job in the long run. I had never before thought that Sherlock Holmes was scared of anything. It was impossible to imagine and should have freaked me out. But I just kept his gaze and eventually, went to sleep.
In the morning, I wake up and he's not there. I have a moment of unrestrained panic because I think he's already gone. Then I smell tea and burnt toast, which makes me smile. Eating breakfast with Sherlock, both of us half asleep and anxious, feels more normal that it should after two days. We are back to the surreal domesticity of last night, but I feel more comfortable with it. My anxiety is mainly for him.
"I won't be here when you get home."
"I know."
We do the washing up together, and I get in the shower, hoping to keeping things short to leave enough hot water for him. This is not a concern in my usual daily existence and it makes me feel that shot of arousal again, thinking of him naked where I am naked now. The tightness in my chest comes back again, and before I know it, I'm sobbing into my washcloth. I keep seeing John's face in the waiting room. I haven't seen Lestrade since Mycroft identified Sherlock's body. I don't want to see Mycroft because his phone call was what started the last two days. Sherlock told me what he needed me to do, and I did it. Mycroft made it all a reality. I can't tell anyone anything, and Sherlock's going off to fight his one man war against a bunch of faceless thugs and I might never see him again, and I don't even have the comfort of my mindless infatuation anymore. My whole body aches and I sit in a ball in the tub with shower pounding on my back, crying for myself.
I feel the water go cold, and I curse loudly. So much for being thoughtful. I feel better though. I'm out and dried and dressed in short order and when I come back into the sitting room, Sherlock is dressed in the suit he arrived here in, looking cold and untouchable, handing me the last mug of tea of the morning before I go to work and he leaves. I know he heard me in the shower. I appreciate that he's not going to say anything.
"What time are you leaving?" I sip my tea to hide my face. I'm sure it's still a bit red and blotchy.
He looks at me for a moment before answering. "Mycroft should be texting me soon to let me know, but soon." He's looking at his phone and I wonder if he's just ready to get out of here and start doing whatever it is he plans to do.
I have to leave for work. I stand up, unsure of what to do with my hands, until I remember that I have to get my purse and coat and keys. I feel slow and awkward, which is at least familiar around Sherlock for me. At least it used to be. It's probably better that I'm not here, because I'd probably cry and make a scene. I've felt so quiet and angry these last few days and it seemed to suit Sherlock just fine. I feel like something in me has been burned away; I don't look at him and feel butterflies anymore, among other things. That used to be the highlight of my day. I feel sad about that, because it was so much simpler. He's been everywhere for the past forty-eight hours: on my couch, in my shower, in my bed. I've never spent so much time with him. I can hardly remember the version of me that would have swooned over the idea of that. This isn't a dream.
"I don't know what to say to you, Sherlock. I want to say something, and I... I can't think of what to say." I feel like I'm regressing, even though I know I'm not.
His eyes soften a bit and he comes around to wrap his arms around me again. It's familiar now, despite it only happening once before, and this time I let my arms fold between us, my hands against his chest. He feels warm and solid and strong, and I want to remember him like this forever. I don't know what he's going out there to do, but it's going to be ugly. I try to make this last moment pretty.
I lean back a bit and stretch up on my toes to kiss him, just once. It feels soft and nice and sad. Nothing thrums through my veins and so I kiss him again, and he kisses me back. I pull back, pushing a piece of his terrible blond hair off his forehead, meet his eyes and nod once, feeling a small smile on my lips that he mirrors. We move apart, and I gather my coat and purse.
I do turn back as I close the door on my way out, because I'm not the same, but I'm still Molly Hooper. He's bent over his phone, thumbs texting furiously, looking ridiculously out of place in his dark suit and blond hair in the middle of my sitting room. Time to go to work.