Work Text:
“What is that?”
Molly glared distrustfully at Sherlock, who had a flower in his hand. A single red rose wrapped in cellophane.
“That better not be a pity rose. Pity chocolate I’ll take, but that’s it.”
On the other side of the lab, Sherlock frowned, looking down at the rose in his hand and back to Molly.
“No? This isn’t for you.”
“You didn’t get me flowers?” Molly’s lower lip trembled, brown eyes wide with hurt.
Sherlock huffed. “You just said you didn’t want pity flowers. And this is from a crime scene. The killer left it as a calling card.”
Immediately Molly brightened. “Oh. That’s different. Bring it here and we’ll look it over.”
This was why he never dated before Molly. Humans made no sense to him and here she was, proving his previous beliefs correct. The rapid mood changes his pathologist just went through within a three-minute conversation was near whiplash inducing.
Still the rose was brought over, and gloves were secured. Side by side, they carefully dissected and assessed it.
“No fingerprints.” Sherlock hummed over the petals. Carefully he flipped over the cellophane, going over every bit of it for any clues. Tweezers out, he plucked off a light-colored hair that was stuck to the tape. “But I might have something.”
“There’s a powder on the pistil. Not pollen.” Molly scraped the white granules onto a slide and covered it. Sherlock looked over from his work, glancing at the slide.
“Find out what it is, Gerald will probably be here soon to take all of this.”
“His name is Greg, you know that.” Molly muttered distractedly as she slid the testing slide under the microscope. Another bit of the powder went into a small testing tube. Solution was added and she slid it into the shaker.
Sherlock watched Molly as she peered through the microscope at the granules. Most people would call this silly, but Sherlock was delighted that Molly had never liked normal tokens of affection. Not like others. John might have taken his latest paramour out to dinner or drinks. Greg would have…he didn’t want to think about what Greg’s idea of a date was. That led to other thoughts and that was…nope, best to delete that. But them, they had always had unusual ways of interacting with each other, ideas of spending time that most would find distasteful but that for he and Molly…worked.
The machine stopped with a beep and Molly stepped back from the microscope.
“Well?” he asked, not demanded because that would be rude.
His reply was a soft hum as she pulled out the tube and dropped another drop of liquid into it. The vial immediately turned a florescent shade of purple. Molly glanced up at him.
“Did you set this up as a date?”
Sherlock maintained a straight face. His Molly was much too clever by far.
“What do you mean?”
She shook the vial containing the purple liquid. “This is itching powder. I doubt a murder scene would have a single rose filled with itching powder as a calling card.”
“It might?”
Shaking her head, Molly carefully placed the vial back into a holder and then carefully tugged off her gloves as she walked away from the table.
“It didn’t. Was this a date?”
Pretense forgotten, Sherlock shrugged, hands in his coat pockets. “You volunteered to work. I thought it would be nice.” Pulling his hand from his pocket, he presented her with a small, wrapped box. She looked at it then at him.
“Are those pity chocolates?”
Silently, he pulled his other hand from his coat pocket holding a slightly larger unwrapped box.
“No, these are the pity chocolates.”
Stepping in close, Molly took the box of chocolates from him. “Mmm, thank you.”
“Thank you. Your gift was delivered this morning.” A rare volume on Victorian beekeeping. Simple chocolates and a gift of jewelry weren’t going to compare.
Opening the box, she plucked out a chocolate piece and bit into it. Immediately her eyes closed in pleasure. “Did you like it?”
Sherlock couldn’t not watch her mouth as she chewed. “It is wonderful.” Temptation overwhelming, he leaned in, lips pressing against hers softly. Molly immediately parted her lips, returning his kiss and the taste of chocolate and her filled his senses.
They were unconventional. And until Molly, Sherlock had assumed unconventional was not what humans wanted in relationships. But as her eyes widened in delight as she opened her gift, an atomically correct ruby heart necklace, Sherlock realized that didn’t matter.
Unconventionality worked.