Fic for red-chapel: Sleekit
Title: Sleekit
Recipient: red-chapel
Author: thehighwaywoman
Characters/Pairings: Molly/Lestrade
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Spoilers for Series 1 and Series 2
Summary: Molly doesn’t mind being called a mouse. Not really. After all, most people don’t know very much about mice.
Molly doesn’t mind being called a mouse. Not really. It’s just a word, isn’t it?
She did mind, once. But mostly these days she politely ignores the ones who call her that and thinks, you don’t know very much about mice, do you? They certainly don’t know very much about her.
* * *
“Fair warning,” the detective inspector says, poking his head into the break room.
It isn’t the best time. Molly’s just dodged Sherlock, who looked as if he had something extremely unnerving in mind. Lucky miss. She did flirt with the idea of enjoying a little secret crush, but for heaven’s sake, he’d have her fired in the blink of an eye and he really wouldn’t care. She’ll still help him, when she can get away with it, because he’s interesting, but he’s not for her, and frankly her life has been more peaceful for it.
She’s been half asleep on her feet for hours, and now she’s wondering if she should make a fresh pot of coffee or drink the last cup on offer even if it does look burned and sticky-thick. He startles her into squeaking, hand pressed to her heart.
But he doesn’t laugh at her. He looked chagrined, honestly and truly dismayed, and that’s rare, isn’t it? “Sorry,” he says, unnecessarily but nicely. “I had meant to stop you from having a bad day, not give you one.”
Molly’s the one who laughs. Not meanly. She can tell he knows the difference; the tighter lines in his face ease, and he tucks his hands into his pockets, sheepish like he’s a teenager and not a grown man.
Nicely put together, too, Molly thinks, with a quiet pleasure meant just for herself. “It’s all right. What did you need?”
“Need? Me, nothing.” He scrubs at his hair, which is already standing on end with no extra assistance needed. “Only wanted to warn you Sherlock’s been muttering about post-mortem bruising, and last I heard he was headed this way with a riding crop, and, well, I figured someone ought to know what’s coming.”
Oh, Molly thinks first, because that would certainly explain quite a lot about Sherlock’s mood, and second, now I know where I’ve seen you before. He’s just gone through a divorce, or so rumor has it, and he looks tired enough for three men. “It’s Detective Inspector Lestrade, isn’t it?”
“Greg,” he says in return. “I scared a year off your life. That ought to put us on first-name terms, yeah?”
“Greg,” Molly agrees. She starts a fresh pot of coffee, because he looks like he could use a cup. “Don’t worry. He won’t get past the other attendant on duty without a fight, and I’ve just gone on break.”
She can tell Lestrade’s no fool. He eyes her up and down, still kindly, not really seeing her as a woman but as an ally and that’s not so bad, and says, “On break, hmm?”
“Yes,” Molly says, quiet and polite as a church mouse. She checks her watch. “As of, oh, five seconds ago?”
He has the loveliest laugh. If he’s not the sort to fancy mice, he’d be nice to them. “You’re a clever woman, Dr…?”
“I’m Molly,” she says, offering him her hand. “First names, remember?”
His hand is so much larger than hers that it engulfs hers from fingers to palm. His skin is warm and dry, and, well, just nice.
“Are you all right?” Molly asks, because she’s seen enough broken hearts on her table or up and walking about to know the look when she sees it.
Greg blinks at her, and she can tell people don’t ask him that often. “Not really,” he says, and that’s something almost no one ever says. He lifts the Styrofoam cup she’s poured him. “I suppose I will be, down the line. Cheers for this.”
And so Molly isn’t there for the grand introduction of Sherlock Homes to John Watson, who looks as much like a little brown mouse as she does, but who has the strength to tame a lion. She could be sorry she missed that, but she spent a lovely fifteen minutes having coffee with Greg instead, and in the end she can’t find it in herself to complain about the tradeoff.
* * *
Molly’s life does not revolve around Sherlock, but the thing of it is his magnetism is the kind that drags people along in his wake, whether or not they want to be dragged.
Greg’s down with a cold when he comes to warn her about Sherlock again, and how he isn’t taking kindly to working with Dimmock on his latest case. Molly’s met Dimmock. She can’t really blame Sherlock. Or Greg, for that matter.
Greg knows by now she can take care of herself, even if she is small and pale and quiet, but that’s just how he is. Nice. Lovely, even. Well, actually, his eyes and nose are red and he looks dreadful, but he’s still lovely. She catches him outside sneaking a cigarette and scolds him for it, and when he comes over bashful again she’s really hard put not to give in to the urge to enjoy a wee crush on him.
The wind outside is fierce, and it tangles her hair up something dreadful. Greg helps her fix it, though he’s clearly got no idea what he’s doing, and he’s almost too busy laughing to do a proper job. But he insists, and in the end she’s got an odd ponytail with all her hair swept to the side and bundled up. He’s so pleased with himself she doesn’t change it then - or later. Just fixes it a bit better in the bathroom mirror once he’s gone.
The style doesn’t really suit her, and she doubts she’ll do it again, but just this once she’ll leave it.
And then Sherlock only goes and compliments her on the change, trying to flatter her. Silly boy. If he’d only ask he might be surprised at how much better honey works than vinegar, but that’s not likely to happen. But why not indulge him? It’s her choice, that’s the point, and Dimmock really is a terrible prat. He’s young, and he’ll learn, but so far Molly wouldn’t want him in her morgue, much less manhandling a case.
Truth be told, she feels a bit sorry for Sherlock. And John. And if they’re hindered, Sherlock will pester Greg even if Greg should be at home with soup and cold medicine, tucked under a layer of fluffy blankets.
And that, well. That’s just not on.
* * *
It’s not always quite so nice, or quiet, or easy. The more she gets pulled into Sherlock’s world, the more new faces she has to size up, and the living are so much less peaceful than the dead.
“So you’re Molly,” the woman called Sally says. Molly reckons she’d prefer to be called Sergeant Donovan. She’d be glad to hail the woman as a bloody saint for scaring off the creepy new IT fellow who’d thought he had a chance of flirting with her. Jim’s got the strangest way of not blinking as often as he should, and he moves his head the way regular people just don’t. Molly, who is a mouse and doesn’t mind it, knows when she’s met a snake.
“I’m Dr. Hooper, yes,” she says, letting Sergeant Donovan know - quietly - how it stands, and that she understands, and it’s okay, really.
Sergeant Donovan studies Molly, as direct as Greg is courteous, but that’s fine too. The sergeant’s as tough as they come. Definitely not a mouse. But Molly sees why Greg likes Sergeant Donovan when she cracks a grin and says, “Someone’s got to distract the Freak’s boyfriend before he gets the lot of us killed. Know anything about hobbies?”
“I know I’m not very good at most of them,” Molly says. She doesn’t correct Sergeant Donovan, not when she can tell they both know nothing will ever distract Sherlock from the work, and that where he goes, so goes John. She can understand the frustration, though, when you’re only trying to do your job and someone comes swanning in over your head.
She could do with less of the name-calling, but no one’s perfect.
“No suggestions, then?” Sergeant Donovan asks, acknowledging the point with a rueful twist of her lips.
Molly cocks her head. “There’s always sewing.” She gestures at the table she’s working at. “I’m quite good at that. I’d be glad to give him lessons, but I think that might defeat the point, don’t you?”
Sally laughs. Molly gets the feeling she doesn’t do that often.
When she tells Greg about it later, he’s on her couch with a cup of tea, hands still shaking as he wraps them around the warm mug. His hair is greyer than usual with ash where it isn’t dark with soot.
She’s learned a lot once he’s told her what’s upset him. Most of it things she wishes she didn’t know. Then she realizes, that’s mostly how Greg spends his life, isn’t it? And he’s still nice. She doubts he knows how very rare that is.
He’s surprised when she hugs him, as if it’s been so long he doesn’t know how to respond, but when he does he’s warm and underneath all the smokiness he smells of clean soap and warm skin, and that’s what we all really need, isn’t it? Touch? Someone to talk to?
So she shares the story about Sergeant Donovan in return, because he needs a laugh, and frankly, so does she. And he did come to her for comfort, after all. He smiles at her when she adds two extra sugars to his tea, and his smile really is lovely, just lovely.
Molly decides to enjoy just a bit of a crush on Greg after all. No one ever needs to know, as long as Sherlock keeps his nose out, and it’ll make her happy. Where’s the harm?
* * *
Molly likes Mrs. Hudson straightaway. Well, once they get past that awkwardness about her hip. Molly will admit she’s never at her best when she’s in the spotlight. Mice like quiet places and cozy nests, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Mrs. Hudson’s kitchen is wonderful, when Molly follows her down there after Sherlock disappears doing who-knows-what. They both stumble over their apologies for what one said and what the other one’s as-good-as-a-son said until they both realize how ridiculous they’re being and stop halfway through to giggle until tears roll down their cheeks.
“You won’t be hurt by that careless tongue of his, though,” Mrs. Hudson tells Molly, mothering her a bit. That’s nice, too. Molly’s own mum has been dead for, oh, years, and she’s missed the fussing the way she never thought she would until she didn’t have it anymore. “Never stops thinking in time to realize he’s being cruel. He’s only really cruel when he has to be.”
Molly nods; she knows that for herself, and Sherlock’s kiss burns on her cheek besides, but it’s all right to let Mrs. Hudson have her say too.
“Mind you,” Mrs. Hudson goes on, puttering around with a locked cabinet at the far end of her kitchen, “He knows better than to get on my bad side.”
Molly doesn’t doubt it, and says so. She’s even more impressed when she gets a peek inside the cabinet and hears the story behind its contents, which actually makes so much more sense of a lot of things now.
“That’s settled, then,” Mrs. Hudson says, a nice mouse again, settling down with a top-off for their tea. “And you won’t get any ideas about his kissing you? No?”
Molly’s seen John, and she’s seen Sherlock, and neither of them are half as good at hiding what they feel as even she is, though they think they’ve fooled the world. Mrs. Hudson’s eyes are as bright with delight as a girl’s when Molly tells her that - and just a little naughty, too.
“Good,” Mrs. Hudson says. “Because, you know, I think that nice Detective Inspector was a bit put out that he didn’t get to kiss you first.”
Molly blushes and blushes, and protests that she and Greg are just friends, but deep down inside, she’s as warm as Greg’s hands, and she’s smiling.
* * *
Molly couldn’t say Mycroft likes her, but she wins his respect and that’s nothing to sneeze at. She’s never met Mycroft properly, nor seen a photo, but she’s heard enough about him to be on her guard when he gatecrashes the morgue on Christmas Eve. Natural behavior for a Holmes, Molly supposes, and doesn’t ask questions, but does make sure she’s the one to go in and assist. Things are getting darker and more complicated with Sherlock, and as odd as it might seem, the cold, quiet room is her nest.
Mycroft is surprised when she greets him by name, and Molly quite enjoys that. He cedes her the minor point graciously enough, and it’s nice to have tweaked the rug from under a Holmes’s feet for a change.
She can’t quite tell what Sherlock’s thinking when she pulls the sheet back. Funny, really. When would he have seen the poor woman naked before, and why? John would have had his testicles for a necklace if he’d strayed. It’s just not like either of them.
Besides, even if Sherlock does seem upset, it’s not that sort of upset. Whoever the poor woman is, he’s just not that into her.
She’ll tell Greg about that later, that and a long list of things that pop into her mind when she’s meant to be doing post-mortems. He’ll laugh with her, and agree that yes, it was awful, but he’ll also say we’re only human, and so were they. Odds are most of them would get the joke. And if they didn’t, well, no ghosts have come back to haunt her yet so she feels she’s mostly safe.
Then he’ll say they probably wouldn’t mind someone kind seeing them to their rest, and she’ll blush, and he’ll lift her chin, saying don’t do that, don’t blush, it’s only true, and she’ll…well. She’ll wish he had been the one to kiss her, after all, and she thinks - she hopes she thinks - she isn’t the only one.
But she’ll think about that later still, when she’s alone. Mice are private creatures.
* * *
Harry Watson doesn’t like her at all, but mostly Molly feels sad after meeting her. She’s been a bit blue anyway, with Greg sent chasing Sherlock off in Dartmoor, of all places, just when she’s gotten accustomed to his popping in at work or her home for a chat. He hasn’t lost that look yet, the one that says he really is still wishing he’d kissed her before Sherlock, and he’s wondering if he’ll have the chance again.
When Molly looks at Harry, it’s sort of like looking into a cracked mirror. Harry’s what Molly might have become, if she’d let herself get bitter or if she’d given up on anything better in favor of the quick but temporary respite at the bottom of a bottle.
Molly doesn’t tell Harry she knows John’s with Sherlock. Harry’s lips are pinched with suspicion and anger just waiting to boil over, and if John didn’t tell her he must not have wanted her to know. It’s not Molly’s business to tattle-tale.
John thanks her later, when he finds out. She wishes she could tell him she doesn’t need his thanks. She only needs for him and Sherlock to take care of themselves better, to be quicker and more careful, because things are stirring and stirring, and Molly is almost sure she can sense the presence of a snake almost ready to show its fangs.
But she doesn’t know how to say it, and Greg’s in an awful state when he shows up. He tried to give himself a couple of days to calm down, but it didn’t work. He gives himself away with every word of his story about madmen and shooting dogs and chemicals that terrify a man down to his soul.
He’s hurting, this kind man, in so much pain, and Molly isn’t the sort of doctor who fixes the living. Usually. She makes an exception just this once and kisses him, because he never will if she doesn’t first.
But he does kiss her second, and kisses her third, and carries on kissing until the very last one of the night, with his dear head resting on her breast while she hushes him and tells him it’ll be all right.
* * *
Which it won’t, if Sherlock has his way.
What do you need? she asks, tired and wanting to go home and cuddle up with Greg, but she knows the look of a trapped, cornered animal when she sees one, and Sherlock isn’t shamming this time. She can see it clearly when he says, truly afraid for the first time she’s ever known him, You.
Right then. Molly tidies her hair as soon as he’s gone. She expects he thinks she’s a mouse who’ll do just as she’s told, but quite a lot can happen in a year, and even more in two years.
Honestly, that idiot. Molly understands what Sherlock doesn’t, for once. She’s seen too many people outside the steps and doors leading down to the morgue. She’s seen how hearts break, and Sherlock might be beginning to understand but he doesn’t yet, not really.
Greg’s surprised when she knocks politely on his office door, then turns the latch to let herself in before she’s invited. That’s something people don’t know about mice: they’re clever, oh so clever, and they’re bold.
He listens to what she has to say, knowing Sherlock would wring her neck and not caring a whit, because she’s sorry, but it isn’t just Sherlock on the line here. That daft twat is going to break so many hearts if he’s allowed.
Greg listens, and he’s the one who doesn’t seem to know what to say when she’s finished.
But Molly does. She tucks her hair behind her ears, and she tells him, “There’s a way to stop it, you know.”
“Not a very legal way?” Greg asks.
Molly doesn’t reply directly, not as such, because he already knew the answer when he asked. “Will you come?”
Greg laughs at that - at himself, more like - and doesn’t explain why, but that’s all right. He takes her to his apartment, where she watches him open a safe with a handgun inside. She knew it was there, and she doesn’t do him the discourtesy of pretending anything.
“Baskerville,” is all he says; that, and “Just goes to show you,” and “God help us.”
“Are you a good shot?” Molly asks.
“Terrible.” Greg grins, lopsided and looking young and old at the same time. “That’s why our next stop is John, right?”
“Not quite. Mrs. Hudson first.” Impishness makes Molly confess, “She told me once she learned how to shoot while she was still in America. She has a few prize ribbons tucked away where no one will look.” Impishness makes her add, “And they won’t. The one time she caught Sherlock going through her private cupboards, she slapped his hands and boxed his ears.”
Greg looks at Molly as if she’s a nine-days wonder. “How do you know all this?”
“She told me, of course. Last Christmas, I think?” He’s dumbfounded, and that makes her laugh. “You’ve met Mycroft, haven’t you? Do you really think he wouldn’t shift heaven and earth to stop Sherlock living in her apartments or ever apologize to the woman if he didn’t know she could kill him in his sleep?”
“She just - told you,” Greg says, as if he’s wrapping his mind around it, and Molly does understand. Confessions of illegal activity really aren’t the usual topics of casual conversation.
“People always do,” Molly says. “Tell me things, I mean. They tell her things, too. They think she’s silly, and they think I’m silly-“
“I don’t,” Greg says.
And that’s nice - really, truly nice, and Molly loves him so much her heart could just burst - but she has a point to make and she won’t be interrupted. “Most people do,” she says. “And that’s okay. Really. They don’t know me. Or her. But you see, when people think you’re silly, you hear things they wouldn’t let slip around anyone else. Sometimes people even tell you on purpose. And we both know that.”
“Right.” Greg clears his throat. He looks like a boy caught unprepared for a quiz, toeing the floor with the tip of one shoes, and she realizes again how dear he is. “I still don’t agree with them. You’re not a mouse.”
“Mice don’t get enough credit, really,” Molly says. “It’s fine.”
“Half the things I learn when I’m talking with you I wish I didn’t know,” Greg says. Then he touches her cheek, ever so lightly, soft as a mouse, and it’s almost like a kiss. Better than. “Then again, the other half makes me glad you think enough of me to tell them.”
Molly checks the clock. They’ll have to hurry. Greg sees the time, too. He nods, and offers her his hand. “I expect you know a way to the roof of Bart’s that no one else does, don’t you?”
And yes, she tells him, she does. Mice always know the secret ways. They know how to slip past the loud ones with all their crash and clatter, and get their work done.
She can teach Greg, later, when there’s time. For now, though -
“Come on,” she says, holding his hand tight. “I’ll show you.”
Recipient: red-chapel
Author: thehighwaywoman
Characters/Pairings: Molly/Lestrade
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Spoilers for Series 1 and Series 2
Summary: Molly doesn’t mind being called a mouse. Not really. After all, most people don’t know very much about mice.
Molly doesn’t mind being called a mouse. Not really. It’s just a word, isn’t it?
She did mind, once. But mostly these days she politely ignores the ones who call her that and thinks, you don’t know very much about mice, do you? They certainly don’t know very much about her.
* * *
“Fair warning,” the detective inspector says, poking his head into the break room.
It isn’t the best time. Molly’s just dodged Sherlock, who looked as if he had something extremely unnerving in mind. Lucky miss. She did flirt with the idea of enjoying a little secret crush, but for heaven’s sake, he’d have her fired in the blink of an eye and he really wouldn’t care. She’ll still help him, when she can get away with it, because he’s interesting, but he’s not for her, and frankly her life has been more peaceful for it.
She’s been half asleep on her feet for hours, and now she’s wondering if she should make a fresh pot of coffee or drink the last cup on offer even if it does look burned and sticky-thick. He startles her into squeaking, hand pressed to her heart.
But he doesn’t laugh at her. He looked chagrined, honestly and truly dismayed, and that’s rare, isn’t it? “Sorry,” he says, unnecessarily but nicely. “I had meant to stop you from having a bad day, not give you one.”
Molly’s the one who laughs. Not meanly. She can tell he knows the difference; the tighter lines in his face ease, and he tucks his hands into his pockets, sheepish like he’s a teenager and not a grown man.
Nicely put together, too, Molly thinks, with a quiet pleasure meant just for herself. “It’s all right. What did you need?”
“Need? Me, nothing.” He scrubs at his hair, which is already standing on end with no extra assistance needed. “Only wanted to warn you Sherlock’s been muttering about post-mortem bruising, and last I heard he was headed this way with a riding crop, and, well, I figured someone ought to know what’s coming.”
Oh, Molly thinks first, because that would certainly explain quite a lot about Sherlock’s mood, and second, now I know where I’ve seen you before. He’s just gone through a divorce, or so rumor has it, and he looks tired enough for three men. “It’s Detective Inspector Lestrade, isn’t it?”
“Greg,” he says in return. “I scared a year off your life. That ought to put us on first-name terms, yeah?”
“Greg,” Molly agrees. She starts a fresh pot of coffee, because he looks like he could use a cup. “Don’t worry. He won’t get past the other attendant on duty without a fight, and I’ve just gone on break.”
She can tell Lestrade’s no fool. He eyes her up and down, still kindly, not really seeing her as a woman but as an ally and that’s not so bad, and says, “On break, hmm?”
“Yes,” Molly says, quiet and polite as a church mouse. She checks her watch. “As of, oh, five seconds ago?”
He has the loveliest laugh. If he’s not the sort to fancy mice, he’d be nice to them. “You’re a clever woman, Dr…?”
“I’m Molly,” she says, offering him her hand. “First names, remember?”
His hand is so much larger than hers that it engulfs hers from fingers to palm. His skin is warm and dry, and, well, just nice.
“Are you all right?” Molly asks, because she’s seen enough broken hearts on her table or up and walking about to know the look when she sees it.
Greg blinks at her, and she can tell people don’t ask him that often. “Not really,” he says, and that’s something almost no one ever says. He lifts the Styrofoam cup she’s poured him. “I suppose I will be, down the line. Cheers for this.”
And so Molly isn’t there for the grand introduction of Sherlock Homes to John Watson, who looks as much like a little brown mouse as she does, but who has the strength to tame a lion. She could be sorry she missed that, but she spent a lovely fifteen minutes having coffee with Greg instead, and in the end she can’t find it in herself to complain about the tradeoff.
* * *
Molly’s life does not revolve around Sherlock, but the thing of it is his magnetism is the kind that drags people along in his wake, whether or not they want to be dragged.
Greg’s down with a cold when he comes to warn her about Sherlock again, and how he isn’t taking kindly to working with Dimmock on his latest case. Molly’s met Dimmock. She can’t really blame Sherlock. Or Greg, for that matter.
Greg knows by now she can take care of herself, even if she is small and pale and quiet, but that’s just how he is. Nice. Lovely, even. Well, actually, his eyes and nose are red and he looks dreadful, but he’s still lovely. She catches him outside sneaking a cigarette and scolds him for it, and when he comes over bashful again she’s really hard put not to give in to the urge to enjoy a wee crush on him.
The wind outside is fierce, and it tangles her hair up something dreadful. Greg helps her fix it, though he’s clearly got no idea what he’s doing, and he’s almost too busy laughing to do a proper job. But he insists, and in the end she’s got an odd ponytail with all her hair swept to the side and bundled up. He’s so pleased with himself she doesn’t change it then - or later. Just fixes it a bit better in the bathroom mirror once he’s gone.
The style doesn’t really suit her, and she doubts she’ll do it again, but just this once she’ll leave it.
And then Sherlock only goes and compliments her on the change, trying to flatter her. Silly boy. If he’d only ask he might be surprised at how much better honey works than vinegar, but that’s not likely to happen. But why not indulge him? It’s her choice, that’s the point, and Dimmock really is a terrible prat. He’s young, and he’ll learn, but so far Molly wouldn’t want him in her morgue, much less manhandling a case.
Truth be told, she feels a bit sorry for Sherlock. And John. And if they’re hindered, Sherlock will pester Greg even if Greg should be at home with soup and cold medicine, tucked under a layer of fluffy blankets.
And that, well. That’s just not on.
* * *
It’s not always quite so nice, or quiet, or easy. The more she gets pulled into Sherlock’s world, the more new faces she has to size up, and the living are so much less peaceful than the dead.
“So you’re Molly,” the woman called Sally says. Molly reckons she’d prefer to be called Sergeant Donovan. She’d be glad to hail the woman as a bloody saint for scaring off the creepy new IT fellow who’d thought he had a chance of flirting with her. Jim’s got the strangest way of not blinking as often as he should, and he moves his head the way regular people just don’t. Molly, who is a mouse and doesn’t mind it, knows when she’s met a snake.
“I’m Dr. Hooper, yes,” she says, letting Sergeant Donovan know - quietly - how it stands, and that she understands, and it’s okay, really.
Sergeant Donovan studies Molly, as direct as Greg is courteous, but that’s fine too. The sergeant’s as tough as they come. Definitely not a mouse. But Molly sees why Greg likes Sergeant Donovan when she cracks a grin and says, “Someone’s got to distract the Freak’s boyfriend before he gets the lot of us killed. Know anything about hobbies?”
“I know I’m not very good at most of them,” Molly says. She doesn’t correct Sergeant Donovan, not when she can tell they both know nothing will ever distract Sherlock from the work, and that where he goes, so goes John. She can understand the frustration, though, when you’re only trying to do your job and someone comes swanning in over your head.
She could do with less of the name-calling, but no one’s perfect.
“No suggestions, then?” Sergeant Donovan asks, acknowledging the point with a rueful twist of her lips.
Molly cocks her head. “There’s always sewing.” She gestures at the table she’s working at. “I’m quite good at that. I’d be glad to give him lessons, but I think that might defeat the point, don’t you?”
Sally laughs. Molly gets the feeling she doesn’t do that often.
When she tells Greg about it later, he’s on her couch with a cup of tea, hands still shaking as he wraps them around the warm mug. His hair is greyer than usual with ash where it isn’t dark with soot.
She’s learned a lot once he’s told her what’s upset him. Most of it things she wishes she didn’t know. Then she realizes, that’s mostly how Greg spends his life, isn’t it? And he’s still nice. She doubts he knows how very rare that is.
He’s surprised when she hugs him, as if it’s been so long he doesn’t know how to respond, but when he does he’s warm and underneath all the smokiness he smells of clean soap and warm skin, and that’s what we all really need, isn’t it? Touch? Someone to talk to?
So she shares the story about Sergeant Donovan in return, because he needs a laugh, and frankly, so does she. And he did come to her for comfort, after all. He smiles at her when she adds two extra sugars to his tea, and his smile really is lovely, just lovely.
Molly decides to enjoy just a bit of a crush on Greg after all. No one ever needs to know, as long as Sherlock keeps his nose out, and it’ll make her happy. Where’s the harm?
* * *
Molly likes Mrs. Hudson straightaway. Well, once they get past that awkwardness about her hip. Molly will admit she’s never at her best when she’s in the spotlight. Mice like quiet places and cozy nests, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Mrs. Hudson’s kitchen is wonderful, when Molly follows her down there after Sherlock disappears doing who-knows-what. They both stumble over their apologies for what one said and what the other one’s as-good-as-a-son said until they both realize how ridiculous they’re being and stop halfway through to giggle until tears roll down their cheeks.
“You won’t be hurt by that careless tongue of his, though,” Mrs. Hudson tells Molly, mothering her a bit. That’s nice, too. Molly’s own mum has been dead for, oh, years, and she’s missed the fussing the way she never thought she would until she didn’t have it anymore. “Never stops thinking in time to realize he’s being cruel. He’s only really cruel when he has to be.”
Molly nods; she knows that for herself, and Sherlock’s kiss burns on her cheek besides, but it’s all right to let Mrs. Hudson have her say too.
“Mind you,” Mrs. Hudson goes on, puttering around with a locked cabinet at the far end of her kitchen, “He knows better than to get on my bad side.”
Molly doesn’t doubt it, and says so. She’s even more impressed when she gets a peek inside the cabinet and hears the story behind its contents, which actually makes so much more sense of a lot of things now.
“That’s settled, then,” Mrs. Hudson says, a nice mouse again, settling down with a top-off for their tea. “And you won’t get any ideas about his kissing you? No?”
Molly’s seen John, and she’s seen Sherlock, and neither of them are half as good at hiding what they feel as even she is, though they think they’ve fooled the world. Mrs. Hudson’s eyes are as bright with delight as a girl’s when Molly tells her that - and just a little naughty, too.
“Good,” Mrs. Hudson says. “Because, you know, I think that nice Detective Inspector was a bit put out that he didn’t get to kiss you first.”
Molly blushes and blushes, and protests that she and Greg are just friends, but deep down inside, she’s as warm as Greg’s hands, and she’s smiling.
* * *
Molly couldn’t say Mycroft likes her, but she wins his respect and that’s nothing to sneeze at. She’s never met Mycroft properly, nor seen a photo, but she’s heard enough about him to be on her guard when he gatecrashes the morgue on Christmas Eve. Natural behavior for a Holmes, Molly supposes, and doesn’t ask questions, but does make sure she’s the one to go in and assist. Things are getting darker and more complicated with Sherlock, and as odd as it might seem, the cold, quiet room is her nest.
Mycroft is surprised when she greets him by name, and Molly quite enjoys that. He cedes her the minor point graciously enough, and it’s nice to have tweaked the rug from under a Holmes’s feet for a change.
She can’t quite tell what Sherlock’s thinking when she pulls the sheet back. Funny, really. When would he have seen the poor woman naked before, and why? John would have had his testicles for a necklace if he’d strayed. It’s just not like either of them.
Besides, even if Sherlock does seem upset, it’s not that sort of upset. Whoever the poor woman is, he’s just not that into her.
She’ll tell Greg about that later, that and a long list of things that pop into her mind when she’s meant to be doing post-mortems. He’ll laugh with her, and agree that yes, it was awful, but he’ll also say we’re only human, and so were they. Odds are most of them would get the joke. And if they didn’t, well, no ghosts have come back to haunt her yet so she feels she’s mostly safe.
Then he’ll say they probably wouldn’t mind someone kind seeing them to their rest, and she’ll blush, and he’ll lift her chin, saying don’t do that, don’t blush, it’s only true, and she’ll…well. She’ll wish he had been the one to kiss her, after all, and she thinks - she hopes she thinks - she isn’t the only one.
But she’ll think about that later still, when she’s alone. Mice are private creatures.
* * *
Harry Watson doesn’t like her at all, but mostly Molly feels sad after meeting her. She’s been a bit blue anyway, with Greg sent chasing Sherlock off in Dartmoor, of all places, just when she’s gotten accustomed to his popping in at work or her home for a chat. He hasn’t lost that look yet, the one that says he really is still wishing he’d kissed her before Sherlock, and he’s wondering if he’ll have the chance again.
When Molly looks at Harry, it’s sort of like looking into a cracked mirror. Harry’s what Molly might have become, if she’d let herself get bitter or if she’d given up on anything better in favor of the quick but temporary respite at the bottom of a bottle.
Molly doesn’t tell Harry she knows John’s with Sherlock. Harry’s lips are pinched with suspicion and anger just waiting to boil over, and if John didn’t tell her he must not have wanted her to know. It’s not Molly’s business to tattle-tale.
John thanks her later, when he finds out. She wishes she could tell him she doesn’t need his thanks. She only needs for him and Sherlock to take care of themselves better, to be quicker and more careful, because things are stirring and stirring, and Molly is almost sure she can sense the presence of a snake almost ready to show its fangs.
But she doesn’t know how to say it, and Greg’s in an awful state when he shows up. He tried to give himself a couple of days to calm down, but it didn’t work. He gives himself away with every word of his story about madmen and shooting dogs and chemicals that terrify a man down to his soul.
He’s hurting, this kind man, in so much pain, and Molly isn’t the sort of doctor who fixes the living. Usually. She makes an exception just this once and kisses him, because he never will if she doesn’t first.
But he does kiss her second, and kisses her third, and carries on kissing until the very last one of the night, with his dear head resting on her breast while she hushes him and tells him it’ll be all right.
* * *
Which it won’t, if Sherlock has his way.
What do you need? she asks, tired and wanting to go home and cuddle up with Greg, but she knows the look of a trapped, cornered animal when she sees one, and Sherlock isn’t shamming this time. She can see it clearly when he says, truly afraid for the first time she’s ever known him, You.
Right then. Molly tidies her hair as soon as he’s gone. She expects he thinks she’s a mouse who’ll do just as she’s told, but quite a lot can happen in a year, and even more in two years.
Honestly, that idiot. Molly understands what Sherlock doesn’t, for once. She’s seen too many people outside the steps and doors leading down to the morgue. She’s seen how hearts break, and Sherlock might be beginning to understand but he doesn’t yet, not really.
Greg’s surprised when she knocks politely on his office door, then turns the latch to let herself in before she’s invited. That’s something people don’t know about mice: they’re clever, oh so clever, and they’re bold.
He listens to what she has to say, knowing Sherlock would wring her neck and not caring a whit, because she’s sorry, but it isn’t just Sherlock on the line here. That daft twat is going to break so many hearts if he’s allowed.
Greg listens, and he’s the one who doesn’t seem to know what to say when she’s finished.
But Molly does. She tucks her hair behind her ears, and she tells him, “There’s a way to stop it, you know.”
“Not a very legal way?” Greg asks.
Molly doesn’t reply directly, not as such, because he already knew the answer when he asked. “Will you come?”
Greg laughs at that - at himself, more like - and doesn’t explain why, but that’s all right. He takes her to his apartment, where she watches him open a safe with a handgun inside. She knew it was there, and she doesn’t do him the discourtesy of pretending anything.
“Baskerville,” is all he says; that, and “Just goes to show you,” and “God help us.”
“Are you a good shot?” Molly asks.
“Terrible.” Greg grins, lopsided and looking young and old at the same time. “That’s why our next stop is John, right?”
“Not quite. Mrs. Hudson first.” Impishness makes Molly confess, “She told me once she learned how to shoot while she was still in America. She has a few prize ribbons tucked away where no one will look.” Impishness makes her add, “And they won’t. The one time she caught Sherlock going through her private cupboards, she slapped his hands and boxed his ears.”
Greg looks at Molly as if she’s a nine-days wonder. “How do you know all this?”
“She told me, of course. Last Christmas, I think?” He’s dumbfounded, and that makes her laugh. “You’ve met Mycroft, haven’t you? Do you really think he wouldn’t shift heaven and earth to stop Sherlock living in her apartments or ever apologize to the woman if he didn’t know she could kill him in his sleep?”
“She just - told you,” Greg says, as if he’s wrapping his mind around it, and Molly does understand. Confessions of illegal activity really aren’t the usual topics of casual conversation.
“People always do,” Molly says. “Tell me things, I mean. They tell her things, too. They think she’s silly, and they think I’m silly-“
“I don’t,” Greg says.
And that’s nice - really, truly nice, and Molly loves him so much her heart could just burst - but she has a point to make and she won’t be interrupted. “Most people do,” she says. “And that’s okay. Really. They don’t know me. Or her. But you see, when people think you’re silly, you hear things they wouldn’t let slip around anyone else. Sometimes people even tell you on purpose. And we both know that.”
“Right.” Greg clears his throat. He looks like a boy caught unprepared for a quiz, toeing the floor with the tip of one shoes, and she realizes again how dear he is. “I still don’t agree with them. You’re not a mouse.”
“Mice don’t get enough credit, really,” Molly says. “It’s fine.”
“Half the things I learn when I’m talking with you I wish I didn’t know,” Greg says. Then he touches her cheek, ever so lightly, soft as a mouse, and it’s almost like a kiss. Better than. “Then again, the other half makes me glad you think enough of me to tell them.”
Molly checks the clock. They’ll have to hurry. Greg sees the time, too. He nods, and offers her his hand. “I expect you know a way to the roof of Bart’s that no one else does, don’t you?”
And yes, she tells him, she does. Mice always know the secret ways. They know how to slip past the loud ones with all their crash and clatter, and get their work done.
She can teach Greg, later, when there’s time. For now, though -
“Come on,” she says, holding his hand tight. “I’ll show you.”