Strays

Just Thank You

The dying sun cast a long, dark shadow in front of her as Molly Hooper made her way up the street to St. Bart's. It was the second day of the year and her first day at work at the morgue from the winter holiday. Her breath plumed out in front of her on the cold air and she pulled her coat more tightly about herself. Not that it helped. It was cold and there were shadows everywhere.

It was a new year in London, the city where she'd lived for years. And yet, she felt unsettled. Everything felt different, hollow. Everyone she cared about seemed different.

Last year had shown real promise. Sherlock Holmes had returned from the dead and his favorable reputation had been restored. Well, Molly was one of few people who knew he hadn't really died and she'd helped him fake his demise. John Watson, their mutual friend, had found love, married and started a family. He'd even managed to eventually forgive Sherlock for keeping him in the dark about his alleged death. Molly herself had met a nice young man named Tom and had accepted his proposal of marriage. Everything, for a short period of time, seemed well and good.

It hadn't taken long for it all to go to hell.

Her feelings for Sherlock had returned with the consulting detective and not long after John and Mary's wedding, she'd realized staying with Tom, when she loved someone else, would be dishonest. Yes, she knew he looked like Sherlock and he was extremely kind, patient. They could have made a life together. It just wasn't in her to be that selfish, to string Tom along so she wouldn't be alone. So she broke off their engagement.

While she didn't regret it, she did come to realize she held a certain resentment towards Sherlock because he'd never return her feelings and she knew that now. As much as she wanted to blame him for Tom and everything else, it wasn't his fault. Molly told herself she was no longer waiting to see if he'd ever feel something for her but deep down, she was. She knew she was. And waiting in vain for Sherlock would inevitably result in the life of a lonely, telly-watching, cat-loving spinster.

Her mother must be so proud.

Right before the holidays, Sherlock took on a case as dark as the winter days and in a very short period of time, he'd ended up back on drugs – for a case he said though she wasn't certain she believed that. He'd been shot and nearly died, left the hospital before he should have to continue the case only to kill the man at its center, Charles Magnussen, himself to protect John and Mary. He would have been nearly dead and exiled were it not for the threat of Jim Moriarty's return, his face striking fear in Molly's heart each time she saw it on a news report or paper.

She'd unknowingly dated him the first time he'd tried to take Sherlock down. Molly shook her head at her own not-so-fabulous taste in men. Scratch that earlier thought. Her mother must think her a right idiot.

Checking her watch, Molly sped up. She was already a couple of minutes late for work.

Mary Watson had been the one to fill in the rest of the details as to what had happened over the Christmas holiday. She'd asked Molly over to tea only a couple of days ago and the normally bubbly blonde woman was the picture of misery when she'd greeted her at the door. Mary, in confidence and while her husband John was elsewhere, had filled Molly in on all the details of the Magnussen case, including her part in it. By the time she got around to telling Molly that is was she who shot Sherlock and how the same consulting detective had killed Charles Magnussen in an effort to protect John and his family because of her past, she'd been an absolute emotional wreck.

Molly had been as supportive as she could in that moment. She'd tried, really had, not to focus on the part where this woman, her friend, had actually shot the man Molly had been in love with for so long. It hadn't been easy. Mary had the love of a good man who had committed himself to her. She was carrying his child and their love was so strong, he'd been able to forgive her for concealing her past as an assassin from him. John had even been able to forgive Mary for shooting his best friend.