Three Little Words

by

thedragonaunt

Molly Hooper stood in her kitchen, leaning against the sink, gazing out of the window at the garden beyond. She loved her little house - her own little house - acquired through hard work and personal sacrifice. She had bought it after she broke off her engagement with Tom and moved out of the flat they shared. It was her sanctuary from the wicked world outside.

The garden was a modest affair - a small, green rectangle of lawn, surrounded by a border of mixed perennials and bounded by a wooden fence topped with a trellis. She had planted climbers – a passionflower, a jasmine and a cotoneaster – trained along the trellis to provide winter colour, summer fragrance and autumn fruit.

She had hung bird feeders on shepherd's hooks in strategic positions to service the needs of the local garden bird population, doing her bit for Nature, and they were at this very moment doing a brisk trade. But Molly was oblivious to the flurry of feeding and fluttering going on outside. She gazed out of the window but she saw nothing.

She was still in a state of anguished bewilderment following that bizarre phone conversation with Sherlock, the day before.

Molly had made her peace a long time ago with the reality of her relationship with the enigmatic consulting detective. From the moment he walked into her life, she had known to the very depths of her soul that she would never love another human being the way she loved Sherlock Holmes. It was a chemical reaction that occurred the instant her eyes met his - immediate, catastrophic and irreversible.

She also knew, beyond a shadow of doubt, that her feelings for him would never be reciprocated. And she was OK with that. After an uncomfortable period of adjustment, they had settled into an easy, companionable friendship with, she believed, a high degree of mutual respect. She counted. She had always counted and he had always trusted her. Compared with not having him in her life at all, this state of affairs was more than satisfactory.

She had tried - sometimes a little too hard – to find romantic fulfilment elsewhere, with varying degrees of success. Tom had come closest to eclipsing the light from Sherlock's sun. It had worked for a while, as long as the detective remained 'officially deceased' following his fake suicide but the moment Molly looked up and saw that all-too-familiar face, reflected in her locker mirror, she knew even that relationship was doomed. With just one glance from those intense sea green eyes, Molly's heart automatically reset to its default position, and it was only a matter of time before she had to let poor Tom down gently and admit to herself that she was never going to settle for second best, even if that meant spending the rest of her life alone.

And that had worked fine for the last year, despite all the turbulence, trauma and upheaval that came with the territory when one was in the orbit of such a powerful force of nature as Sherlock Holmes. But then yesterday had just…happened.

It wasn't a good day to begin with. Child PM's were never easy, should never be easy. The tragedy of a life lost at such a tender age - just six years old – was overwhelming, even for someone as at ease with the inevitability of death as Molly was. Her heavy heart had followed her home and was flatly refusing to leave. Then the phone had rung.

Sherlock.

Sherlock never called. He communicated by text. He only ever phoned when he needed her to do something which she wouldn't want to do. Because he knew she might ignore a text but she was incapable of ignoring the sound of his voice.

But she did try to ignore the call, taking up a knife and beginning to slice a lemon to make a comforting cup of tea. She let the call go to Voice Mail and heaved a weary sigh. But, damn it, if he didn't ring back straight away. He wouldn't give up, she knew. He would keep on ringing until she answered. She toyed with the idea of switching off the phone but… With a huff of annoyance, she wiped her hands on a tea towel and picked up the phone.

That had been twenty-four hours ago but, thinking about it now, her heart clenched like a fist. Why? Why had he done that? What possible reason could there be for him to humiliate her like that? Forcing her, cajoling her, manipulating her to say those…three little words?

Molly gasped from the pain – sharp, intense, visceral - and leaned over the sink, her eyes screwed tight shut yet still unable to stem the flow of fat, salt tears that oozed out beneath her lashes and dropped like stones into the washing up water.

'Bastard!' she croaked, past the lump in her throat.

The door chimes sounded without warning and she jumped in alarm.

Bloody hell, who on earth could that be? Of all the worst times to have a caller…

She held herself very still, hoping her visitor would assume she was out and go away. But a minute later the persistent chimes rang again and Molly, with a growl of irritation, doused her face with cold water from the tap and patted it dry, as she made her way through the sitting room to the front hall. Approaching the door with caution, she peered tentatively through the spy hole then staggered back in alarm, clutching the wall to steady herself, and sitting down heavily on the bottom step of the staircase.

It was him. He was here. At her door.

Molly sat on the stair, hugging her knees as her heart tried to force its way out of her chest through her rib cage. She was rigid with alarm.

Not now. Not now. She couldn't face him now. My god! Hadn't he tormented her enough?

She waited, frozen, as if her life depended on it – a prey animal avoiding a predator - listening intently for the sound of his footsteps retreating from her door, telling her she was safe, for now. And, at last, it came – the long-striding tread of the consulting detective walking away.

Molly heaved a shuddering sigh of… Not relief, no. She couldn't even imagine, right now, what relief might feel like but her body began to relax, her head dropped onto her knees and she exhaled a long, slow breath.

A few seconds later, she raised her head and leaned forward, preparing to stand and make her way back to the kitchen and the kettle, but her heart almost stopped dead at the sound of her back door opening and someone coming in.

Damn it! She left the back door unlocked! Shit! He was in her house. Now. And there was no longer any tangible barrier between him and her.

In a reflex reaction, Molly whipped round and scrambled up the stairs, not even trying to keep the noise down. The time to hide was gone; it was time for flight. She made it to the top of the stairs on all fours and launched herself across the landing, into the bathroom, slamming the door and bolting it securely, then she backed away, putting as much physical space between herself and the doorway as her small bathroom would allow.

Feeling the toilet seat against the backs of her knees, Molly sat down, gasping for breath, less from the physical exertion of her flight than from the imminent possibility of having to face her nemesis. She clutched at the rim of the wash basin, beside her.

She could hear the creak of the stairs as he mounted them slowly, one tread at a time to the top. And then he was outside the bathroom door. She visualised him, leaning forward, positioning his lips near the door jam, and then…

'Molly, please. I just want to talk…'

'Go away!' she shrieked. 'How dare you invade my private space! Get out of my house before I call the police and have you arrested for breaking and entering!'

There was a brief pause and then he replied, almost apologetically,

'Molly, your phone is on the counter in the kitchen. I saw it when I came past. So, unless you have a spare handset in your bathroom, you won't be calling the police. Also, I didn't need to 'break in'. The back door was op...'

'Oh, you're so bloody clever,' Molly snapped back, annoyed with herself for not thinking that one through. 'If only we were all as clever as you! But I mean it. Get out of my house. I don't want you here.'

She heard him sigh.

'I just want to explain…about yesterday. I want you to understand why I did…what I did.'

'You don't need to explain…' Molly barked. 'When did Sherlock Holmes ever explain anything, except to prove how clever he is and how bloody stupid the rest of us are? Anyway, I'm sick of your mansplaining. I don't care why you did it. I don't bloody care, do you understand?'

Much to her annoyance, she heard her voice crack and felt tears dribbling down her cheeks. She scrubbed angrily at her eyes with the heels of her hands then snatched up the toilet roll, tore off several sheets and blew her nose, noisily.

Meanwhile, Sherlock was speaking again.

'I had to do it, Molly. I thought your life was in danger and the only way to save you was for you to say the code words – I. Love. You.'

'Oh, for god's sake!' Molly scoffed. 'Is that the best you can come up with? That has to be a new low, even for you! What sort of fool do you think I am?'

'I don't! I don't think you are any kind of fool, far from it! I think you are the cleverest woman I have ever known – and I have known some very clever women. I am telling the tru…'

He broke off abruptly, mid-word, and then, in a firm voice, said,

'Molly, open the door so you can see my face.'

'What?' she gasped. 'How bloody arrogant can you get? Do you really think that you can win me over with your winsome charms? Get over yourself, Sherlock Holmes! And get out of my house!' The last few words came out as a yelp - part demand, part plea.

Molly heard him sigh again.

'I want you to see my face,' he said, with exaggerated patience, 'because then you will know that I am telling the truth. You learned to see through my bullshit a long time ago.'

That was, indeed, true. Molly gave an ironic laugh.

'And I'm not leaving, even if you insist on staying in there all day.'

Molly furrowed her brow in frustration. Impossible man! But, nevertheless, she found herself weighing her options.

She could dig in and try to out-wait Sherlock but she knew, when he set his mind to something, he had the patience of Job. She might be stuck in this bathroom for ever. Alternatively, she could accede to his demand and get this farce over with in the shortest time possible and in a more comfortable location – preferably with access to a kettle.

The logic was inescapable.

'Oh, alright,' she hissed, standing up and striding to the door. Sliding the bolt, she opened the door and strode forward.

Sherlock had retreated and was standing tall and straight at the top of the stairs. He looked sad.

Molly had seen that look many times before, especially after Mary died and John, in his grief, had denied Sherlock access to himself and to Rosie. He hadn't even allowed Sherlock to attend Mary's funeral. That had been the saddest look of all. Sherlock went along to the cemetery anyway, hanging back, hidden amongst the headstones, cutting an isolated figure and melting away before anyone but Molly spotted him.

Molly felt her heart begin to soften… so she steeled her resolve, looked straight ahead and brushed past him, making her way down the stairs and through the sitting room to the kitchen, where she set about making tea.

As she filled the kettle and laid out the teapot and two mugs, she heard Sherlock descending the stairs and crossing the sitting room, coming to a halt on the far side of the breakfast bar, which formed a boundary between the kitchen and the sitting room.

Without looking up, Molly waved a hand,

'Sit down then. You're making the place look untidy.'

'I'd prefer to stand,' he replied, solemnly.

'My house, my rules,' Molly growled, throwing him a searing look through narrowed eyes.

Sherlock pursed his lips but, obediently, reached forward to pull out one of the bar stools in order to comply.

'Over there,' Molly insisted, pointing to the sofa, in the sitting room. She didn't want him staring at her from close quarters while she made the tea.

With an almost imperceptible nod, the consulting detective crossed the floor, removing his coat on the way, draped the garment over the arm of the sofa and sat down.

Molly glanced at him, surreptitiously, while she prepared the tea then carried two mugs into the sitting area and offered one to her unwelcome guest.

'What's that?' she said, withdrawing the proffered mug and staring at his out-stretched hand.

'Oh,' he said, rotating his wrist but not looking at the hand. But Molly could see that, from the cuff of his shirt to the tip of his little finger, the skin was scratched, cut and bruised – quite badly. It looked painful.

'I… hit something,' he muttered.

'Well, that's fairly obvious,' Molly replied, her tone dripping with sarcasm. 'I'm a pathologist. We know these things.'

Sherlock reached out again for the tea and Molly relinquished it, taking a seat in the single arm chair, just to the left of the sofa.

'Alright,' she said, resignedly. 'Let's hear your excuse, whatever it is.'

She was bluffing, of course - hiding her devastation behind a mask of sarcasm. And she knew he knew that, too, but then he would, wouldn't he? He was Sherlock bloody Holmes.

Sherlock took a thoughtful sip of tea and a deep breath then said,

'We were on a case – of sorts – and the person we were…investigating…told me that your life was in danger…'

Molly snorted,

'Who? Who was this 'person'? How would they know anything about my life? How would they even know I exist? And even if they did know something, why would they tell you?'

'Molly, please…'

Sherlock was beginning to look quite agitated. Molly felt a frisson of satisfaction about that.

'Who the person was is rather complicated and I will explain that to you afterwards. But may I just explain this part first? Please?'

Molly made a show of considering his request, but only to annoy him, and then gave a curt nod of consent.

Sherlock acknowledged her permission with a tight smile and began again.

'The person said your house was rigged to explode in three minutes unless I could persuade you to say the code words that would stop the countdown - I. Love. You.'

He spoke those dangerous words so glibly, as though they were the most innocent words in the world but the power they held caused Molly's chest to contract, squeezing the air from her lungs. The memory of the day before was raw, bitter.

'And I wasn't allowed to indicate in any way,' he went on, as though nothing had just happened, 'that you were in any danger at all. Had I done so, the phone call would be terminated and the bomb detonated, destroying your house and killing you,' he concluded and raised his eyes to meet hers, waiting for her to react.

She stared back at him, her expression one of utter disbelief.

'Don't be ridiculous!' she scoffed but she was looking into his eyes and they were telling her, beyond any doubt, that he was speaking the truth.

'A bomb? Here? How…how is that possible? Where is this bomb?'

His gaze was still steady and utterly sincere. Molly felt panic rising and it reflected in her voice.

'Is…is it still here?'

'No, no, Molly, it's fine,' Sherlock replied, leaning forward and extending a reassuring hand in her direction. 'As it turned out, there was no bomb. It was a trick.'

His voice dropped to little above a whisper and he lowered his eyes.

'A trick to make me hurt you in a different way.'

'Well, it bloody worked!' Molly gasped, trying but failing to keep the pain out of her tone. This person, whoever they were, had found the perfect weapon to use against her.

Her pain ratcheted up another notch. Was she really so obvious? Did the whole world and his wife know how much she loved this man? And was the world laughing at her? Her cheeks glowed with the crimson badge of embarrassment.

Molly became aware that Sherlock had moved from his place on the sofa and was kneeling beside her, holding her hand. She stared at that point of contact - and saw that his other hand was marked just like the first one.

'What…what did you hit?' she asked, bringing his hand closer to her face, in order to study the injury with both a professional and a personal curiosity.

He gave no response as she began to recite her observations.

'Lateral slices and oblique puncture wounds, some fine and superficial, others deeper and broader, indicative of traumatic contact with a grainy, fibrous material, probably…wood. The bruising evenly distributed along the entire edge of the hand, suggestive of a…chopping action but with a closed fist. Was it a door?' she asked, looking into his eyes.

He frowned and licked his lips, reluctant to disclose the nature of the object he had assaulted but, just as she was losing any hope of receiving an answer, he said,

'It was the lid of a coffin… Your coffin.'

Molly's eyes grew round, the blood froze in her veins and her heart stuttered. This was real! This had happened. Even Sherlock wouldn't make up something like that.

'Tell me what happened,' she whispered and Sherlock nodded his acquiescence.

ooOoo

'Your sister?' Molly gasped, not doubting his voracity but shocked beyond belief. 'All that time, and you didn't know?'

Sherlock, back on the sofa now, gave a little shrug.

'Well, I knew about her, of course, but I had…deleted her. I suppose she was the inspiration for my Mind Palace, her and Victor. I needed somewhere to bury those memories that were too devastating to contemplate, so I created a place where all my demons could be incarcerated, locked away – not dissimilar to Eurus herself.'

'But, Sherlock, she was just a child! Five years old?' Molly exclaimed. 'How could someone so young even contemplate killing another person?'

'I honestly don't think she did,' Sherlock replied. 'She had no concept of death. No one in our family had died and, because of our father's allergies, we weren't allowed any pets, which is the usual way that children become acquainted with the permanence of death. The only experience of death Eurus had was the fake graveyard, with all the impossible dates, someone's idea of a joke.'

Molly shook her head, sadly.

'All she wanted was to be included in the game,' Sherlock went on. 'She knew that Victor and I loved to play pirates and what do pirates do?'

'They look for treasure?' Molly ventured.

'Exactly! So, she hid some treasure, something she knew that I would want to find, and then she gave me a puzzle to solve. Even back then, I loved to solve puzzles. And she knew I liked to play in the graveyard, so she used the dates on the gravestones as a cypher for the puzzle. The idea was that the cypher would lead me to her and she would lead me to Victor. So, she would be part of the game.

Unfortunately, she was so much cleverer than the rest of us – cleverer than all of us put together - and no matter how many times she sang the song, none of us could crack the code.'

For a brief moment, his eyes took on a distant expression then he snapped back to the present.

'When it became obvious that we weren't going to crack the code, she tried to make it easier for us. She gave us a clue – 'Drowned Redbeard'. I would venture to suggest that, had anyone realised she was referring to the well, Victor might still have been alive at that point. But again, she gave us credit for being much smarter than we were. And Victor's fate was sealed.'

Molly could see the emotional price Sherlock was paying in order to tell this tale but he obviously needed to tell someone so she sat quietly, and waited for him to regain his composure and continue.

'Eventually, she realised that her plan had gone horribly wrong. I think at that point Eurus understood that Death was not a joke. It was real and it was final. And it frightened her. That was when she set fire to the house.'

'Oh, god!' Molly gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.

'But that wasn't her intention, either,' he went on. 'It's a common mistake that people make with exceptionally bright children. They assume that their emotional maturity matches their intellect which, of course, it doesn't! They are still just children.

Knowing how much I – her favourite brother - loved the graveyard, Eurus had drawn some pictures of gravestones, with 'RIP Sherlock' written on them, like the gravestones in the garden. It was intended as a gift. But when she realised that death was not a game, she panicked and tried to get rid of the pictures by burning them, in her bedroom. Unsurprisingly, she couldn't control the fire and…the house was gutted.'

'Sherlock,' Molly interjected, 'I know this is your family we're talking about so this might sound impertinent but where were your parents while all of this was going on? There does seem to be rather an absence of parental supervision.'

Sherlock gave an ironic laugh.

'My parents – my 'so normal' parents, as John Watson called them – were never very good at taking responsibility. They were sadly lacking in parenting skills which is why, when Uncle Rudi came along and took charge of the situation, they were more than willing to let him get on with it.'

Molly was appalled, on so many levels.

'Christ, Sherlock! How could your uncle – how could anyone - condemn a five-year-old child to a place like Sherrinford? My God, if she wasn't psychotic when she went there, which she clearly wasn't, she certainly would be after thirty-odd years!'

'Yes,' replied Sherlock, shaking his head. 'Rudi obviously thought it was for the best but, unfortunately, he's not around to explain how he came to that conclusion. And after he died, Mycroft opted to stick with the status quo.'

He sighed and passed a hand across his forehead.

'It's highly probable that, by then, she was beyond help. Spending one's entire life in solitary confinement, in a state of near-total sensory deprivation – no colour, no natural light, no natural sounds or scents, no variety of tactile stimuli. No wonder she played the violin for weeks on end. It was the only stimulation she had.'

'And exploited by successive governments for her analytical expertise,' Molly interjected, with barely restrained disgust. 'My god, she was kept as a slave…'

Her voice broke, overwhelmed by the enormity of the utter tragedy that Eurus's life had been – and would continue to be, since it seemed she was quite beyond rehabilitation now. What a sad waste of a life and a brilliant mind.

Molly looked at Sherlock and immediately regretted her blunt outburst as she watched his facade crumble. After only a brief hesitation, she crossed to the sofa and knelt beside him. Wrapping her arms around his shoulders, she gathered him to her and held him until the moment passed and he pulled away.

'How about another cup of tea?' she asked, gently, and he nodded, not yet trusting his voice.

ooOoo

'So, you smashed up my coffin,' said Molly. 'How did that feel?'

Sherlock shrugged.

'I don't remember, to be honest. Like Eurus said, all those complicated little emotions. It was like letting the genie out of the bottle. Rather over-whelming.'

'I'm sorry I made you say it first,' she said. 'But I thought if I was going to make an utter fool of myself, it was only fair that you should, too.'

'Eurus understands more about human nature than people give her credit for,' Sherlock replied.

'How so?' Molly asked.

'Well, I think she knew you would make me say it first and that was really the whole point,' he replied.

'What do you mean?' Molly was perplexed.

'It was all about me, the whole 'game', for want of a better term,' Sherlock sighed. 'She said I was her favourite. She had obviously been 'studying' me, via the Internet, for quite some time and formed certain hypotheses. When I met her in person, in the guise of Faith Smith, she said some strange things…'

He paused and a pensive expression suffused his features.

'What strange things?' Molly prompted, gently.

'She said I 'thought sweetly',' he replied, wrinkling his nose with distaste. 'And that I was 'nicer than anyone'. Well, I suppose if you've lived your entire life being treated like a lab rat, the 'niceness' bar must be set pretty low.'

'You do yourself a great disservice, Sherlock Holmes,' Molly chided.

'I think you're rather biased, Molly Hooper,' he returned, quirking an eyebrow, then went on,

'She devised a battery of experiments that would test out her hypotheses.'

'So, what was her hypothesis with regard to me?' Molly asked, quizzically. 'How did she even know I existed?'

'She was in the room, posing as John's grief counsellor, when he demanded a second opinion on my drug abuse status and put you forward as the best candidate. She heard what he said about you.'

'Which was?'

'That you saw through my bullshit long ago.' He gave a self-deprecating grimace.

'And she extrapolated from that that I had feelings for you?' exclaimed Molly, realising only after she had spoken that she had just admitted, for the second time in two days, her guilty secret. And it felt…OK. Quite liberating, in fact.

'Well, I can't say for sure but, after you and I went off in the ambulance, and John in the stretch limo, Mrs Hudson was left behind. I imagine Eurus pumped her for information. You know Mrs H. Nothing she likes better than a cup of tea and a gossip.'

They both chuckled, despite the enormity of the fact that Sherlock's septuagenarian landlady had been left alone with a psychopath. It was entirely possible that, in a tussle, Eurus may have come off worst.

'And her theory about you was…' Sherlock ground to a halt. This was virgin territory for him. He wasn't ready to confront the answer to Molly's question. Not yet, if ever. It was all too new, too strange.

'It's OK,' Molly assured him. 'You don't have to tell me.'

'I barely know myself, Molly, if truth be told,' he murmured, his brow contracted into frown lines. 'But I am sorry for what I put you through - making you say those words - I truly am,' he insisted, earnestly.

'You didn't make, me say it,' Molly replied, softly.

'But I did!' he exclaimed. 'I had to. I thought you were about to die and I couldn't let that happen. I used every manipulative trick I could think of…'

'And none of them worked,' Molly cut in.

'What…?' It was Sherlock's turn to be confused.

'You didn't make me, you convinced me' she said.

He shook his head. What was she talking about?

'I told you to say it first, to say it like you meant it,' Molly said.

'Yes, yes, and I failed…miserably!' he retorted.

'No,' she said.

'No?'

'No.'

Sherlock searched Molly's face, trying to deduce her meaning but she was a closed book.

'The first time you said it, it was just words. No conviction, no feeling.'

'Yes…?'

'But the second time…' she paused, gazing steadily into his eyes, '…I heard it in your voice.'

'Heard it? Heard what?' Sherlock was still baffled.

'You said it like you meant it,' said Molly.

He sank back against the sofa cushions, confusion confounding his mental processes, alarm bells ringing in his brain. This was dangerous territory, indeed.

'It's OK, Sherlock!' Molly extended a gentle hand to reassure him. 'I know you were only acting! I know you didn't really mean it but you sounded as though you did.' She smiled, wistfully. 'And hearing you say it like that, how could I not say it back?'

Acting? Was that what that was? It certainly didn't feel like acting at the time but...

'Molly, I…' he stammered.

She placed a single finger on his lips, silencing him.

'It's OK! I'm OK. We're…OK,' she said. 'We're friends, remember? I'm your friend. And I always will be. You know that, don't you?'

Sherlock gave a weak smile.

The truth was, he had no idea what he knew any more. These last few days had been manic, with one revelation after another and a whole lifetime of beliefs to unlearn and replace with new ones.

He had a sister who had been lost but could maybe be found again.

He had a brother who had lied all his life to protect him from the awful truth.

He had a friend who had become a brother.

And he had another friend who perhaps meant more to him than he was currently equipped to understand.

He also had a flat that had been completely destroyed by a patience grenade and was entirely unfit for human habitation.

That was more than enough to be going on with.

He grinned at Molly and said three little words.

'Yes, I do.'

ooOoo

To my regular readers -sorry I've been a little AWOL recently. I've been so distracted by S4, I found it impossible to switch my brain over to my current fic, Until Death. However, now S4 has been and gone, I'm back at the key board and will be updating very soon! Happy New Year to you all and thank you for your patience. :)