"Clean?" She asks bitterly, speaking in John's direction, but she wants Sherlock to know, to hear the inflection of disappointment in her voice. He does; of course he does. He thought he was done hurting her, and again he fails.

But before anyone realises what's happening, she is standing directly in front of him and her hand slaps him across the face; once, twice, three times, but Molly will not falter. She will get angry, she will let Sherlock know how she feels, but she won't be weak. Her anger projects at him.

"How dare you throw away the beautiful gifts you were born with and how dare you betray the love of your friends. Say you're sorry."

Sherlock grips his stinging cheek. "Sorry your engagement's over. Now I'm fairly grateful for the lack of a ring."

Again he hurts her; of course, Sherlock Holmes has to defend himself. It isn't what he wanted to say, but he's high, and in a room full of people. He could sit there and let Molly Hooper slap him for something he, in truth, shouldn't have done, but letting out his vulnerable side... there were too many witnesses for that.

"Stop it; just, stop it," she finds herself saying. She knows what this is, she knows why, but she thought he was done with this. She doesn't know what else to say, so she turns on her heel and goes back to her work, disregarding the ignorant man in her morgue.

The second she walks away, disappointed and unforgiving, a tug pulls on Sherlock's chest. This is supposed to be different, he hasn't said or done a cruel thing to Molly since his return, and that is how it is supposed to be for someone who risked so much to save him. He fucked up; what he is doing may be for a case, but there's no excuse for the way he treats her. Not anymore.

After coercing, and a confirmation from Mary that he wasn't going to disappear, everyone leaves the morgue, except for Sherlock and Molly. As much as she tries to ignore him, she can't. She's pretending and Sherlock sees through it. He needs to make it right.

He still feels a small euphoria from the high that he knows will crash in the time it takes him to talk to Molly and return to Baker Street.

When he approaches her, her body stiffens. She doesn't move to look at him, her eyes stay trained on what's in front of her as she waits for him to speak.

"It was for a case," he explains, as if it is a justification that they certainly know is not.

"I don't care," she tells him, her hand gripping the lab table tightly, knuckles turning white.

"If you understood what he's doing, who he's trying to hurt-" he starts, but she finally turns to face him, and her hand is there, moving towards his face.

He catches her wrist this time, and does not allow her to slap him again. Her nostrils flare, but she speaks quietly in her anger.

"I understand going undercover at a drug flat to save the lives of others. What I don't quite comprehend is that you had to do the drugs. You're capable of putting on a certain visage, whatever it is you need to get what you want; and you don't have to lift a finger. I've seen you work, Sherlock." Molly stops for a moment, looking away from him as she lets out a long sigh. "You got high because you wanted to, Sherlock, not because you had to. What disappoints me the most is that you're trying to hide that, as if I won't see it. Like John, everyone that cares for you, will ignore what you did because it's 'for a case."

And there it is, as honest and open as she can be with him. She doesn't imply she is disappointed, she lets him know outright, because she knows deep down he doesn't like to disappoint, not in a manner like this. Not Molly.

Molly doesn't say anything; she doesn't know what else to say, but she feels him place her hand at her side before gently taking hold of her chin and asking her to look at him. "I am sorry."

They both know that this is him accepting her accusation.

Molly closes her eyes momentarily before looking at him again. "I don't forgive you."

"I know," he begins, trying to find the right words. It's a long moment before he speaks again, for once thinking about words before they come spewing out of his mouth. "I've learned from John that saying it once doesn't always work."

This is him trying, and Molly feels for him for trying. She knows he's learning, but at the moment, he is still high and she refuses to back down on this, not when he did something that could potentially destroy him.

As Molly looks into Sherlock's eyes, it's as if something clicks in them; they turn soft and honest. She can see how broken he is, but there is a soft smile on his face, and it's as if she knows what's he's trying to say. What he's thinking, what it seems like he's going to admit.

Sherlock's face is close to hers, enough to make Molly let out a soft breath as her eyes flicker to his lips. She's afraid of what comes next, so she looks away; deliberately breaks the moment because it won't be like this. She refuses to let him assert something while he's high. She tells herself the only reason he's looking at her like that is because he's high.

"Go home," she tells him as she pulls away from him and turns her back. Sherlock can't help but hear that she sounds angry at him again. She had sounded so much calmer only moments ago.

"Molly-"

"Go wait out your high," she reiterates. He may hear anger, but even through his drug-muddled mind, he knows she's upset. He assumes she's re-evaluating her feelings; he wonders why she ever fell for such a broken man when she deserves better than anyone she could find.

A drop in his stomach happens when he is so close to a woman who has done so much for him, and he can't stop thinking about it. It's a feeling that causes him to feel ill when he kisses Janine; not that he enjoys her very much anyway.

He has made his way through his high and through the night. Another week goes by, and he can't stop thinking about Molly.

She has been relieved from Tom. Tom never deserves her in the first place, but now there is nothing for Sherlock to ruin. Now, he can tell her how he feels. But if she ever finds out what he's doing to Janine, she might never forgive him.

Not to mention that he does not know how to get Molly to forgive him. It's not as if he could bring her into a bomb of a tube carriage and make her believe she was going to die so that she had no choice but to forgive him; no, he already did that with John.

He finds himself in the morgue, and arrives before her shift starts. He needs time to think; he needs to be away from everyone that will disrupt his thinking.

Into his mind palace he falls, recalling the moments after he tells her he wants her to be happy, even if it's with Tom. Of how sad she seems, and how he knows that she isn't over him. Of her crying; that he knows she is when he walks away, but something tells him to keep going, to keep walking. He can't walk away from this again, not this time. When he's brought out of his mind palace, he realises that she's been here for over an hour.

He isn't the only one lost in thought; so is she. She realises what he is doing and left him be. She does not want to initiate conversation with him anyway. She wants to forgive him, but she can't; it was assumed he was over this, over the urges that a depression, or boredom is what he refers to, initiates. She would be more likely to direct her feelings differently if he admitted to having a problem; that he did need help and support from his loved ones.

When she comes out of her reverie, she realises Sherlock is standing beside her. Sherlock can see the disappointment in her features, or so he thinks that's what it is. He does not expect her to be happy with him, but needs to speak with her.

The air is quiet, but thick, between them, and Molly is wondering where this goes next. She waits, just glad that he isn't high this time.

You would never know that the man has recently gone through a relapse. He looks like his normal self; showered, prim and proper in one of his nice suits.

"Why are you here?" she says, trying to sound stern, but she only notices that she's trying too hard and her tone becomes calmer. "What do you need?"

"I..." Sherlock hesitates, looking around for a moment and immediately feeling out of his area. "I came to apologise."

"You did that last week," she reminds him, though her voice is soft, and not hardened with anger. She lets out a soft sigh after a moment of silence between them. "Sherlock, I know that you're trying, that this," she says, animating with a wave of her arms, "is not your usual thing, but it's not about me forgiving you; it isn't about me at all. You can't just charm your way out of this one. You have to prove to the ones that love you that you're sorry enough to care about yourself not to use anymore... Even if for the sake of a case."

Internally, Sherlock felt angry at himself. He could not tell her how he felt if she didn't forgive him, but maybe the more precise word he is looking for is trust. Molly has trusted him always, never doubted him. Even when his life was destroyed and every good thing she believed about him was questioned by others, she stayed confident and decisive about the type of person he is.

And this was about her; he only has a few people he cares for in his life, and he wants to keep them all within it. With Molly, he wants something closer, but where are the right words?

Molly feels terrified when she sees something in Sherlock's eyes as he hesitates, the same look as when he was high. This time, it can't be the drugs; maybe it's a long term effect she tells herself. Why would he realise then? Why would something change in that moment and why would it carry on?

"I wanted to talk to y-"

How Molly knows what he's going to say, how she understands the look he's giving her, she doesn't know; maybe because she's looked at him in a similar way for years. But she feels confused, and she doesn't know what to do. She can't help but feel like Sherlock when she chooses to deal with feelings like he does; she runs away.

"Sherlock, I have to go," she tells him quickly. She can't look him in the eye, and it feels like she can't breathe. She's wanted to hear this for so long, but so much has happened with his return, and how their friendship has developed, what happened with Tom; she could have sworn she heard John say something about Janine.

"You don't have anything scheduled besides your shift, and you aren't due for break for another two hours and sixteen minutes," he reminds her. Part of him wants to tell her before he can't do it anymore.

"I have a… a department meeting," she lies, and she knows that he knows she is lying. But before she can walk away from him, he grabs her wrist gently, silently asking her to stay.

"It's important," he says with a hint of desperation in his voice. When Molly looks up to meet his eyes, Sherlock sees panic he can relate to; that of sentiment, of caring. He feels like a bad influence, but of anyone in the world, he understands why she's scared. He doesn't deserve her anyway.

He nods and let's go of her wrist, and she quickly walks away. She only wipes the tears from her eyes when she's clear out the door where Sherlock can't see her, and where he won't witness the long stretch of emotions that wonder why she would walk away from that.

It's interesting to Sherlock that when he gets shot, when he's in danger of dying again, his mind palace has natural instinct to look for help from Molly. She is good at saving him, he decides, unconscious representation of Molly or not.

He wakes up earlier and talks to Janine, but the second day he wakes up, a different form is there. Molly has pulled a chair up close and she is looking out the window; she's anxious for him to wake up, and doesn't realise yet that he has.

"Molly," he says, his voice hoarse. She looks to him worriedly when he begins choking; his throat is dry and scratchy, and he does not fight her when she helps him drink water.

When he finally calms down, he sees Molly's red and tired eyes (though, he's sure he can't say much for the way he looks). She gives him a weak smile as her hand covers his.

"Morning," she says. He can hear that she is trying not to cry, but she continues on. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I've been shot two days ago," he replies, but his smart remark disappears within the silence between them and Molly only feels a pain in her chest.

Sherlock begins to deduce in their silence: There is a deep pen smudge on the side of her hand... She must have found out about him being shot while she was doing paperwork, and jumped in surprise. This is backed up by a small coffee stain on her sleeve that she would have knocked over. There's a mostly empty coffee cup, and the remaining liquid is cold, so she's been in the room with him at least a few hours; five or more to be exact since she finished her shift early to come sit with him. But he stops deducing when he looks over to the side table, and he sees the articles about him and Janine, and his attention is directly back on her.

She knows the stories in the papers, though she learns long ago that not everything you read is true.

"Molly, I-"

"I don't care, Sherlock," she says, tears coming down her cheeks now, and Sherlock doesn't know how to interpret them, so he looks at her and remains quiet.

"I've seen what's in the papers, and I don't know if what they are saying is true. It doesn't matter to me, though."

Sherlock is surprised. In the past few weeks, he does things his friends say he shouldn't do, yet they are still here. They still seem to be supporting him when he more than likely does not deserve it.

"Something else is bothering you."

Molly hesitates for a moment: "It's just... its fine," she stops herself. She tells herself it's not the time to bring it up, but the entire reason she feels guilty is because she's been putting it off longer.

"No," Sherlock says in that familiar voice; he's serious. He doesn't want to deduce, he wants her to tell him.

"I cut you off when you tried to tell me something important..." She pauses, looking down as she brings her free hand up to wipe the tears from her cheeks. "And then we almost lost you for real this time."

She is about to pull her hand out of his to try and wipe away her tears, stop herself from crying, but Sherlock squeezes her hand lightly. It isn't often that he can, but he sympathizes with her.

"It isn't that easy to kill me, though I do suppose it may have been easier without all the help I had the last time that happened." She looks up at him now, and a brief smile spreads across her face. He decides to leave out the part where it was Mary and he knows she had no intention of shooting to kill; that's something he will deal with soon.

She doesn't ask him directly to tell her what he was going to say before, because he knows that's implied. She feels saddened thinking that she could have lost her chance, but she's only glad that he's okay.

Sherlock takes in a deep breath, trying to find words he had trouble finding when he was slightly more prepared the first time, and not in pain from a gunshot wound. "I... care about you, Molly," he tells her, "more than I had allowed myself to realise." Sherlock wants to take this slow, do it the right way; actually thinking about what he says and does with Molly. He doesn't want to hurt her again.

"Would you accompany me on a date, Molly Hooper?" he asks, adding "when I'm not lying in a hospital bed from a gunshot wound."

Molly only smiles as tears keep coming down her cheeks. "You git," she tells him with a small laugh, "yes, that would be lovely."

She looks down when he pulls his hand from hers. She is close enough to him that he reaches up, and cradles the side of her face with his hand, his thumb stroking over her tear stains. Molly closes her eyes and leans into his touch. "I'm just glad you're okay," she says softly, her tears finally slowing down as she is calming. Sherlock can feel her pulse slowing down as he cradles her face.

"It's alright," he says to soothe her, "I'm alright."