Author's Note: This epilogue of sorts turned out to be way longer than I had planned but I hope it's nice to see a look into their established relationship. Thanks so much y'all for reading and reviewing. Thanks again to writingwife-83 for allowing me to adopt her prompt lol. Until next time :)

Sherlock had a skip in his step as he reentered 221B. John had left after Sherlock was well on his way to Molly's. He stepped inside his bedroom and opened up the bottom drawer of his dresser, digging through the clothes he rarely wore to uncover Molly's gift from five years back. Carefully undoing the ribbon and wrapping paper, it revealed a small keepsake box of sorts. He lifted the lid to find a worn paperback book, a disc in a jewel case flipped over backwards and a letter on top. He opened the letter first, finding the need to read Molly's words and hear her voice in his head.

Dearest Sherlock,

Though you claim to be above sentiment, I don't wholeheartedly believe that's true. I know you secretly appreciate sentimental things. At least that's what I personally deduced about you seeing the items scattered across your flat each time I brought body parts for you.

Anyways, I'm rambling, so here, have a box full of sentiment…my sentiment. The book is the first in a trilogy that I adore. It reminds me of us a bit. Okay, a lot but if you do enjoy the first book, I'll be more than happy to hand over the other two. I have another set, so it's okay. The other gift you'll find is a CD full of music. As to what it pertains to, you'll see when you flip it over to read the inscription.

And for another dash of sentimentality, do you remember the first time we met? Everyone had warned me about you as I was new and replaced the old head pathologist. From the snippets I processed from their warnings, it all seemed to come down to one thing: they didn't think you to be "normal." Well, I had told them that normal was overrated and terribly boring. Meeting you, I was, for lack of a better word, enchanted. The things that made you different are the things I found most charming about you. Anyways…

Merry Christmas,

Molly xxx

Sherlock smiled to himself. He never knew that that was how Molly felt even before they met. He turned the disc over and read the inscription.

I love you, but I'm not good with words.

Things I never said.

She loved him even then and it grew throughout the years into something deeper. The difference between love and being in love came to his mind. The book was revealed to be Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare. It was obviously her personal copy, little sticky tabs poking out every which way. Flipping through the pages to give it a glance over, he found her annotations in the margins, sometimes accompanied by a doodle. It was an incredibly personal gift and he mentally praised her bravery. His phone pinged then.

Did you open it yet? MH

Yes. SH

And? MH

I love it. I love you. SH

I'm glad. I love you too, Sherlock. MH

A month later, Molly was tugging on her rubber gloves, preparing for an autopsy. Greg had just given her the run-down of what had happened; or supposedly happened. Sherlock was supposed to arrive any moment now. Molly flicked her eyes over every corner of the room before speaking.

"Pssst, Greg, do you have any tens?" Molly asked, referring to Sherlock's rating system for cases, but it went right over the detective inspector's head.

"Eh…go fish?" Greg shrugged. Molly closed her lips tightly in an attempt to keep herself from bursting out with laughter.

"I was talking about cases," Molly explained. "Do you have any that Sherlock would consider a ten?"

"No, sorry. Why? Is he bored already?" Greg chuckled.

"No, I was just trying to do something special for him," Molly sighed. "Oh well, I'll think of something."

"Lestrade," Sherlock nodded as he flew into the morgue. "Molly," he smiled, caressing her name on his lips as if it only contained the best letters in the alphabet. With a chaste kiss pressed against her cheek, they began to work together, throwing observations at one another until the cause of death and the man's associations were revealed.

"So you've got everything?" John asked Sherlock.

"Yes, I'm perfectly capable of taking care of Rosie while you're on your double shift," Sherlock insisted. John raised an eyebrow.

"Don't worry, I'll keep him in line," Molly smirked.

"Don't you always?" Sherlock asked, flashing a smile at her. John left for work, leaving the godparents to it. Molly held Rosie in her arms, cooing at her.

"We'll make sure Uncle Sherlock stays out of trouble, yes we will," Molly told Rosie in her baby voice. Sherlock was too awestruck to be annoyed at the remark. Seeing the woman he loves handle Rosie with such care with her natural motherly instincts warmed him. He knew then that one day, he wanted a family with Molly. He could see a little girl with Molly's hair color but in curls and her eyes or even his.

"Sherlock? Did you hear me?" Molly asked.

"Hmm?" he muttered, snapping back to reality.

"I said, why don't we go out for ice cream?" Molly reiterated.

"Sounds wonderful," Sherlock agreed.

"Uncle Sherlock's silly, isn't he?" Molly laughed. With a kiss to her temple, he took her hand in his as they left for the ice cream shoppe.

Sherlock had Rosie in his lap as he fed her the creamy vanilla ice cream.

"Mmm," Rosie hummed in delight with every bite. Molly was enjoying a cup of mint chocolate chip. She couldn't help but think that Sherlock would be such a wonderful father. Her heart jumped at the idea and she knew then that she wanted a family with him.

"Isn't your Aunt Molly beautiful?" Sherlock asked Rosie, gaining a loving smile from his girlfriend.

It didn't take too long before Molly figured out exactly what she wanted to do for Sherlock. It was more of a sentimental route, but she knew he'd appreciate it, as he had grown into his emotions. She had left him a heart in his refrigerator from an autopsy that she performed a couple days ago. When the consulting detective opened the door, he discovered the heart for his experiment with a sticky note on either side of it. I love you is what it essentially said. Their shared morbid sense of humor made it all that more personal.

Friday rolled around and Sherlock was surprised to find Molly at his door.

"What happened to work?" he asked her.

"Traded shifts so I could have the day off," Molly smiled, biting her lip.

"So, what do I owe the pleasure of your company?" Sherlock smirked.

"Here," Molly said, thrusting a rolled up paper into his hands. He unrolled it, revealing a map of various landmarks. She had drawn it herself, symbols depicting each different area.

"What is the significance of these places?" Sherlock questioned.

"Well, you see, that's for me to know and you to find out," Molly teased.

"Consider me intrigued," Sherlock replied. "I take it that 'X' marks the spot where there's buried treasure?"

"Figuratively," Molly laughed. "So, are you up for an adventure? I bet it'll be a ten in your book."

"Then what are we waiting for?" he asked, throwing on his Belstaff and scarf. "The game is on."

Their first stop was Bart's Hospital, where Molly had only written the word 'hello' on the map. They traveled to the currently empty morgue.

"This is where we first met," she told him. "A bit morbid, I know. Loads of other things happened between us here at Bart's." Her tinkling laugh filled the room.

"I remember," Sherlock mused. "You were the first person at this hospital to treat me so kindly. The only person."

"Remember the day after, you were waiting outside of those doors and I was rushing down the hallway because I was late," Molly reminisced.

"Yes, I recall that you ran right into me." Sherlock chuckled. "And then promptly fell down." He laughed once more.

"But you helped me up and made sure I was okay," Molly smiled. "That was the day my crush began."

"I'm always learning something new about you," Sherlock smiled in return.

"So, all of these places have sentimental value, I take it," Sherlock deduced.

"Mhmm," Molly confirmed, walking hand in hand with him. They went inside a building and Sherlock took in the familiarity of this particular stairwell.

"The day I took you out to solve crimes," Sherlock pointed out.

"Our first date, according to you," Molly laughed. "That day, you said things to me that indicated you thought of me as more than a friend."

"Experienced my first heartbreak here," Sherlock told her. "It wasn't fun but I wanted you to be happy."

"I wasn't; not really. If you had come back six months later than you did, I'd be in a loveless marriage right now. Well, maybe not loveless but I knew I wasn't in love. I was settling," Molly explained. "You made me realize that when you came back."

"How so?" he asked.

"When you went to kiss my cheek, all I wanted to do was turn just enough to kiss you properly," Molly admitted.

"Why don't we have a second go at it?" Sherlock smiled. And then he was leaning into her, pressing his lips against hers. He pulled away after a moment and spoke again. "Kiss me the way you wanted to then." That was all Molly needed. She tugged at the lapels of his coat and captured his lips in a most passionate kiss. It was gentle and hard at the same time. It was, in a word, illogical. Beautifully illogical. His fingers found the belt loops of her jeans and pulled her closer, unable to get enough of her. They broke the kiss and leaned their foreheads against one another. The silence was broken by a familiar voice.

"Sherlock Holmes?" Howard Shilcott questioned in disbelief.

"Ah, Mr. Shilcott," Sherlock greeted, pulling his face away from Molly's.

"Miss Hooper," Howard nodded. "I knew there was something between you two. Congratulations." And with that, he stalked off onto the streets of London, leaving Molly and Sherlock to their fit of laughter.

They stopped at her flat, where Sherlock was supposed to search for a note. He found it stuck to her bedroom door, where he used it as a bolt hole. The words written on it only said,

Home is…

The mystery was solved when they arrived at their last stop where 'X' marked the spot: 221B Baker Street. There, Molly handed him the other note that she had kept in her pocket the whole time.

…Where you are.

"Molly," Sherlock whispered, his voice thick with emotion.

"I was thinking, maybe, if you wanted to—" Molly began before being cut off with a kiss.

"Yes," Sherlock told her.

"Do you even know what I was going to ask?" Molly laughed.

"Yes, I want you to move in with me," Sherlock smiled. She should've known he would have deduced it.

"I love you," Molly told him, placing a hand against the side of his face. He snogged her senselessly all the way to his bedroom, now theirs, laughing against each other's lips in a moment of pure bliss.