Chapter Text
Molly stumbled through the door of the dorm she shared with her best friend Mary, at the prestigious St Brigids Ladies College. After a day of dress shopping with Mary, and their friend Sally, she was utterly exhausted. She carefully hung her dress up in her closet, before falling face first on to her bed. Mary and Sally weren't far behind her - Mary hanging her dress over the edge of her bed, and Sally just hanging hers up behind the door in anticipation of taking it next door to her own dorm.
The girls were in their senior year at St Brigids, and with their exams nearly behind them, the senior ball was fast approaching. St Brigids took turns hosting the ball with the boys school they were paired with - St Bartholomew’s - and this year it was the ladies turn. There was a lot of pressure on the hosting school to make sure they surpassed the previous years efforts - something that had been drummed into them for weeks.
“Because of course” Molly thought to herself, “trying to pass your exams isn't stressful enough - they just had to throw ‘look pretty or you will disgrace your school’ on top of that!”
Molly rolled over, sat up, and looked over at her friends. They both looked pretty worn out (probably as much as Molly felt), but they looked happy. They all had just one or two exams and then it was done.
“So…” Mary started, “shall we compare dresses then”.
Molly smiled to herself, as her friends somehow found more energy - Mary was always very competitive, and while she sometimes would butt heads with Sally, they still got on famously.
Even though their dresses would be rather different, Mary’s competitiveness (and probably ego) won out.
“Should we put them on or just hang them up?” Sally asked
Mary thought about this for a minute, “Let’s just hang them next to each other, and leave the ‘big reveal’ for next week”.
Molly couldn't agree more - she had very little energy left after a day of traipsing around after the others all day, and really didn’t fancy trying to get into her dress.
The girls managed to hang their dresses side by side, and each marvelled at their choices.
Mary’s went with a sky-blue, vintage, floor length lacy number which she had picked out weeks ago, but had only just come back from the dressmaker with the required alterations.
Molly thought that it was probably the sort of dress that someone could get married in (in fact Mary confided in her that it WAS a vintage wedding dress, that had been dyed and altered for the occasion). Paired with Mary's latest present from her not-so-secret boyfriend, John over at St Bart's, she knew she would look wonderful.
Sally had argued long and hard for the right to wear a kick-ass pants-suit to the ball, but had been denied by their very strict and conservative headmistress. So, to spite her, she had picked at a rather form-fitting black and white gown, with a rather daring split at the back. She knew it was going to piss off the headmistress, but that was rather the point.
Molly spent hours poring through magazines, looking at slinky dresses and full on “princess” dresses. Mary and Sally had dragged her into countless dress shops to try on gowns that she would need 9 inch heels so that she wouldn't trip over the hem (curse you shortness!). FINALLY, she had found the perfect dress, in an unassuming little dressmakers. It was an order that had been cancelled at the last minute - and with a few “Molly touches”, it was perfect.
It was a soft yellow, tea length dress, with a sweet-heart neckline, and an organza overlay. She had added in a little diamanté skull to the thin sash that went around her waist (a nod to the “Morbid Molly” nickname that her fascination with pursuing pathology had earned her).
After staring at their dresses for far longer than was appropriate, Sally gathered hers and headed back to her dorm. Mary decided she was starving and wandered down to the dining hall, leaving Molly to her thoughts.
She had seen that boy again today - the one that always hung around Mary’s boyfriend John.
He was impossibly tall, with luscious dark curls, and eyes that you wanted to dive into, if you weren't so afraid they would burn into your soul. His lips looked delectably kissable, and Molly had to repress the urge to throw herself into his arms. Mary had told her little about him, just that “His name is Sherlock, and he is a proper genius and GOD does he know it because he can be such an insufferable know it all...”.
Molly giggled to herself, remembering the litany of faults that Mary was listed, probably in an effort to deter her from being interested. Not that it helped. As soon as Molly saw him again (even from a distance) she was hooked. They hadn't spoken a single word to each other, and she had convinced herself she was in love with the guy. Not that he would even look at her - she, with her “mousy” brown hair that her mother had convinced her to keep long, and her ‘mousy’ little features that couldn't hold a candle to the beauty that her friends had, and her ‘mousy’ personality that meant she was mostly forgettable, and whole bunch of other flaws that could be summarised as ‘mousy’
“Oh god you’re so pathetic Molly Hooper” she groaned to herself, covering her face with a pillow.
With just six days to go until the ball, she was terrified of facing Sherlock, worried she would trip over her dress, or worse - sound incredibly stupid in front of him.
After such a long day, Molly allowed the darkness to engulf her, and promptly fell asleep.