They don't think much of one another at first. Their first impression isn't much more of a simple "He/she seems rather nice" after a simple hello and shake of the hand.
He is fifteen years her senior and has thrice the experience that she has in both the workplace and the city life. At this point in his life he's almost twenty years married with a daughter who is now just two weeks shy of her thirteenth birthday. He's also held onto what is left of a full head of brown hair, which is destined to whiten far more quickly than he believes possible.
She, on the other hand, is twenty-eight and facing the first day in a new hospital. She hasn't lived in London for very long and is so used to the seaside atmosphere of Cornwall that getting lost in the big city becomes too easy, resulting in her arriving late for her first day at work.
She apologizes repeatedly when she stumbles into work, but is forgiven immediately by her new boss and a detective inspector who comes only to examine the body of a murdered teenager.
The young pathologist and older detective inspector meet eyes as they shake hands and at that moment there are two things that strike her about him: the first is the warm grip of his hand on hers and the second is that his smile looks more like the smile of a boy than a man. He thinks of her as uniquely pretty, almost waif-like, and takes a particular liking to the strange innocence in her big brown eyes.
Despite that, neither of them feel anything close to attraction just yet and years from now they won't even remember the specifics of how they met.
"Greg Lestrade," he says.
"Molly Hooper."
