I love the idea that Mycroft would secretly be quite fond of Molly Hooper without really admitting it. He doesn't love her, but he admires who she is as a person, and they sort of have an understanding between them, a mutual respect and odd type of brother/sister friendship. Plus she makes him sweets and he lets her.
Molly Hooper was a conundrum to Mycroft. Not so for his little brother. Apparently Sherlock was in love with her, or some such nonsense. It had been some time since he'd seen the pathologist in passing. He searched his memory, recalling the last time had been during the case with The Woman. He and Sherlock had gone to identify the body and Molly Hooper had been on call at the morgue. Before that it had been the night he'd brought her in to see what her relationship with Sherlock was. She sent him a cheesecake after, which he took as a threat (she called it peace offering). While she was on his list of people to 'look after' her security level was nowhere near John Watson's or Mary Morstan's. She simply wasn't that harmful, aside from the occasional baked good left on his desk. He was quite certain Anthea purposefully delivered them when she was upset with him.
Molly Hooper shared things. Ever since she was in primary school, she shared her crayons, pencils, and lunch, even if the child staring with envy at her food was undeserving. She was a pushover, and Mycroft had no use for pushovers.
That was a lie. Pushovers were ideal in just about any situation. They got you information regardless of the harm to themselves. Mycroft made the mistake in thinking Molly was the average woman. Indeed, her profession was hardly average, and while her stutter was unbecoming, fashion sense appalling, she did possess a backbone, a vicious, protective streak that he'd come to admire.
Also she seemed to thrive on turning out puddings and sweets and delightful confections that Mycroft had to fight hard to resist.
Mycroft watched from the chair he occupied while Sherlock plucked idly at his violin. He was off a case, but busy with experiments so at the moment he was turning over in his mind two possible outcomes of his experiment while waiting for the tests to come back. Molly was in the kitchen, mixer turning at what Mycroft could only describe as a languorous pace, she dipped the rubber spatula in the bowl, pushing down whatever it was mixing. The entire flat smelled of vanilla and chocolate. Mycroft kept telling himself to leave now before the confection was finished. Sherlock, clearly enjoying his elder brother's inner turmoil, happily asked Molly her technique in baking, what she was so intently making, to which she only answered that it was a surprise.
She bent over the open oven door, carefully removing the dish, placing it on the cooling rack. To Mycroft's great disappointment, she shut the mixer off, took out the bowl and turning her back to them, scraped the contents into a glass pan that he could not see into. She then transferred it to the fridge and then pulled out, to his chagrin, fish. Sherlock perked at this and Molly almost grinned.
"Yes, I promised you fish and chips," she said, pulling a bag of potatoes out of the cupboard. Mycroft did not eat fish and chips. It was fried, it was fish (he only ate the creature grilled with a squeeze of lemon) and chips were never a satisfying way of eating a potato. It was the food of simpler people with simple tastes who could not appreciate a fine wine or a good cheese. People who ate fish and chips did not understand the satisfaction of cutting through a tender flank steak or understanding the proper degree of temperature to cook mussels. They probably ate their pasta with sauce from a jar.
But Molly Hooper knew all those things. She knew what it meant to fold in ingredients, how to truss a pheasant, when egg-whites were beaten enough, and she knew the difference between chocolate from Switzerland and chocolate from France. Watching Molly cheerfully dip fish in batter and then drop them into the basket of hot oil, Mycroft was confused. She could turn out a breathtaking crème brûlée, make delicious pavlova and a boeuf bourguignon that set everyone in 221 Baker Street running to Sherlock's flat. Why on earth was she putting together something that chavvy teenagers, ordinary pencil pushers and lorry drivers guzzled on a daily basis?
"It makes her happy," Sherlock answered Mycroft's unspoken question.
"And you eat that sort of thing?" Mycroft asked. Sherlock shrugged
"You don't?"
"God no."
"You should," he replied. "Molly is a very good cook." Sherlock never paid compliments. He stated facts. Mycroft knew quite well that Molly was more than a cook, she was a chef. If she wasn't such a good pathologist and loved her work so much, she could probably work in any restaurant in the heart of London as sous-chef or even chef.
"Are you staying for dinner?" Molly asked him. "I need to know how many chips to put in."
"She made dessert," Sherlock said under his breath. Mycroft loved sweets, and he found himself nodding, if for nothing else than to see what Molly had put in the refrigerator.
Sherlock took his plate back to the living room to look at his cultures, leaving Molly and Mycroft to eat at the table. On the table sat two jars, and a bowl of mushy peas.
"Vinegar and salt?" Sherlock called.
"On the table," she answered, seating herself. Mycroft looked at the fried haddock, underneath it sat chips. Both fried to a golden brown and he found himself disappointed in the bland color. Food should pop with colors and shades and crisp flavors before you even put a bite in your mouth. Fried fish sat on fried chips like brown rice would sit on oatmeal. To his surprise, she did not put out ketchup or hot sauce as he often saw people do in shops. He was studying the glass jars, trying to discern what was in them. He watched Sherlock help himself to several forkfuls of one jar, and then the other.
"Watermelon rind pickles," Molly pointed to the jar closer to her, "and these are pickled garlic, bit strong," she cautioned. He looked at his brother digging into his food while studying his petri dishes, admiring the results that had come about overnight. Molly herself was happily tossing vinegar and salt over her fish and chips. With a sigh, he mimicked her actions, sprinkling a little over his plate before delicately cutting off a bite. He reminded himself that what was in the fridge could very well be a tasty chocolate pie. That in mind, he put the fork in his mouth and chewed quietly.
Out of the corner of her eye, in-between discussing Sherlock's experiments, Molly watched Mycroft take his first bite. He chewed thoughtfully, looking at his plate, as if confused. He ate slowly, tasting a little of everything, even the pickled garlic. She supposed he was only being polite, but Sherlock was almost grinning with some wicked delight. Paying no more attention to either, she tucked into her own food, losing herself in the bliss of a good meal.
Mycroft was at war with himself. He hated fish and chips. He wanted absolutely more of everything Molly had put on the table, yes, God please, more chips, and maybe just a half-serving of fish. Watermelon rind pickles (what the hell was he putting in his mouth, were these pre-bitten melon rinds?) and pickled garlic each had a delightful tang all their own, one sweet and with a mouth-puckering bite at the end, the other strong enough he could almost feel them all sweating garlic. The fish was fried crispy golden; the fish flaked away under his fork, not wet and soggy as he expected. The chips, also golden brown (such a lovely color) had just enough texture to the potatoes, not too thick, not too thin. Mycroft actually had to fight the urge to lick the salt from his fingers. His plate empty, he looked at it with some disappointment.
"Was it alright?" Molly asked, taking the plates away.
"It was…" he paused, searching for words. Too many came to mind. Mycroft could not bring himself quite yet to sing praises of fish and chips. "Unexpectedly tasty," he settled on and Molly fought back a grin, Sherlock kissing her cheek.
"Oh don't, you're all greasy!" she wriggled from him, plates in hand as she laughed. "Go on, put on the French Press since your brother is here, coffee will suit this dessert better than tea anyway."
Mycroft, still befuddled at his sudden appreciation of fish and chips, was suddenly staring at a slice of chocolate cream pie. He blinked, and then looked up at Molly.
"I know everyone's favorites," she said, handing a slice (no plate) to Sherlock who took it, climbing over his chair while eating it in three bites, distracted now by his experiment. Molly didn't seem bothered that her home-life was not very homey. Indeed there was a full-sized skeleton in the kitchen by the door that doubled as a hat-rack. Sherlock never sat at the table to eat (except when they were all forced to go home to eat with their parents). Most women would be upset that their love-interest did not sit down at the table with them, or that they'd rather look at mold cultures or half-rotted fingers while they ate instead of discussing the events of day and matters pertaining to distant relatives and friends. Mycroft looked between Molly who was pouring coffee and Sherlock, working on his second piece of pie, realizing just how well Molly Hooper fit his brother. It was a revelation as large as his realizing he enjoyed fish and chips, and he found himself startled by it. He disliked being startled. It meant he missed something. It meant that he failed to observe. He ate his dessert quietly, thanked Molly quite sincerely for dinner and bid them goodnight, mulling over the evenings' seemingly simple events. A simple meal was not extraordinary. It wasn't confounding or interesting and it should not have left Mycroft's thoughts in such a confused manner.
As he was preparing for bed, Mycroft was hit with a sudden thought.
Molly Hooper was not ordinary.
And yet she was. She is ordinary in the sense that yes, she had a nine-to-five job, kept a cat, cared deeply and freely and did the entire mundane average day-to-day living. She complained about bills, wore sub-standard clothing, rarely did anything with her hair and took pictures of her food and her cat and posted them on Instagram. But Molly Hooper had also accomplished an extraordinary thing, and that was love Sherlock Holmes. She knew Sherlock, probably as well as Mycroft did, she knew his faults, knew he would never ever, be the ordinary boyfriend or husband that women want. She knew he kept odd experiments, invented his own job, wore three nicotine patches at a time, was a former addict and spoke exactly what was on his mind, regardless of how the person felt. These were not qualities that would make anyone happy. They weren't healthy habits that would foster love in a good, stable relationship. But she loved him anyway. Molly Hooper took Sherlock Holmes for what he was, and somehow, without forcing him into a mold of her idea of who he should be, made Sherlock want to do better, to try to be an improved version of himself.
Molly Hooper was observant, even if she couldn't put it into words what she saw. That alone was a skill Mycroft found useful. If his brother was to be involved with anyone, he found himself glad it was someone paradoxically extraordinarily ordinary as Molly Hooper.