English isn't my first language, I may make mistakes even though I try my best not to. This is the translation of a story I kept hidden for a long time. This wasn't at first a story involving Sherlock Holmes but I decided he would be the one helping her with her case. Sherlock's characters will come around only later, this is mainly the story of Hope. I hope you like it !


September, 1990

"You're nearly here, Madame, you have to keep breathing."

The woman was speaking in a very soft voice, she was encouraging the young woman in front of her. The nurse was looking up to a man, the woman's husband. He was holding his wife's hand, so tightly into his own hand. The wife almost crushed his hand, she didn't want to hurt him but her body was already working.

"Come on Catherine," the husband spoke to his wife's ear, "You did a good job with Peter, he is here and healthy and now it's time for our little girl, you just need to hold on. Breathe, don't forget to breathe."

Catherine used one more push and a little scream could be heard, the last of the twins came out. Jean, the husband and father, kept his wife's hand into his as they laid the newborn, onto her mother's chest. Catherine, opened her eyes, she put her hand onto her daughter's back. She was so small, so fragile and innocent. She had surprisingly, unlike her brothers, quite a lot of hair onto her head. She had dark brown hair. Her hand was gripping her mother's cloth, she was crying, discovering her lungs, the air, and the outside world. Her mother was here, but where was her brother? The one she shared the womb with? Peter, they called him Peter. But her mother was here, the newborn recognized the smell, the love and the voice. It seemed to be already a very strong bond.

Jean was watching his girls, his wife and their desired daughter. His wife loved her sons with her whole heart, but he knew she had always wanted a daughter, and so did he. Catherine wanted to be here for her daughter, much more present than her mother had ever been for her. She had proved herself to be a very great mother with their first born, Tony. Tony was soon to be three years old, and now he was a big brother of two. Catherine knew he would be a wonderful protector, he had been expecting his sibling for so long. The nurses, after a few minutes of leaving the twins alone with their mother and father, took the kids to clean them and take care of them. They knew the boy's name, Peter but they were unknown of the girl. Peter Tony Garnier.

An hour later, the toddler, Tony rushed into the room her mother was in with the twins. Tony was excited to meet his brother and sister, Jean was following him and closed the door. "Be careful, Tony, no big moves or scream, they are babies." He warned his big boy. Tony climbed onto the bed and kissed his mother's cheek.

"Maman, your tummy isn't so big anymore!" He said curiously as he looked at her. Catherine smiled, she wrapped her arm around her son to hug him. "Of course, the babies are out now." She said.

Tony smiled quite big, he leaned down to the small baby beds. The twins were here. He smiled and could tell who Peter was and who his sister was. "Peter doesn't have a lot of hair compared to…" He said, unknown of his sister's name. Catherine smiled and gently picked up the little girl up into her arms. She gently let her son hold her, she was of course holding him at the same time, watching him to be sure he doesn't hurt her. The newborn watched her brother, she had green eyes, she was looking at that strange little man.

"Your brother is named Peter Tony Garnier, we gave him your name as his second name. Since he took your name, we decided that you can choose her middle name. She is called, Maryline." Catherine told her little boy.

Tony smiled brightly, he was so happy to get such a big responsibility. "Espoir! Mummy, espoir. Because that's what she gave you."

Catherine smiled, she liked that name, but she also loved the English language. "In English, espoir is pronounced 'hope', why don't we use that? It sounds pretty good doesn't it?"

Tony smiled and touched his sister's face, she was the prettiest thing he had ever seen. "Hope…" He smiled.

March, 2017

"Hope! Move away from here!" A voice shouted to a young woman.

Hope sat up from the place she had been laying on and looked around herself. "Honestly, you don't need to talk that loud do you?"

Hope Turner was lying onto a mattress on the ground, she was with another girl of her age. They seemed like they had been sleeping into an abandoned garage. It was early in the morning, the owner was meant to be back later in the day. Hope took her bag and took all of her belongings to put them back in it. She didn't have much, a few clothes, a hair brush, a blanket, a man sweater, a white cat plush. She put her coat on her and stood up, feeling dizzy. Hope held onto the wall to help her stand.

"How much have you taken last night?" The other girl asked her.

"Just a bag, I needed sleep." Hope replied.

"You're killing yourself." The other said as she made her way out of the garage. Hope sighed rather deeply and breathed in deeply the fresh air that was offered to her. Her morning ritual, the same days over and over… Hope would usually sleep in a garage, go out in the day, finding a spot with Sibyl, they would come back at night once the owners of the garage were in their own home. Hope would also find the way to use whatever drugs she could find to help herself sleep. The nights were awful, the nightmares were the worse.

Sibyl and Hope found each other in London, central London, the heart of the city. It was happened about two months before. Hope seemed lost, drugged up, exhausted, that was when she walked into Sibyl, another homeless in London. Sibyl was so glad to find someone of her age that she spent her time with Hope. The young woman seemed to come out from hell, she never spoke about what happened. Hope had always been silent about her past and about what happened to her. She was far from being a social woman. Sibyl had tried to speak about her family, if she used to have a job, passions, boyfriend, girlfriend, but Hope never told a thing. Sibyl got used to her shell. On the other hand, Sibyl had always been quite opened with Hope, she spoke about her family. Sibyl came from Brighton, she moved in London to find a work in a hotel. She worked for two years, getting engaged to another woman named Clara. However, Clara, one day just took off with all the money and Sibyl's belongings.

Sibyl lost her job, her apartment, she had been stolen by her ex fiancé. Now here she was, in the street, with Hope Turner. Hope heard Sibyl's story countless times, her stories about Clara. Sibyl was still madly in love with Clara, it was obvious and she was even certain that if Clara came to call her around again, Sibyl would go.

"Love is duuumb." Hope would usually tell her.

Both women had managed to get to their usual spot, they were in northern London. Hope made it clear that she refused to get to the centre of London. Sibyl never understood the real reason why, once again it was a thing Hope never spoke about. Sibyl, built the idea that Hope was simply afraid of the big city. They didn't get as much attention in northern London than they would in the heart of the city. Sibyl wanted to convince Hope to get into the city sooner or later, she would manage.

"Maybe there is a thing you can tell me Hope." Sibyl started as she was eating a sandwich a teenager gave them. "Where are you from? You're clearly not British."

"Whoa, should I take this as a compliment or… on the contrary, is it bad not being British?" Hope teased, showing of a smirk.

"Nah, this isn't bad. I would bet on Irish."

"Nope. Scottish." Hope said as she looked over at her friend. "Happy now that I answered your question?"

Sibyl was actually quite glad that Hope mentioned something, even a tiny thing about her past. It was so unusual, something that Sibyl told herself she would never know that she was actually glad…

Hope kept on eating the half of her sandwich, the bread felt good into her mouth. After months of living into the street, years of living on her own, she almost forgot the hunger. Hope learned to ignore it, it wasn't such a problem for her anymore. On the other hand, Sibyl found it harder to deal with hunger, but Hope didn't mind.

"How was it? Your childhood, in Scotland?" Sibyl asked with her mouth full which amused Hope. Scotland was indeed beautiful, that was something Hope never denied.

August, 1998

Her bedroom was blue, blue and white, it was clear, simple. Some toys were onto the ground, there was a doll with long blond hair. The sleeping little girl, was holding into her arms a little white cat. The cat came from her brother, as far as she knew, he offered it to her just after their adoption when she was two years old. Now, she was eight, she was at that age where she wanted to discover everything, to find herself, to be happy. Hope Turner was her name. When the sun came through the window of her bedroom, the young girl woke up. She rubbed her small hands against her face in order to wake up properly, she knew she had been dreaming about something but it seemed impossible to remember what it was about... Hope stretched her body and jumped out of bed. Her stomach was growling, she was obviously hungry. Starving would be the appropriate word concerning the young Turner. It was the begining of the summer in 1998, early July, the sun was quite warm over their mension in Applecross. Hope loved summer, she loved to walk in the garden barefoot on the grass, she absolutely loved to watch the life of the insects on the outside. She had the habit to keep boxes to catch any kind of insects, to offer them a home and to watch them evolve. Every mornings, the little girl would run outside to see if her little friends had escaped or not. She made sure to make holes to offer them the air, but her holes were most of the time so big that it was enough for them to escape.

Hope ran down the stairs to the kitchen which was downstairs. She smiled as she saw her nanny, Lucie Maywood. Hope loved her nanny very much, she loved to spend times with her. They would sometimes pick up some flowers in the garden, or they would speak about Hope's dreams.

"I want to take care of animals when I grow up!" Hope would often say to Lucie. "I want to make them happy because they look so unhappy."

Hope seemed like a little girl full of life, of hopes and dreams, just like any little girl of her age. Lucie saw Hope coming into the kitchen, and this brought a smile upon her face. "Good morning Hope," she said with a soft voice, "I prepared some toasts for you. Did you sleep well?"

Hope sat on the table and took the toasts in what could be called a hurry. The little girl nodded and smiled. "Yes but I can't remember my dream, just like last night. Why does it happen so often?" She asked as she took a bite of the toast covered in strawberry jam.

"Your mind doesn't want you to remember it, that's why." Lucie said as she cleaned some plates for Hope's parents. "Do you remember when I taught you about the mind?"

"You said..." Hope tried to remember, she spoke as she was chewing slowly. "Hm you said that, the mind is in our head and it speaks for us, the mind protects us and makes decision for us."

"Very good." Lucie smiled as she looked at the young girl. "Do not chew and eat, you must do only one of them, this isn't polite. Your mother would not be happy."

"Is mother here?" Hope asked as soon as her mother was mentionned. "She promised me she would take me to the park with my bike."

Lucie took a look at Hope and smiled quite sadly, the young girl was always looking forward to spend some time with her mother. Camille, Hope's mother, was always out. She never took any time with their children since Hope reached the age of five. Camille wished they would stay small and young forever. She would often say to her husband that she didn't want the kids anymore, she didn't like teenagers, she liked children. Lucie had heard her speak about it with her husband a few times. She felt sorry for the sibling and this only drove her to care for them even more.

"Your mother left with her friend today, she will spend time with you tomorrow, I promise." Lucie said as she walked behind Hope to give her a warm hug. Hope nodded, she couldn't help but smile a bit when she felt her nanny's arms around her. Her smile got wider when she heard the steps of her eleven years old brother coming down in the kitchen. According to the position both the nanny and Hope had, he guessed that something was bothering his sister. Tony, then, wore his prettiest smile and rushed to his sister to pick her up. He spinned with her. Hope let out some loud laughs as her brother came to her, to play with her. "Tony !" Hope laughed as she held onto her brother.

"Good morning, dear, loving sister." Tony said, smiling, as he put her down. "What about, you and me, we go for a walk today? We could go see the horses and donkeys accross the lake? What do you think?"

Hope looked up at her brother and jumped slightly on herself from happiness. She was never really sad, her brother was always giving her the goodness she needed. Tony was quite protective over his sister, she was his treasure. From the moment they were adopted, he never left her side. He had insisted on sleeping into her bedroom when they got into their new family. Tony was aged of five years old at the time, he would get up to take care of his crying, two years old sister. They were sharing an unbreakable bond.

Lucie Maywood, loved Hope and Tony as if they were her own children. She was a women in her fifties, she had been a widow for about two years and she was the mother of a nineteen years old boy. Her son was living in his college in Glasgow so Lucie was on her own which made her spend more times with the Turner's children.

That day, just like every summer days, Tony had spent his time with his little sister. He took her out, showed her the animals, taught her how to ride a bike properly. Tony always made sure that his sister was well, never sad. He loved her too much and he would never allow anyone to hurt her, she was his treasure. After their adoption, Tony told their new parents to call Hope by her second name, no more Maryline. Tony needed it, he needed Hope and his sister was here, to remind him every day that he must keep holding onto hope.

It was nine PM, when Edward Turner came back from work. He found the house quite empty, empty in the way that his wife didn't come back. He had always done everything to make her happy, they couldn't have children and he found her two kids. He married her, offered her the best house he managed to afford. Nothing was enough for Camille. When Hope turned five, Camille had started to go out at night, then during the day, she came back drunk, without her own mind. Camille also always said that her husband wasn't worth anything, and this made him hate the children. He didn't choose to have children, he made a sacrifice for his wife and she was not thankful.

He stepped into the living room, Hope was playing with her dolls. On the ground, she had made quite a mess, the plastic dishes were all around the little girl, the clothes of the doll…

"Where is your brother, Hope?" The father asked his daughter.

Hope looked up at him, she rushed to gather all of her toys. She knew how much her father hated mess, he was scary to her. Hope hated when her father screamed, when he would sit on the sofa, holding his bottle, ordering her around to do things, to bring him food because she was the only girl available in the house. Lucie Maywood often insisted to do it instead of Hope, she was the nanny and the maid, but Edward strictly pointed out that she wasn't family.

"In his bath, upstairs father." The little girl said as she stood up. "Do you want your magic bottle?"

"I think it should be better if you spent the evening and the night in your magic room, Hope."

Hope shook her head. The magic room, the magic room was her worst nightmare, and she knew that when her father mentioned it, he was serious. He had never laid a hand on her, unlike he did with her brother, he never abused her physically, but he had found something else, anytime his daughter didn't behave.

March, 2017

"For sure it was beautiful," Hope told Sibyl, "we had a big house, a big garden with trees… We had apples! I loved apples, I would pick them up and eat them all day long. I even got sick. There was a farm around with animals, and you know how much I love them. A lake a few streets away…"

"So, that was good memories right?" Sibyl smiled at her friend, delighted to know more suddenly.

Hope shook her head. The young woman finished her meal and leaned against the bench she was sitting on.

"No, not really."