DAY 2: JUST STARTED DATING / EARLY RELATIONSHIP

THE PERFECT FIRST DATE

5 March 2018

Summary: Sherlock and Molly disagree on what constitutes a romantic date.

Theme: Just Started Dating / Early Relationship (Non-Canon/Headcanon)

Rating: T, for some mild sexual references

A/N: This was inspired by Kevin (Probably) Saves the World 1x11, where 'Amy and Nate struggle[d] to plan the perfect first date'. This fic diverged a bit from what happened in the episode, because one specific aspect of their interactions in that episode stuck with me. So I chose to focus on that.

Hope y'all enjoy this one!

I don't own these characters. They belong to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, BBC, Steven Moffat, and Mark Gatiss. If I owned Sherlock and Molly Hooper, then there would be a lot more Sherlolly in the show. All mistakes are mine. Reviews and constructive criticism are welcome; I only ask that you'd be mindful of your words.

Molly looked up from her paperwork when she heard the pathology lab doors open. She grinned at Sherlock as he made a beeline for her. But her smile dropped when she saw the worry and guilt in his eyes. "What's the matter? Problems with our official first date?" she asked, a tiny part of her still hoping that she was wrong.

Stopping beside her, he planted a kiss on her cheek. "You can say that." He heaved a disappointed sigh. "I'm afraid Mycroft needs me on a case starting tonight," he stated slowly as if he was unwilling to say it.

She frowned. "Oh. He is aware that tonight is supposed to be our official first date, yeah?"

"Of course. But I owe him for getting me out of trouble with the Belgian prime minister. And I know it's always a matter of national security with him, but he's not exaggerating this time. Would you mind if—"

"If we postponed our first date? No, of course not." She exhaled and shrugged her shoulders, giving him a soft smile. "We've waited this long. So what's another few days or another week?"

Keeping his hands behind his back, he bent down to kiss her tenderly. "Thank you, Molly Hooper." Straightening up, he took something from behind him and held it out to her. It was a brown paper takeaway bag bearing a familiar shop logo, which made her eyes light up and brought back her smile. "I managed to persuade Mycroft to give me a few hours to prepare. So I stopped by our favourite fish shop and got us some dinner. Could you take your lunch break now?"

"Yeah, sure," she said as she set her pile of paperwork aside. "It's a slow night anyway."

He removed a huge cloth napkin from his coat pocket and spread it on the worktop. Next, he arranged two paperboard containers, two sets of cutlery, two bottles of water, and some paper napkins on their makeshift tablecloth. Then he sat down on the stool next to hers.

"Oh, by the way, this isn't a substitute for the perfect first date that I'd been planning," he said before he flipped his container's lid open and took a bite of a chip. "It's more of an apology for postponing our first date."

Chewing, she nodded as she considered his words. "So this isn't a date then?"

"No, no, no," he replied, shaking his head. "Just a simple takeaway dinner between two people who had just begun a committed romantic relationship."

"But that's technically a date."

"No, it's not," he insisted. "Look, I really want our official first date to be perfect. And as much as I love eating fish and chips with you, it's not how I envision our first date would be."

She reached for his hand and squeezed it. "I've told you before I don't need fancy or posh dates. I'm content with takeaway and tea or wine as long as I'm having them with you."

Raising her hand to his lips, he gave it a tender peck. "Yes, I know. But we've always done that, even before Sherrinford. We're going out now," he said, gesturing between the two of them. "Dates for us need to be something special, not like when we're loafing about your flat or when we're conducting experiments in my kitchen."

Chuckling, she caressed his cheek. "Have you been asking John for dating advice?"

He frowned and darted his eyes around before swallowing. "W-well, he wouldn't be nicknamed Three-Continents Watson for nothing. And Mary would attest to his romancing prowess."

"Sherlock, he cheated on her, technically, with your sister," she gently reminded him. "And he didn't confess it to her until she was nearly dying from getting shot by Mrs Norbury."

"Yes, you're right," he replied, his jaw clenching at the memory. "But he managed to woo her back after she found out."

She tilted her head and laughed softly in agreement. "All right. I'll give him that."

"And Lestrade and Mrs Hudson agree with him. Donovan too. But, if it makes you feel better, Anderson agrees with you."

"Well, he's been wanting us to get together for ages. He thinks he knows us better than we do. And, in case you've forgotten or you've deleted it from your Mind Palace, he was smart enough to get some things right regarding your faked suicide. I think we should listen to him." She giggled when he only gave her an incredulous look in response. She took a bite of a chip. "So what did you have planned anyway?"

"I'm not telling you!" he replied with a smirk. "You'll just have to find out after I finish this case."

She rolled her eyes. "Fine. Can you tell me anything about the case?"

He scrunched up his nose and shook his head. "Sorry, no. Although…" He bit his lower lip in thought. "What do you know about the Philippines?"

Molly was reading a paperback whilst sipping red wine on her settee when she heard her front door being unlocked. She set her wine glass down on the end table and shifted in her seat. He's home!

She smiled upon hearing the familiar footsteps behind her. "Hi, Sherlock," she said without turning to look at him. "How was Manila?"

"Unbearably hot and humid," he replied before bending down to kiss her on the lips. He plopped down next to her. "Traffic congestion's just the worst! And the street food didn't quite agree with John, though he said it was delicious." Shifting around until he was lying down, he gently pushed the hand holding her book upwards so he could lay his head on her lap. "John and I got to commandeer a jeepney in the end though. That was fun!"

"A jeepney?" she asked in a curious tone.

"After World War II, Filipinos turned surplus American military jeeps into passenger vehicles. Many of the modern ones are irritatingly crowded and garish, but at least the one we commandeered was air-conditioned."

"Did you get the bad guys?"

"Yes, of course! Terrorist attack thwarted, many lives saved, John nearly punched the president, blah, blah, blah."

"He did? Why?"

"The president kept making lewd and racist remarks towards the younger prince's fiancée."

"Oh, wow. Thank God he didn't cause an international incident!"

He shrugged. "I would have punched him myself if I hadn't suppressed the urge. Thinking of your disapproving face usually does the trick. And I just didn't want to owe Mycroft another favour for needing him to clean up the mess that I would've made."

"I'm sure Mycroft's grateful." She chuckled at his indifferent shrug. "Oh, before I forget, I've got some toes on ice in the lab. Want to experiment on them?" she asked, grinning at him.

"Of course! Will tomorrow night be OK? I've missed Rosie, so I offered to babysit her all day tomorrow."

"Sure. I'll be off work by 5, so I should be there by 5.30."

"Excellent." His stomach rumbled, making Molly giggle. "Anything in? I'm starving!"

She set her book next to her wine glass and caressed his midnight-blue-shirt-clad chest. "I have leftover Thai in the fridge from the other day when Mary and Rosie called round. Do you want that?"

"Sounds good," he replied with a happy grin. He sat up and kissed her on the lips. "I'm just gonna take a shower. Then I'm gonna tell you all about the case during dinner."

"All righty then," she said as she rose from the sofa. "Um, Sherlock?"

"Nope, not a date!" he threw over his shoulder on his way out of her lounge-slash-kitchen.

Giggling and shaking her head, she went to heat up the food. Suit yourself, my love, she thought.

Molly walked into 221B the next night with a small cooler in her hand. "Hiya!" But Sherlock was nowhere to be seen and the only evidence that Rosie was in the flat were a few scattered toys in the front room.

"I'm in the kitchen!"

She shed her coat and set down her tote bag on the floor before going into the kitchen, where Sherlock was preparing for their experiment. She smiled at him and kissed him on the cheek whilst depositing the cooler on the table. "Did I just miss Rosie?"

"Oh, yeah, sorry. They left five minutes ago. They couldn't wait because they have to pick up Harry from the airport."

"Right, yeah. That's a shame. I was looking forward to seeing her tonight after the day I had at work." She shrugged and glanced at the cooler. "Oh! There's an extra kidney in there for you!"

He lifted the cooler's lid and his eyes widened in delight at its contents. "If I had known that you'd be bringing me extra body parts, I would have snogged you in Mr Shilcott's hallway even if you were engaged to another man."

Molly laughed out loud. "First of all, you weren't ready to snog, let alone date, anyone at the time. Second of all, you're too good of a man and too much of an idiot to make a move on a betrothed woman. Third of all," she added amidst his protests, "I literally grabbed that kidney on the way out of the morgue. Lastly, I've given you extra body parts even when we weren't dating."

Giving her a tender look, he wrapped an arm round her waist and pulled her close. "I truly don't deserve you, Molly Hooper."

"Oh, stop it, you." She wrapped her arms round his neck and kissed him. "I don't care whether or not we deserve each other. I knew what I signed up for when I started dating you. All I really care about is that I love you, you love me, and I want you."

He smiled at her. "I love you too." He kissed her this time, giving all he had in the kiss.

"So…" she began when they came up for air. To her delight, he was as flushed as she felt she was. "Are we experimenting on the toes and kidney or are we experimenting with each other in the bedroom?"

He smirked. "Toes and kidney first, mind-blowing sex later. Deal?" he asked in a low, sexy voice.

"Deal," she replied with a wide smile.

He kissed her before releasing her. "In case you're hungry, Mary made lasagne and brought it when they picked up Rosie." He glanced at the refrigerator as he handed her a pair of latex gloves before donning another pair.

She removed a bag of toes and laid it on the kitchen table. "I had a doughnut on my last break, so I'm still fine. Plus, if we're having sex later, then we're much better off eating lasagne afterwards," she pointed out with a cheeky wink.

He nodded. "Good point. Oh, Mary said you got a phone call from my mother when she and Rosie called round?"

"Yeah, she invited me to their 50th wedding anniversary party this weekend. I said yes, of course. How could I not when she said she's been looking forward to meeting me?"

"We should go together then. Mycroft's sending a car on Friday at 6pm."

"Perfect." She beamed at him before pointing at a deformed and swollen big toe. "I thought of you the moment I saw that."

He took the toe and held it up to inspect it. "Ah, excellent eye, Molly!" He gave her a kiss on the cheek before beginning the experiment.

They worked in companionable silence, save a few murmured observations.

"I think we should consider scientific experiments in either of our flats as dates," she remarked whilst typing on the laptop.

"Why? We do this all the time, even before we started dating," he replied without looking up from the slide he was analysing.

"We're spending quality time together doing something that we both love. And now that we're going out, we sometimes make love after we're done. I say that counts as a date."

"I disagree. Something we ordinarily did before Sherrinford doesn't count. Going out to dinner does."

"Yeah, but for us, dinner means either the specials at Angelo's or fish and chips."

"Or watching movies."

"You hate watching 99% of the movies I like."

"Or going to museums or theatre or the opera."

"All right. I'll give you museums," she conceded. "But we like the morbid and the nerdy kind of museums. And you hate the opera. And our schedules rarely coincide with whatever plays or musicals are running that we both might like."

"That's true."

"Performing experiments on body parts whilst eating takeaway and then having mind-blowing sex is more us."

He raised his head and stared ahead of him. Then he turned to her and shook his head. "No, I say this," he decided, gesturing around them, "doesn't count as a date. I asked John about this and he said it doesn't count. Lestrade and Mrs Hudson concurred. They've been in loads more romantic or sexual entanglements than I have. Which is why I trust their judgement."

"And what did Mary say?" she asked as she took a sample from a different thumb and placed it on a slide.

He darted a glance at her. "She agrees with you."

"You also trust her judgement, don't you?"

"Yes," he reluctantly conceded. But he rolled his eyes when he caught her waggling eyebrows. "Nope, still not a date though."

Chuckling and good-naturedly rolling her eyes, she fiddled with the knobs of her microscope and resumed her work.

Molly went out to the brightly lit but quiet backyard and immediately found Sherlock on the lounge chair. His glass and a half-full bottle of whisky sat on the table next to his chair.

"Hey," she softly called out as she approached him. She smiled when he turned his head to look at her. Setting her wine glass on the table, she lowered herself to the vacant lounge chair on the other side of the ceramic patio table. "Your mum's looking for you."

He took a sip of his whisky. "She probably wants to know when we're getting married and having children."

"Oh, she already asked me that." She grinned at his curious gaze. "I told her we'll get married and have children when we're ready and not a moment before."

He reached for her hand and laid a kiss on her knuckles. "God, you really are perfect. What did she say to that?"

"Basically the same thing you said. Then she laughed and laughed."

To her surprise, he softly groaned. "Oh, God. If you replied, 'Thank you. I'm here all week,' while bowing, I'll—"

She glared at him. "You'll what?"

"Nothing," he answered with a chuckle. "I see Mary Watson is rubbing off on you."

"Oh, yeah? I kind of like it!"

"I like it too." Tugging her off her seat, he sat her between his parted legs. He pulled her up and wrapped his arms round her middle, holding her even closer. He planted a kiss on her hair when she laid her head on his chest.

They lay in silence, just admiring the stars and the night sky out of London.

"Don't you think we should consider this a date?" she softly asked.

"Being forced to attend my parents' 50th wedding anniversary party is hardly a date."

"But no one forced me to be your date. We're already dating, and I get along well with your parents. And it's not something we ordinarily did before we entered this relationship."

She could hear the gears turning in his head as he processed her words. "But shouldn't it be just the two of us?"

"Sure," she replied with a nod. "But that's not always the case. And, even if we're surrounded by other people, it can still be about us."

"Like now?"

She nodded as she listened to the laughter, music, and voices coming from his parents' house. "Yeah, like now."

"So does that mean that visiting Eurus with my parents yesterday was also a date?"

"Absolutely. I had a lovely time, your parents are wonderful, and I enjoyed your duet with Eurus." She scrunched up her nose in thought. "But maybe just that instance. Or not every time I accompany you on your visits with her."

"But that can't be our official first date, can it?"

"Well, what about that time you took me to assist you on your cases right after you came back to London?"

He stiffened, and she could picture him giving her an incredulous look even if she kept her gaze forward. "But you were betrothed to somebody else and, like you said before, I wasn't ready to date you then."

She craned her neck up to look at him. "But you consider it a date!" She giggled and ignored his eye-roll. "OK, how about when you took me to a charity gala for a case and I wore this expensive, glittery red gown? We'd just started going out then, we had the best time, I helped you apprehend the bad guy—"

"By kicking his grabby arse!" The pride in his voice made her smile.

"And we made love for the first time when we got home! That's the best first date I've ever had, because it's with you and it's just perfect for us."

His chin grazed her head as he nodded. "You're absolutely right. I suppose I'll just save my ideas for our official first date for something else."

"Like what?"

"Nothing." He chuckled before dropping another kiss on her head. "Shall we go back inside now?"

"No, not yet," Molly replied with a shake of her head. "We should wait until your Great-Aunt Elizabreth's gone home before she makes us promise to name our firstborn daughter after her."

Laughter was Sherlock's only response.

This is my first time giving the Philippines––where I spent the first ~19 years of my life––a shout-out in a fic. But I was feeling a bit homesick while I was writing the first draft, so I decided to keep the references. Also, my brain is too fried to revise the whole case bit.

(Now I can't get the image of Sherlock and John commandeering a jeepney out of my head! Also, can y'all imagine Sherlock's reaction upon seeing Filipino street food?)

'Elizabreth' is not a typo.

And, oh, please watch Kevin (Probably) Saves the World, y'all! It's a good show!

So what do y'all think? Hate it? Like it? Love it?