Chapter 3: Molly

One way, or another
I'm gonna find ya
I'm gonna getcha getcha getcha getcha
One way, or another
I'm gonna win ya
I'll getcha, I'll getcha

Molly was singing along to a Blondie tape, as she was trying to focus on her homework. History. It was weird doing history in 1983, because so much hadn't happened yet. Before school started, her mum had given her a briefing about current affairs of 1983, and told her specifically which topics were off-limit, but at times it was hard to remember all of them. Apart from that, Molly was enjoying her life here. It wasn't half bad, the music was okay, though she really had to get used to tapes instead of CDs or mp3s.
And more importantly, her mum had never seemed happier than she was now. The only person she sometimes missed was Evan, since he had always been a big part of her life. Of course Evan was around in this time as well, only he didn't know her here, and it would be too strange and confusing, so meeting him was unfortunately out of the question.
And of course there was Gene. He was a bit weird, but Molly had liked him from the start, and he seemed to like her too. So all in all, life was good for Molly Drake. And now she also had a baby brother or sister to look forward to, which she was really excited about. Just mere months ago, she couldn't have imagined a life remotely like the one she was leading right now.
Molly shoved her homework to the side. There would be plenty of time for that later.

For months, Molly had lived in a state of fear and confusion. After she had briefly been taken hostage by a man called Arthur Layton on her birthday, her godfather, Evan, had taken her home and her mum had promised to be there as soon as she could. Only she had never come. For days, Molly had no idea what had happened to her mum, nobody had seen her or heard from her. Until she had finally been found, down by the river, shot in the head. She had been rushed to hospital, where doctors came to the conclusion that she was too weak to be operated. For weeks, Molly and Evan had visited her in hospital daily, sometimes even twice a day. Molly had been worried sick, she couldn't concentrate on schoolwork, or anything else for that matter.

Eventually her mum had been strong enough to be operated on, but the doctors had told her it would still be a risky operation. The bullet was quite deep, and the doctors weren't sure they'd be able to remove it. And even if they did, it wouldn't be a guarantee that her mum would wake up afterwards. This had come as a big shock to Molly. After all, she didn't have many people in her life besides her mum. Her father had walked out on her and her mother, when Molly was only 6 months old, and her grandparents had died a long time ago, when her mum had still been a little girl herself. Luckily she would always have Evan, her godfather, but apart from that she had no one.
As the day of the operation came closer, Molly grew more restless, and on the day itself she had been a wreck. Luckily the operation had been successful and the doctors had managed to remove the bullet from her mum's brain. Now all they could do was wait and see if she'd wake up from her coma. Molly had sat by her bed every day, hoping and wishing that her mum would wake up. But days had turned into weeks, and nothing happened. Molly had started to get desperate. She knew Evan felt the same way, though he was trying his best to hide this from her.

And then the doctors had come with the devastating news. There had hardly been any sign of brain activity since the operation, and the whole process was taking too long. They were giving her another 48 hours before declaring her officially brain dead, and then it was for Evan and Molly to decide to switch off the machines and to let her go. At that moment, Molly felt as though the walls were crashing down around her. The room was spinning, and she couldn't think straight. This couldn't be happening, not to her, not to her mum. She needed her mum, for all the obvious reasons, but also because she was the only family she'd ever had.

For the next 48 hours, Molly barely left Alex's side. She refused to go home with Evan, she didn't want anything to eat or drink, she just wanted to be close to her mum. When the 48 hours were drawing to a close, Evan found Molly by Alex's bedside. She looked so defeated and vulnerable, as she sat there, staring at her hands. Then a doctor in a white coat appeared.

"I'm afraid it's time."

Evan walked over to Molly and put a hand on her shoulder.

"Molls, darling. It's time to say goodbye to your mum now."

He had tears in his eyes, but Molly didn't notice. A sense of sheer panic took over, and she felt sick. She made an attempt at standing up, and walking over to her mother's bedside. At that moment, the room started spinning around, and moments later, everything went black.

When she opened her eyes again, she was lying on her back, but the surroundings were strange. She was no longer in the hospital room. She was lying in the living room of a flat, which Molly thought, was oddly decorated. She felt confused, and wondered what was going on. Had she fainted? How long had she been unconscious? And who's flat was she in, and how had she ended up here? She stood up, and decided to have a look around. But before she could do anything, a door opened, and Molly's heart skipped a beat. Right there, in the door opening, was her mum! She was wearing pyjamas, and her hair was different, she had curls! Alex looked as though she'd just seen a ghost.

"Molls. Is..is that really you?"

"Mum, where is this place? Where are we?"

Alex had sat her down on the sofa, and explained everything to her. How she got shot by Layton, and had ended up in 1981. Molly could hardly believe what she was hearing. All this time, while she had been sitting by her mother's bedside in hospital, she had in fact been living a life in a different decade. It had been a lot of information for the 12 year old girl to get her head around, but at the same time she felt she had no choice but to believe it. After all, she had ended up here as well. Frankly, she didn't really care where she was. She had been reunited with her mum, and she couldn't remember the last time she had felt this happy. There were so many things she wanted to ask her mum, about her life here, her job, whether she had made friends. But she didn't know where to begin, and before they could continue their conversation, they were interrupted.

A man had let himself into the flat. A man with dark blonde hair, piercing blue eyes, wearing a long black coat and leather gloves. As he came into the room, and noticed Alex and Molly sitting on the sofa, he came to an abrupt halt. He clearly hadn't been expecting this, and her presence had caught him completely off guard.

"So who's yer visitor then, eh Bolls?" he asked after a moment of silence.

"Gene, this is Molly, my daughter. Her eh… godfather has just dropped her off here."

Gene raised an eyebrow in surprise. "Just like that, without lettin' you know in advance?"

Alex hesitated for a while. "Yes, it was an…emergency. So from now on she'll be staying with me again. Isn't that great?"

"Yeah it is Bolly, great news."

Having said that, he walked over to Molly and stuck out his hand.

"Nice to meet yer Molly, I'm Gene 'unt. I've 'eard a lot about you."

Molly, still overwhelmed by the whole situation, hesitated a moment before shaking his hand.

"Nice to meet you too, Mr. Hunt."

"Now, there's no need to go all formal on me. You can call me Gene", he said as he gave her a reassuring wink.

He was slightly strange, Molly had thought to herself, but she realised she liked him. He seemed like a nice man. Her mum obviously liked him too, Molly could tell that by the way she looked at him. She had never seen her mum look at any man, the way she looked at Gene Hunt. And it gave Molly a feeling of reassurance, as though for the first time in her life, things would drastically change, in a good way.
Her mum had gone off to get dressed, so she was left alone in the sitting room with Gene. Both felt uncomfortable, and didn't quite know what to say. After a few minutes, Gene got his act together, and made an attempt at starting a conversation.

"Happy to be back with yer mum then Molly?"

Molly nodded. "Yes I've never been this happy before. I really missed my mum."

"She missed you too, she never for one moment stopped talking about you."

After Gene had broken the ice, their small talk gradually evolved into a real conversation. By now, Molly felt completely at ease, as she and Gene talked about a variety of topics. After a while, her mum had appeared again, now fully dressed, and she seemed content that they got along so well already.

Then there had been the problem of living arrangements. The flat had only one bedroom. Her mum had said she'd figure something out, but Gene had come up with a better and easier solution. He suggested they'd move in with him, after all, he had two bedrooms. Molly noticed her mother's hesitation, but eventually she agreed to it. Molly had no idea how involved Gene and her mum really were, but the fact that he had his own key to her flat, and that he'd suggested for the two of them to move in with him, made it seem like they were in a pretty serious relationship.

Gene had never properly moved into his flat, even though he had been living there for nearly 3 years. Many boxes were still unpacked, and the spare room, now to become Molly's room, was a mess. So the 3 of them cleared out the flat, unpacked the boxes, and soon the flat had turned into a rather nice looking place.

The first week they'd all lived together had been a bit awkward, but soon everyone started to get used to the new living arrangements. Since summer had started, and both her mum and Gene had to work, Molly came with them to the station most days. She liked it there. She spend a lot of time talking to Shaz, whom she'd instantly bonded with. When it was a quiet day in CID, they read a lot of magazines and listened to music on Shaz's walkman. A walkman! She had only seen those on TV, and once she'd found an old one of her mum's in a box in the attic. She didn't miss much, but sometimes she wished she could have her iPod, it was so much more practical than a walkman.

When her mum had a day off, they would do fun things together. After having been apart for such a long time, they both felt they had to make the most of their time together now. Sometimes Gene came along too, unless they went shopping of course. Like most men, Gene hated shopping with a passion. On Sundays they would go to the park, or they would go swimming. And one time Gene had taken them on a trip to the countryside, something they hardly ever did in 2008.
It was a good summer, and Molly dreaded the end, when she would have to go back to school. She was worried. Would she fit in? It was 1983 after all, perhaps the children would be very different here. Perhaps they wouldn't have anything in common with them, and nothing to talk about. Her mum tried to comfort her, telling her that she needn't worry. Children in the 80's were the same as they were in 2008, interested in music, television and shopping. She did give her a long talk about which topics to avoid. Anything that had to do with computers, internet, mobile phones and CDs was obviously off limits. She'd also have to be careful during history classes. There was still a cold war going on, Russia was called the USSR, 9/11 hadn't happened yet, and princess Diana was still very much alive. And there was much more stuff like this to remember. Molly wrote everything down, and just hoped she wouldn't let anything slip.

Her first day of school hadn't been half bad. She had been very nervous, hadn't been able to eat anything, and according to her mum she looked very pale. At school she was sat next to a girl named Alice. At first they'd both been very shy, but by the end of the day they were chatting away as though they'd known each other forever. When she'd gotten home that day, and told her mum about how great her school was and that she'd already made a friend, she'd been very pleased for her.
But Molly noticed that something was wrong, her mum was acting strange. It had started with a nasty flu, which Molly hoped she wouldn't catch, as it was the beginning of term. The flu didn't go away, but still her mum continued to go to work every day. It worried Molly. After about a week, Alex had sat her down for a talk.

"Molls, I have something very important to tell you. But before I go on, I just want you to know I love you very very much, and I hope you won't be upset by what I'm about to tell you."

Molly's heart started beating really fast. What on earth is going on, she thought to herself. She had a look of fear in her eyes, and her bottom lip started trembling.

"M-mum, y-y-you're not sick are you? Please tell me you're not, please tell me you're okay!"

"NO nothing like that darling, I'm not sick, don't worry. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you!"

"Then what's wrong?" Molly asked, still sounding unsure.

"Nothing's wrong Molls." Alex smiled at her. "I'm pregnant."

It took Molly a moment to let her mum's words sink in, but then a broad smile appeared on her face, as she pulled her mum into a hug.

"That's great news mum!"

"So you like it then? You're not upset or anything?" Alex asked.

"No not at all, I think it's great! Why would I be upset about something like this?"

"Well it's just that there have been a lot of changes over the last few months, for all of us, so I wasn't sure how you would react to yet another major change to our lives."

Molly couldn't stop smiling. "I love it, I've always wanted to have a baby sister!"

Alex looked at her and raised an eyebrow. "Just a sister?"

"Well, I guess a brother wouldn't be that bad either", she said teasingly.

"Good to know." Her mum smiled at her.

"So does this mean we'll be moving soon then? After all, we haven't got an extra bedroom."

"We're already looking at houses, so as soon as we've found one, we'll move", her mum replied.

Molly snapped out of her daydreaming as she heard a voice calling from downstairs, it was her mum.

"Molls, dinner's ready!"

"Be right there!", she replied.

It had taken her mum and Gene another 2 months to find a house, and they'd only moved in last week. It was a very nice 4 bedroom house, with a garden, not too far from the station and her school. It was definitely a lot better than Gene's old flat, although that hadn't been too bad either, but a real house was much better.
Molly glanced at her clock. She had sat here daydreaming for over an hour, and she'd planned to finish her homework before dinner. She shrugged her shoulders. She'd probably finish it later, and if she didn't, she could use the recent move as an excuse at school.

She jumped up, and ran downstairs, where a nice family dinner awaited.

To be continued...


Author's note: This story will get at least another chapter, preferably 2 or 3 more, but I don't know when this will happen. So far, none of it has been written yet.
Thank you so much to everyone who's been reading and reviewing so far, I really appreciate it!! xx