Molly sighed, staring down at the long list of names that still awaited her on her clipboard. There'd been a lot of activity in the morgue lately – fifteen bodies in just the last few days, and that was nothing compared to the activity of her living colleagues, most notably Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock had been in and out of the morgue almost constantly over the last week, and he'd made yet another entrance just that morning, but for once, Molly wasn't glad to see him. For whatever reason, Sherlock had been in an incredibly foul mood recently, and his snapping had been almost too much to bear – more than once, he'd nearly reduced Molly to tears with his harsh tones, and, of course, Sherlock being Sherlock, he hadn't even noticed. She'd decided that a case must be going badly – Sherlock was the exact opposite when his work was going well, like an overly energetic pup in pursuit of a hot scent. Rather than face his wrath for the sixth day in a row, Molly determined to avoid Sherlock as best she could today. Luckily, this, at least, proved easy enough, as she had a long list of lab chores to finish and he was spending almost all of his time in the morgue. There was one hairy moment when they found themselves alone in the lab, but Molly determinedly carried on with her work, only making eye contact long enough to catch the brief nod Sherlock sent her way before he left the room once more. Glancing up at the clock, Molly breathed a sigh of relief when she saw she'd made it to lunch unscathed. Only a few more hours, she thought as she tidied her things and headed to the lunchroom.

As she loaded up her plate with steaming pasta, Molly's thoughts drifted again to Sherlock's perplexing behavior. He hadn't even asked her for a cup of coffee all week, never mind requested information about various corpses or flattered her to get extra lab time. She really wanted to ask him what was wrong, but she knew talking about feelings – or talking about anything, for that matter – wasn't his style, so she'd just have to ride this one out. Sighing, she turned to make her way to the seating area and almost ran right into the person in front of her.

"Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry!" Molly cried earnestly as she fumbled to keep her tray from toppling. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, no problem," the man responded, flashing a broad smile. "Is that always how you introduce yourself to people?" he added cheekily.

"Um…no," Molly said, trying not to blush. "Just a bit preoccupied."

"Ah, well," her companion said, nodding thoughtfully, "hard not to be, these days. So much craziness around here, right? Anyways, I'm Jim, from IT. I'm kinda new around here, so…mind if I join you?" Molly took a second to study him. He was of middling height, trimly built, and his large, chocolate-brown eyes had a bit of a twinkle to them. Ok, Molly admitted to herself, he's friendly, and kind of cute too. Why not?

"Not at all! I'm Molly, by the way," Molly said, making her way to a table. Jim took the seat across from her and they fell to talking.

"What did you say you do, then?" Jim asked between bites of his sandwich.

"I didn't, but I'm a pathologist," Molly replied.

"Oh, so you actually work with the dead bodies and all? Totally too squeamish for that, I'll stick to my computers. The lab sounds cool though!" Molly liked Jim already – he seemed really enthusiastic and fun.

"Yeah, I guess it is. Although it's not fun at the moment, Sherlock's been hanging around all week and he's not in a good mood."

"Sherlock? Wait…you don't mean…Sherlock Holmes?" Jim's eyes widened.

"Yeah…what about him?"

"You know Sherlock Holmes?" Jim sounded positively astounded.

"Um…well, yeah, I do," Molly admitted, not sure what else to say. She saw Sherlock so often that it never really occurred to her that even other Bart's people didn't. "He comes to the morgue a lot to do investigations for cases, stuff like that."

"I mean, he's only like the best detective ever!" Jim said, sounding more like a little kid than anything else. "He's practically my hero! Do you think…" he paused. "Do you think I could meet him?"

"He's just a person, really," Molly said with a laugh, "but sure, why not? You can come check out the lab, and I'll introduce you. Probably best to wait till this case is closed, whatever it is. Then he might actually acknowledge you in some way that doesn't involve trying to bite your head off."

"Touché," said Jim with a wink. "Head biting is not at the top of my to-do list right now." Molly laughed again. Cute, and a great sense of humor. She was liking this guy more and more. Twirling her pasta on her fork, she said, "So tell me more about yourself. How'd you end up here at Bart's?"

"Oh, nothing fancy really," he replied, brushing her comment aside with a wave of the hand that still held half his sandwich. "I'm just a computer guy. I help make sure there aren't any viruses – computer viruses, not the real stuff you deal with downstairs – so that everything runs smoothly in the labs. The more important question," he continued, fixing his large eyes on Molly's face, "is whether or not you'd like to go to dinner this Friday after work?" He gave her that lopsided grin once more, and Molly couldn't help but respond in kind.

"I'd love to."

"Great! See you then!" They cleared their table and went their separate ways, Molly with a little spring in her step that certainly hadn't been there only moments before.