Summary:
Molly visits her father's grave; Sherlock finds her there. Sad with a happy ending!
Notes:
Flufftober fic for Oct 19th- "Flowers"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*August 13, 2019*
The summer sun beats down as Molly exits the flower shop. She is beyond thrilled that it's a bright and sunny day, instead of having ever dreary London rain. Usually, she would be busy behind the slab, performing an autopsy at this time, but not today. Today is the day that she takes off of work every year, a day she uses to reflect on her life and how blessed she really is, despite how many things had gone wrong in the past. She looks down at the pink bundle of carnations in her hand and gently strokes the petals, reminiscing about the good years of her childhood that he spent with her father and little brother in their little family cabin; the one she had inherited and hadn't visited in a while. Those quickly fleeting, yet tender five years from when she was thirteen to eighteen years old.
She makes a mental note to visit the cabin with Sherlock as her happy memories fade to sadness, her thoughts morphing into how Matty probably felt having his only loving parent die at such a young age; he was only five when their dad got custody and ten when he died of lung cancer, a symptom of fighting in the war. When he had served his tour and decided not to renew, he came back home to them. It was at that time that he saw how completely changed his wife was, and how she had been treating Molly. It horrified him enough to quickly file for divorce and for custody, which was thankfully obvious to the judge. Their mother had gone to prison for the abuse Molly had endured, and despite knowing it's probably wrong, she doesn't give a damn if she had died there. She never wanted to see her again and that still stands, no matter what the current state of affairs may be. The only thing that provides Molly solace is that Matthew was only two at the time and her mother saw him as too weak to take out her drunken hate-filled urges on.
Though her experience was rough, and she remembers the abuse of their mother more vividly than him, she still got more time with their father, being eight years older. That left her, an eighteen-year-old orphan-by-choice (since there was no way she would subject Matthew to the abusive whims of their mother, if she were even free at the time), to raise him on her own. Lots of other bad things ended up happening from the time she was eighteen to the time she had raised Matthew to that age and had reluctantly agreed to let him follow their father's footsteps and enlist, despite how much crying ensued after agreeing.
Molly takes a sniff of the flowers once she slips into the driver's seat of her yellow VW Beetle, before placing them on the passenger side. She always wishes Matthew were home for anniversaries or holidays or birthdays, but she knows that he is serving to honor their dad and that's his way of connecting to him. It's been ten years and he had renewed his contract once already, but she selfishly wishes he comes home this year instead of renewing again.
Suddenly snapping out of her daydreams, she realizes that she had pulled into the cemetery; her conscious brain must have taken her the familiar route to his grave.
Grabbing the flowers, she gets out and makes the walk down the small path to her dad's headstone.
{Mark D. Hooper
April 20, 1941 – August 13, 1997
Beloved Father}
Next to his is a tiny cross marker that says "Declan Mark Hooper", without a date. She had added it when she had miscarried about a year after her father died (a pregnancy which resulted from her being assaulted, but she was committed to loving the child. She was depressed and anorexic at the time and used to blame herself, but had learned to cope with everything through therapy).
