A/N: This work is my Sherlolly Secret Santa gift for Ukthxbye, who requested a fake-married canon-compliant Sherlolly fic. You'll find not-so-subtle clues as to which episodes the scenes fill in for in each chapter. Cross-posted to AO3.

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It was during an uncommon lull before the holidays, when London's criminal element seemed to have taken an interlude from evildoing to take part in their own Yuletide celebrations, that Sherlock found himself in a hotel lobby, staring at rows of neatly arranged name tags, all laid out in alphabetical order.

He sighed as he picked his up—Sherlock H. +1––and did his best to ignore the overly-cheery woman who presided over her little army of laser-printed labels. He watched her adjust the names to fill in the gap his tag left behind, as his phone chimed and vibrated from inside his coat pocket.

"Hey, mate," John's text read. God, he only called him "mate" when he was trying to butter him up. "Jeanette's just rang, turns out she's free tonight, so…" Sherlock stopped reading there, thrilled at having escaped what would have been a thoroughly mortifying evening being John Watson's plus-one. He was about to rip the name tag off his coat lapel when he heard his name called.

"Sherlock!" Molly exclaimed. He turned to see Molly Hooper, minus her familiar lab coat and blue gloves, looking surprised but no less pleased to see him. She was dressed smartly, in low-heeled shoes, fitted trousers, and a polished top. He saw that she already had a Molly H., St. Bartholomew's Hospital tag on her blouse. She also wore her hair down, save for a festive, bright red barrette that kept her hair from her face, just above her left ear. It took several beats for his brain cells to register what was different about her, when he realised this was the first time he'd seen her outside of Bart's. "Hi! What are you doing here?"

"I was supposed to be here with John, but he had better plans." He waved his phone with the text still illuminating the screen for emphasis.

"Right," Molly said knowingly, elongating the vowel just a bit. "Oh, what's her name's––Jeanette's schedule finally opened up, did it?" she asked, a wry smile quirked her lips.

Sherlock returned her with a smirk of his own. "Essentially."

"Well, if you're staying, you can be my plus-one," she offered, a faint blush creeping up her cheeks.

Suddenly the prospect of being home alone seemed less attractive than it did a couples minutes ago, for reasons he could not think of at the moment. He clicked off his phone and put it in his pocket. With an outstretched arm and a slight nod, he gestured toward the table laden with light refreshments and followed Molly in the direction of the biscuits he'd had his eye on earlier.

Over plates of small sandwiches and ginger nuts, they discussed plans for the holidays. Sherlock, who was now very grateful for an audience, told Molly that John was going to his sister's for Christmas on a misguided belief that she had finally quit drinking.

"Oh, sorry," she cried sympathetically, and his heart warmed. "But isn't there a Christmas do at Baker Street next week?" she asked in consolation. "At least everyone will be there then."

He contemplated this and his face softened, as he reached to fill his plate with more ginger nuts.

Several minutes later, he and Molly found themselves in a rather intriguing conversation with a doctor of medical virology. They discussed applications of the field in criminal cases.

"Sorry, if you'll both excuse me," Molly interrupted, swishing her plastic cup of half-drunk, overly-sweet lemonade. "I just need the ladies'."

From the corner of his eye, Sherlock followed her as she ducked in direction of the loos.

"Your wife is tremendously good at what she does."

Sherlock blinked. "Sorry, who?"

"Er, Dr. Hooper, M-Molly… who was just here?"

"Oh," he began, emitting it more as a sound rather than an indication of understanding, until his gaze was pulled downward and he remembered his name tag. "OH! Yes!" For a fraction of a second, the words stayed with him: wife, Molly, married. He let them linger in his head, like the first, unfamiliar sip of wine. The only context for which the word "married" passed his lips was when he'd tell people he was married to his work. He certainly did not have time for mundane, trivial things like emotions because there was The Work to attend to, he wanted to explain. But because the virologist was beginning to look at him oddly and because he found no point in particular to disagree with, really, he added simply, "She is. She's incomparable."

"Well. I'd best circulate. You've got my card. Pleasure to meet you, Sherlock."

"Thank you. Likewise."

When Molly returned, she asked after the absent virologist. "Did I miss anything while I was gone?"

"No," he said decisively, looking everywhere else but at her. "Let's mingle, shall we?"

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Comments and feedback are greatly appreciated! :)