Ok so you raised a point when you said Molly was a hot dude and now I can't let it go. Seriously can you talk about Crossdressing Hot Dude Molly trying to fend off Victorian ladies because they think 'he' is so handsome and Molly's internal reaction because now I want to know!
Hooper is a doctor after all. Not quite as well respected a profession at the time as it is now but, steady income and all. Especially since he deals with the dead and there will never be a shortage there.
And he’s got all that dashing hair. (She keeps her hair cut short and wears wigs when she’s out as a woman, because that’s a lot easier than hiding a few feet of hair in a wig and she spends most of her time as a man [and maybe that somehow feels more like home anyway.]) He’s on the small side but so are Victorian ladies and not everyone wants a Byron. Some prefer a John Keats type.
And luckily the rules of etiquette mean that Hooper’s interactions with unknown ladies are kept to a minimum, but he sees the glances. And shop girls aren’t as beholden to etiquette rules, as long as they’re making a sale and aren’t in plain sight of the floor walker.
Sometimes he wonders what it would be like to take up the offer of one of the ladies lounging in dark doorways as he makes his way to a crime scene in the middle of the night. Would she be appalled when the bindings were revealed, or laugh and say she’d seen everything and this warn’t anything new?
Once, there was a flower seller near the hospital, with a smart green hat set fetchingly over brown curls. They met one day when the woman’s hat had blown off in the street and Hooper had retrieved it, dodging two hansoms and an omnibus to do so. The girl, Violet was her name, gave Hopper some lavender for his buttonhole. He’d come back nearly every day that spring and through the small talk allowed while making transactions (a buttonhole some days, daisies for his dining table on others) he learns that she wants to study for a nurse. That she has four brothers. That her favorite flower is lily of the valley. That her father is from Algeria and her mother from Spain. That her dimples may be the most charming thing Hooper has ever seen.
At home Hooper begins to wonder if being around men all the time has made her start to think like one. But she can remember being fascinated with more than one schoolmate’s smile--even when she had to wear dresses and stockings every day--and that some of them had been girls. She contemplates going to see Violet in her dress and corset, even though it’s all gotten hopelessly out of fashion, with its bustle and tight sleeves.
Sitting by her fire, rubbing liniment over her aching ribs, she imagines befriending Violet as a woman. She could say she’s the doctor’s sister if Violet notices the resemblance. They would be free to keep each other’s company in almost any setting then. Luncheons. Tea. Theatre. She sometimes misses those small intimacies in the private moments of the women’s sphere. And it would be more appropriate for a female friend to help Violet with her studies, would it not?
But, that would be deceitful, and so far, Hooper’s deceit has been for the greater good, not for selfish gains.
And what if Violet only likes her as a man. What if--God forbid--her interest is only a ruse to sell more flowers?
Or, what if it’s not, and Violet does see Hooper as a man. As an interesting man. As a potential mate?
This is why, for all the charm of his outward appearance, Hooper’s usual demeanor is prickly and gruff.
It is with some relief, but more than a little pain, then, when Violet tells him one morning that she’s going to Bristol for her studies. She shyly asks if Hooper will write, and he begins to say that he can’t, but when he opens his mouth he says he shall try.
“Funny thing,” Violet says as she hands Hooper his change. “I still want to be a nurse, but I hear there’s more and more women training as doctors. Maybe one of these days, it’ll be as common as daisies.”
