#and gina has been pretty completely deprived of adults that show her kindness

[kazumasdiary]

so, in 1-5, after you invite gina to dinner and she runs away, ryunosuke says,

"Once she's had a chance to calm down, I think there's a good chance she'll decide to come."

the thing is- gina is a pickpocket living on the streets of east end. most days, she probably doesn't know where her next meal is coming from. and i think ryunosuke realizes this, and that's how he gets to this conclusion- gina would need a really compelling reason to turn down free, guaranteed food.

and on that note, courtesy of my friends- don't think about how, in 2-4, gina says she saw gregson wind his watch at the pub every evening. don't think about how that means gregson took her to the pub every day, because even if he could not guarantee her stability in most areas of life he could at least guarantee that she was eating that day, if nothing else.

but the other thing is that, here, in 1-5, as far as we know, this is the second time sholmes has ever met gina. there's an argument to be made otherwise- gina's weirdly acquiescent to iris's insistence that she come along at the end of 1-3, which could imply they knew each other beforehand- but everything else seems to suggest that case 1-3 is the first time she and iris have ever met. so, when iris takes her back, that would be the first time gina and sholmes ever met, and this moment in the pawnshop marks the second.

which means that sholmes saw a young girl, who he knew to be a pickpocket and therefore likely an orphan, who he had met exactly once before, and before she walks away he makes sure to invite her to dinner.

and none of this is said out loud, because of course it's not. gina hates grown-ups. she says so herself. and that hatred is pretty justified- later, when you speak to her in the prison, she says

If you do wot the grown-ups tell ya, it'll get yer mates dragged off by the coppers. Or worse. I've 'ad it 'appen to me before an'all.

the kids in the east end have no one to look out for them. it's why mcgilded could threaten them so easily. every adult, every authority that should have protected gina has instead been used to hurt her.

so any insinuation that sholmes was trying to help her would have probably resulting in gina throwing something at him. and to be fair, most of the time, sholmes doesn't really try to be respectful or understanding- "a great detective is wont to lie" comes to mind, for one. but if he noticed this, too- if he realized that gina probably didn't know where or if she'd have food that night, and that she'd probably reject any offer of help if it was phrased that way- then this scene becomes one of the moments where he does choose to be tactful, in order to try and give someone what they might need.

(sholmes is, perhaps more aware of the people around him than he lets on, and it's a testament to how well his act is working that it took me until about halfway through case 2-4 to realize it. but that's not the point here.)

the thing is that society, as a whole, has failed gina in a lot of ways. it says something, that gina's stated goal at the end of 1-5 is to become the kind of adult that could protect kids like her- the kind of adult she never had.

but we do see a couple of instances where people choose to do better. they give her a chance, where she might not have gotten one otherwise. they go out of their way to make sure, just in case she hasn't eaten, that she is fed.

sometimes we see people get it right.

(as usual, thank you to @ifidogaysomyself for checking my claims.)