The thick summer heat of L.A was almost overwhelming, causing each carefully positioned palm tree to recoil into themselves, and if not for the slight breeze that caused each overindulged leaf to sway and float, they might have already shrivelled up into themselves by now. The suffocating heat was doing nothing for the two jet-lagged and hungry children as their mother urged them along towards the front door of a reasonably sized white house. 

“Nicky, don’t kick that yet,” Helena said over her shoulder, stuffing the keys to a rental car back into her bag before knocking three times at the door. Ignoring his mother’s words, Nicky continued to kick his ball, accidentally hitting his younger sister in the back of her legs and causing her to indignantly yelp out his name. “Nicky, please! Just hold the ball and come here,” Helena repeated, trying to calm her expression when she noticed a shadow appearing behind the window in the large door. 

Within seconds the door had been dragged open and two grinning men appeared before the small family. “Helena!” Andrew cried, face almost splitting with the joy at seeing her, and quickly enveloped his arms around her. “I haven’t seen you in too long,” He said into her ear as Helena hugged him back with a large smile, his excitability apparently contagious. 

Having witnessed their uncle’s reaction to seeing their mother, neither Leah nor Nicky were at all surprised when Andrew then proceeded to beam down at them and open his arms for a joint hug. Although they hadn’t seen much of him, the children remembered their uncle as the family member who would entertain them whilst sitting through boring family get togethers, and so hurriedly ran into his embrace, squealing and laughing when Andrew lifted them both up together before carefully dropping them back down to the ground. “Haven’t you two gotten so big since I last saw you?” He asked, grinning down at them before moving aside and gesturing towards the man stood behind him, “You remember Peter, right?” He asked, his eyes lingering on his partner’s face as the dark haired American stepped forward.

“Of course, hello Peter, it’s nice to see you again,” Helena grinned, pulling her (she suspected) soon-to-be-brother-in-law into a hug.