The windows were open but for once the street outside lay in relative quiet as rush hour gave way to dusk. Molly Hooper-Holmes looked up from her laptop to check on her girls, since too much quiet didn't necessarily bode well in a house with children.
Imogen sat with Clementine, pasting photos and mementos into a scrap book. Clementine's chubby hands had just learned to master the little scissors and the glue stick, though she needed her sister's help with proper placement.
The older girl gave up trying to tuck her long hair behind her ear after the third time a glue backed photo stuck to the strands, and tied her hair in a knot at her nape, security it with a pencil. She looked up and caught her mother staring.
"What?" she said, with a touch of adolescent paranoia.
"Nothing," Molly said lightly. "I'm allowed to look at my daughters, right?" She took a sip of tea.
"I suppose," Imogen said, winking at her mother and going back to her work. Molly turned back to her laptop.
Clementine had been a bit of a surprise. An accident as Sherlock bluntly put it, but Molly insisted on the softer term. Imogen had been ten when Molly had gone to the doctor thinking she had started menopause and come out with the news she was pregnant. She had dreaded telling Imogen more than she had telling Sherlock, but both took the news beautifully. Imogen decided that the baby belonged to her right from the start and had been an absolutely devoted big sister. There were some moments of discord, when it sank in that the girl would really and truly have to share her parents' affections, but Sherlock had sat down with her and reasoned through it, and things had gone smoothly after, at least compared to the horror stories of sibling rivalry Molly had heard about from friends and colleagues.
"Mummy?"
"Yes, Clemmy?"
"Dada's home."
Molly looked at her watch. Still half an hour before they could even begin to expect Sherlock. "How do you know, sweetie?"
"Someone on the street said hi to him and he said hello back!" She ran over to her mother and put her hands on her knee. "He's home." When the door opened downstairs, followed by the sound of Sherlock's feet on the stairs, Clementine twirled and squealed. Her father walked in the door, brow furrowed but barely suppressing a smirk.
"Molly is that the tea kettle?" He said, looking around but not down at the little girl hugging him around his knees.
"It's me!" Clementine said. Sherlock looked down and gaped in mock surprise.
"Well, look at that." He bent down and swooped the three year old up. "You sound like you're suffering from cabin fever." He ruffled her chestnut curls and kissed her on the nose.
"Mummy says we're still not over our colds enough to go out but it's so nice out I want to go to the park."
"We'll go to the park as soon as Mummy gives the all clear. And, I've been round to the other flat. The builders said we can go home next week.
"Thank God," Imogen said. "Baker Street is fine for a few days but Clemmy kicks like crazy at night and I hate having to get up so early to get to school. It's bollocks."
"Immy, language!" Molly said, getting up to kiss Sherlock on the cheek. She ran her hand affectionately through his still curly though now salt and pepper hair, marveling at how distinguished he looked at fifty.
It had been a trying month, the four of them crammed into the Baker Street flat while the kitchen in their Chelsea flat was renovated. They'd moved out of this one when Imogen was a toddler, after realizing it could never be properly childproofed without destroying its charm. Sherlock kept it so that John and he could have a base of operations.
"Curse words are a social construct, Mummy," Imogen said primly as she put away the craft supplies. "What really makes my saying 'bollocks' any worse than if I'd said 'irritating'?"
Molly gave Sherlock a pleading look, but he shrugged. The last thing Molly wanted to say was "Because I said so," so she sighed and decided this battle could be forfeited.
"Fine," she conceded. "But don't say it around Clemmy, since her teachers won't understand. Or around either of your grandmothers."
Immy smiled, an enormous grin identical to her father's. "So, what's for dinner?"
Molly groaned. "I hadn't even thought about it, I've been so swamped with this paper. Indian?"
"On it," Sherlock said. He kissed Molly on the forehead, deposited Clementine in her lap and swooped up the laptop in a series of graceful movements that still left Molly breathless.
Molly looked down at Clementine, her little surprise, and hugged her tightly. "Are you happy, Mummy?" her youngest asked.
"Yes, sweetheart. The happiest."