Happy 4th :) 21 days to go until Christmas :) Thanks again to Dinabar, Lizzi, Amy and Em (you're not hopeless!) for reviewing – hugs and kisses coming your way :) Hope you like this one!

Love Flossie xxx

Wednesday 4th December 2019

-6.50am

Harry Cunningham groaned as the alarm clock began to blare, rolling over and slamming his hand down on the sleep button wearily. Just 5 more minutes, he told himself, pulling the duvet up over his head. He would heave himself out of bed in 5 more minutes, but not just now.

"Harry?"

He pushed back the bedclothes at the sound of his name, rolling over to face Nikki to his left. Her eyes were still closed; the pile of tissues overflowing off her bedside table behind her suggesting that whatever it was she had been suffering from the night before, it had only gotten worse overnight.

"Harry, was that our alarm?" she asked blearily, half-awake, her voice hoarse-sounding and croaky, barely more than a whisper. "Harry come on, we need to get up."

"No, I do," Harry corrected her, wrapping his arms around her waist as he pulled her in close, pressing a soft kiss to the top of her head. "You're not going anywhere. Joycelin didn't even have any voice last night and she was sick yesterday so we can't send her into school. And you're not well either, so you can stay at home with her today and take it easy, hey?"

"But that's not fair, Harry, I had yesterday off with her," Nikki protested weakly, rubbing at her eyes as if in an attempt to wake herself up, convince him that really she was fine. "You were really tired last night too, you should take today off. I'll be fine."

"No you won't," Harry told her firmly, pulling away and dragging himself out of bed at last. "Look, I'm up now, and I've got outstanding PMs to complete, it makes more sense for you to be the one who takes the day off." He wandered around to Nikki's side of the bed now, leaning over to kiss her softly. "Go back to sleep, OK? I'll go and check on Joycelin, sort her out; you just go back to sleep. Do you want anything? Water? Tissues? Lemsip? Hot water bottle?"

"Water would be great, thanks," Nikki murmured sleepily, kicking away the bedclothes and stretching out across the bed like a cat in the sun. "Too hot," she complained weakly.

"I know," Harry sighed sympathetically, brushing her hair away from her face gently. "I know, go back to sleep. You'll feel better when you wake up, OK? I promise."

Harry emerged from the bathroom a short while later to find Nikki fast asleep, duvet thrown on the floor and his pillows now firmly on her side of the bed, pressed against the small of her back. Even from the wardrobe at the other side of the bed he could tell she had broken into a cold sweat in the brief time he had been in the shower, the glass of water he had left for her on her bedside table empty. A part of him was almost glad that their daughter still wasn't well enough to go into school, otherwise, there would have been no stopping her going into work, something which clearly was the last thing she needed right now. In all honesty, he hated the idea of leaving her, wanted nothing more than to stay at home and look after her, but knew at the same time that it wasn't fair to leave poor Leo down two pathologists at once. No, he was just going to have to leave Nikki and Joycelin to look after each other for today and try to get home early that evening. It was only a few hours, he told himself, dressing quickly and leaving the bedroom as quietly as possible as so not to wake her, swinging the door closed behind him.

"Joycelin!" Harry called softly as he pushed open his daughter's bedroom door slowly, flicking on the light. "Joycelin?"

But the room was empty, the bed made and curtains drawn, revealing the dull grey sky and absent sun.

"Joycelin?" Harry called, frowning as he wandered down the hallway towards the lounge. "Josi, are you in here?"

He could hear her voice coming from the corner of the living room as he opened the door; clearly she was talking to someone. But who? Nikki was still in bed…?

"Josi, who are you talking to?" Harry asked as he entered the room, spotting his daughter sat at the computer in the corner. His daughter turned round as she heard him, still in her pyjamas, revealing a lilac stuffed elephant sat on the desk next to the computer screen, webcam perched precariously on top.

"Morning, Dad!" she smiled brightly; her voice was still hoarse though she neither looked nor sounded anything like as ill as she had the previous evening. "I'm on Skype," she offered by way of an explanation, as matter as fact as could be. Harry hadn't even been aware that his 8 year old knew how to work Skype by herself; he and Nikki had allowed her to use it to talk to her 'relatives' in South Africa in the past, mostly due to her and Martha running up the phone bill, but never had she been shown how to work it herself. Children these days really were growing up too fast.

"Jasper says hi." Joycelin told Harry now, beginning to turn back to the computer screen.

"Hang on, Jasper?" Harry repeated. Jasper was Leo and Janet's middle child, and Joycelin's best friend. "Josi, why on earth are you on Skype to Jasper at quarter past seven in the morning? I know you're not going to school today, but he still has to, and you're not exactly helping Grandma and Granddad get your cousins to school on time, are you? You can bet your Granddad's going to be having words with me later."

"It's fine Uncle Harry, we don't know if we're going to school yet, either," Jasper explained brightly from the computer screen, his voice slightly distorted by the speakers. "Mummy's just checking to see if school is open today."

"Really?" Harry asked sceptically, crossing the room to perch beside Joycelin at the computer. "And why wouldn't school be open today?"

"Because it's snowing, Daddy!" Joycelin told him excitedly, giving her father the mock look of exasperation her mother often used when Harry came up with something stupid, missed something obvious. "Haven't you seen?"

"I saw it last night," Harry told her now, moving over to look out the window. "But I didn't think there was enough of it to… " He cut off as he reached the window, suddenly confronted with a Christmas-card-like view of West London stretched out before him. To say it had been snowing was an understatement: even from their first floor flat, he could see quite clearly that the road and pavement below was smothered completely in a blanket of thick white snow, so far unspoiled by car tracks, footprints, nothing. There were no longer any snowflakes falling past the window, but there was a thick layer of snow covering the window sill, the roof of the block of flats opposite, the tops of the street lights; the cars parked along the sides of the road the only indication as to where the road itself ended and the pavement began. Now that the sun was beginning to make an appearance and the sky had paled in complexion it seemed to blend with the snowy ground, the horizon blurred and uncertain as wintery London seemed to stretch on for eternity. "Oh."

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Joycelin beamed happily. "I don't think anyone's tried to get out of our road yet, but Jasper says their neighbour tried to leave their estate and his car got stuck in the snow! Granddad's gone to try and help him get it started." Why was it, Harry wondered, that the world grinding to a standstill was so exciting through the eyes of an 8 year old, whilst the adults around them were too busy worrying about the logistics of life to relax and enjoy it all?

"He has, has he? Jasper? When your dad gets back, can you ask him to phone me, please?" Harry asked. It certainly sounded like Leo was not going to be able to get into work, which meant that either he would declare the Lyell Centre closed for the day and give everyone the day off, or he would be all the more determined for Harry to get in to the lab so that at least one pathologist was there. And Harry was desperately hoping Leo would go for the first option; not only would it mean that he could stay at home and look after Nikki, but it also meant that he would be able to take his daughter to the park for a snowball fight, something he had been desperate to introduce her to for years, but never had the opportunity to do. Today was just the perfect day for it… the snow was still so fresh, so untouched, his daughter's first proper glimpse of snow and therefore the most special, the one she would remember in years to come. And that meant it simply had to be just that: the most special.

-7.29am

"Daddy?" Joycelin asked as she threw Ollie the elephant up onto the kitchen counter before clambering up and sitting down beside the microwave, using the cupboard door handles as foot holes. "Daddy, so are you or aren't you going into work today?"

"Not sure yet, darling," Harry told her, rummaging around in the cupboard above the kettle for the coffee jar. "I'm waiting for your granddad to phone and tell me whether or not he wants me to try and get into work, though whether or not I'll actually manage to get there even if he does is another matter altogether. And anyway, what have I told you about sitting on the counter?"

"But it's the only way of reaching the microwave!" Joycelin protested, pouting at her father as her face twisted into a near perfect replica of Nikki's when he stole her coffee.

"Then ask Santa for a stool for Christmas. Now come on, down. I'll get your breakfast out the microwave for you."

"But I'm grown up now!" Joycelin complained, jumping down from the kitchen counter begrudgingly. "I can get my own breakfast out of the microwave!"

"Not if you can't reach it!" Harry teased her. "Now listen, darling, Mummy's not feeling very well today, I think she's got your virus. So if I have to go into work today, then you're going to look after her for me, aren't you?"

"Of course I will," Joycelin told him sincerely, now rummaging around in the cutlery drawer for a spoon, before stopping, her ears pricking up as she heard the phone begin to ring. "I'll get it!"

"No, let me, it's probably Granddad wanting to tell…" Harry began, but not before his daughter had clambered up the kitchen counter on the opposite side of the room, grabbing the phone off of the base.

"Hello? Hi, Granddad!" she called excitedly, absent-mindedly walking her stuffed elephant across the toaster. "I'm fine, thank you; I'm feeling much better now… Ja, he's here, would you like to speak to him? It's Granddad," she explained to Harry, holding out the phone. "He wants to speak to you."

"Well, I could have told you that," Harry said, feigning annoyance, taking the phone from Joycelin and holding out a cup of coffee to her. "Can you be really, really helpful and go and put that on Mummy's bedside table while I speak to your granddad? But don't wake her, OK? You promise? Hi Leo," he greeted his friend warmly, leaning back against the kitchen table. "How are you on this wonderful snowy morning? Still stuck on the col-de-sac?"

"Afraid so," Leo sighed. "Hang on, how did you…?"

"From Josi, who got it from Jasper via Skype- don't ask," Harry told him. "So you're not going to be able to get to the Lyell Centre today, I take it?"

"Probably not," Leo admitted. "We're completely snowed in down here, what about you?"

"Not sure, haven't tried yet. Though for a road that's supposedly been gritted, it's looking positively snowy out there."

"Not really worth bothering, then," Leo concluded. "Charlie's already phoned, all the over ground trains into London have been cancelled so she can't get in either; I would suggest you and Nikki try to get out and you could drop Joycelin round here for the day- school's closed so our lot are at home. But Nikki's not well, is she?"

"No, she seems to have caught Josi's cold," Harry sighed. "Although Josi actually seems much better this morning- if you're sure you don't need me to try and get into work then I might take her down to the park for a snowball fight."

"Yep, I'm positive, you have fun," Leo assured him. "I'll phone the coroner and tell her we're all snowed in, there's no point fighting our way into work when we could have fun throwing snowballs at our children in the park, is there?"

"No point at all," Harry agreed. "Thanks, Leo."

"Don't mention it. It's only winter for a few weeks a year, Harry, there's no point wasting it."

-9.48am

"Nikki?" Harry called softly as he stepped into their bedroom, peering slowly around the door and spotting her sleeping form curled up under the covers, long blonde curls spread delicately across the pillows. "Nikki, sweetheart?" He crouched down beside his fiancé and shook her shoulders gently, feeling more than just a little guilty as she moaned a little under her breath, blinking up at him blearily, still half-asleep as she became slowly aware of his presence.

"Harry?" she asked slowly, finally managing to force her eyes open, though her voice still confused, as though she wasn't quite awake still, not quite with him. "Harry, what…? What time is it?"

"Almost 10," Harry told her gently, running his hands through her hair in a comforting gesture. "How are you feeling?"

"Like crap," Nikki mumbled weakly, tiredly, pulled the duvet up around her shoulders. "Why aren't you at work?"

"Because it's been snowing like crazy out there, no one can get into work and so Leo's declared the Lyell Centre closed for the day," Harry explained, moving to perch on the edge of the bed as his arms snaked around Nikki's waist. "Listen, Josi's feeling much better this morning, she's desperate to get out in the snow and I don't think I can hold her off any longer."

"You mean you can't wait to get out there and pelt her with snowballs," Nikki murmured sleepily, her face breaking into a smile.

"Well, that too," Harry admitted. "So, I'm going to dig her gumboots out now and take her over to the park. You don't want to come, do you?"

Nikki just shook her head, eyes now firmly closed as she buried her head into the pillow. "Just want to sleep."

"OK," Harry said softly, pushing the duvet gently around her body until she was wrapped in a warm duvet cocoon. "OK. We won't be long, we'll just be over the road; I'll take my mobile and call if you need anything, alright? I love you," he whispered, his hand lingering on Nikki's arm a little longer. "Go back to sleep, OK?"

-10.23am

"Daddy?" Joycelin called across the park to Harry, her hands stretched out in front of her as she tried to catch one of the newly falling snowflakes in her hands, her face lighting up in wonder as one landed on her glove and promptly melted away. "Daddy, will you help me?"

"Depends what with," Harry teased her, wandering over to where his daughter had been busily rolling snowballs, one, Harry reasoned, almost the size of her. "If you want me to help you lift one of those up so you can throw it at me, you can forget it."

She paused for a moment, contemplating. "OK. So how about if I wanted you to lift it up for me, but to put it on top of the big one to make a snowman, not to throw it at you?"

"Well, I suppose…" He lifted up the second snowball and balanced it on top of the first, stepping back to admire his handiwork. "Perfect. Now all we need is a carrot."

"A carrot?" Joycelin repeated. "What do you want a carrot for?"

"For his nose, of course! Come on, Josi, use your imagination!"

"Oh! But… where exactly are we going to get a carrot?"

He reached into his pocket now, pulling out the carrot he had grabbed out of the fridge earlier. "How about this one?"

"Daddy? Why have you got a carrot in your pocket?"

"For occasions such as this. There you go, I'll try and find some stones for his eyes and mouth," Harry told her, turning away and crouching down in the snow. "Josi?"

"Hmm?" she said, turning around to face her father, too late to move out of the way of the large snowball hurtling towards her, hitting her square in the chest. "You are so going to pay for that!" she laughed, crouching down to form her own snowball.

"Whatever you say, Josi," Harry grinned, picking up his second snowball and taking aim. "Whatever you say."