AJ groaned when he woke up. Miranda's night-light was shining a constellation of stars onto the ceiling, and the light was too bright to go back to sleep.

Instead AJ rolled over to peer over the edge of his mattress to make sure his Birthday-twin was alright. Miranda hadn't woken up in the night, or if she had he hadn't heard her.

He was surprised to find Miranda's bed was empty, her pillow gone. The phone was missing too.

Confused AJ got up and wandered out into the corridor.

He pushed open the door to the bathroom, just in case… but the room was empty.

"Miranda!" he whispered as he continued down the hall, listening out for her.

Maybe she had gone back to her own bed?

He wandered down to Miranda's room at the other end of the corridor but she wasn't there either.

AJ was very confused as he headed back to the top of the stairs, if Miranda had got up in the night, surely she would have woken him?

"Miranda!" AJ called out a little louder

Then he heard a thump behind him and the creak of an opening door.

A drowsy headed Gabby was looking at him, clutching a cuddly monkey to her chest as she emerged from her bedroom; Ayesha wandering out behind her.

"AJ, what you doing?" Gabby asked sleepily.

"I was looking for Miranda." He replied. "She wasn't in bed."

"Has she gone for bw-eakfast?" Gabby asked.

"It's too early." said AJ. "I looked at my clock. It's only six."

"Oh." said Gabby.

"In there?" Ayesha asked, pointing towards their mommies' room.

AJ froze, was that a moan he heard coming from the big bedroom?

Together the three kids cautiously pushed open the door.

There were figures asleep in the bed.

Gabby's eyes went wide.

"MOMMY! MAMMA" she exclaimed and quickly scrambled up into the bed, jumping on the two biggest lumps under the duvet.

"Wha… what!" exclaimed Bianca, startled awake. And there was loud groan beside her.

"Mom!" AJ cried in surprise.

Marissa let out a longer moan and reluctantly opened her eyes.

"Morning, buddy!"

Bianca was hugging her youngest daughter and smothering her with kisses. Miranda was sat up beside her, looking very unhappy about the rude awakening. Marissa straightened up slowly and held open her arms welcoming AJ in for a hug.

"Mom, when did you get home?" AJ asked, climbing onto her lap.

"Very late last night." answered Bianca. "Your mommy kindly drove us all the way home."

"I knew we had to get back." said Marissa, giving AJ a quick cuddle.

AJ bit his lip as he looked back at her.

"And daddy?"

Marissa sighed. It felt too early for this kind of question.

"You daddy is going back to hospital. He's still not well. He still has trouble controlling his temper, and so he is going to a special hospital that will help him. But he'll be away for a long time."

"He's not taking me away?" AJ asked; he still looked nervous about the idea.

"No." said Marissa, kissing his cheek. "No one is going to take you away from your family."

AJ smiled happily, and settled into the space in the bed between Marissa and Bianca.

"I'm glad." he said, grinning widely, looking up at both of them.

"Mommy?" asked Gabby, sitting back on Bianca's lap. "You're home!"

"I'm home!" Bianca replied.

"Are you home for good now?" Miranda asked, looking at her mommy hopefully

"I'm home for good." replied Bianca, wrapping her arm around her eldest daughter and pulling her into the family hug.

"And mommy… mommy…" cried Gabby bouncing up and down on her mother's lap.

"I'm listening." said Bianca, laughing at Gabby's enthusiasm.

"You did w-emember that I'm doing your counting today?" she asked.

Gabby was talking about Bianca's morning exercises.

"I remembered." she said, giving her daughter a little tickle.

Bianca then stopped; noticing Ayesha still standing by the bedroom door.

She tapped the bed beside her,

"Do you want to join us?" she asked, welcoming her into the family huddle. The little girl nervously climbed into the foot of the mattress and Gabby crawled down the bed to sit beside her.

"Do we actually know what the time is?" Bianca asked looking across to Marissa.

Marissa turned to glance at her bedside clock.

"Six thirty."

"Six." said Bianca, doing the maths in her head. They'd had around five hours sleep.

"Can we have aminal pancakes for breakfast, I told E'sha all 'bout them?" Gabby asked, she had her arm around her little friend's shoulder and clearly wasn't worried about the time.

Bianca and Marissa shared another look. There was no chance now that they would be going back to sleep.

"Okay." said Bianca with a sigh. "Let's get up and get dressed! It looks like morning is starting early today!"

…