Chapter Text
Sam fidgeted at the front door, listening to the various noises of family life behind it. Little running feet; Nathan’s voice raised in a teasing kind of threat; that big dumb dog of theirs, barking its big dumb head off; Elena yelling at them all to stop fooling around, then giggling as she presumably got caught up in whatever game they were playing.
He knocked again and this time someone heard him. The door whipped open and he was greeted by... the back of Elena’s head as she continued trying to corral her family into some sort of order with feigned seriousness. “Nate, will you just stop? You’re getting her all hyped up. And get the damn dog OFF the couch… Oh, hey Sam!”
“Hey…” But she was already off back down the hall, scooping up various bits of domestic detritus as she went. Sam took a deep breath and followed her in – there was not enough coffee in the world for this, but a promise was a promise…
Elena shot an apologetic smile back at him. “Sorry about the mess, just… step over the piles of laundry. And throw the dog outside if she’s a pain.”
“Is that Sam?” came Nathan’s voice from the kitchen, quickly followed by a smaller, higher voice that made a little twist of affection pull inside Sam’s chest.
“Sammyyyyyyy!”
Nathan was standing at the counter carefully constructing a pretty accurate – if a little wonky - representation of the Parthenon. Out of waffles. His four-year-old Cassie was standing on top of the counter, jiggling around with excitement as she watched her father work. The moment she saw her uncle she made a flying leap into his arms, with no apparent concern that she might not get caught. Sam stumbled with the impact, wrapping his arms around her and grimacing as her teeny hands, sticky with syrup, gripped at his hair.
“Hey, little boots,” he whispered into her neck.
Elena rolled her eyes, “Will you stop encouraging that nickname? My daughter is not a sociopathic Roman emperor.”
“What?” Sam shrugged, jostling Cassie up and down, “It’s not my fault you let this little lunatic run your house. Plus, at last Caligula had style.”
Nathan frowned at his waffle creation and licked syrup off his thumb. “Sam, he made his horse a consul and tried to sleep with his sister,” he muttered scathingly.
“Okay, so no one’s perfect…”
“Look, Sammy! Waffles!” Cassie yelled, temporarily deafening him in one ear. He flinched, nodding obediently. Nope, not enough coffee in the universe...
“I see,” he said, sitting her back down on the counter and pointing a finger at the construction. “You’re, uh, missing a column there on the right, Nathan.”
Nathan looked up with mock sternness. “Yeah well, someone keeps stealing my building materials.”
Cassie, with elephant-like stealth, reached around the back of the plate and grabbed a slice of waffle which unfortunately turned out to be a load-bearing support and the whole thing came crashing – well, smooshing – down. Nathan sighed expansively. “An hour, that took me.”
“Which is why we’re not ready yet,” Elena added, whipping a tea towel at Nathan’s butt. He gave a little yelp but took the hint and scooted off towards the bedroom.
“All right, all right, let me just get my pack.”
“So…” Elena said, half-heartedly trying to scoop up some of the many unwashed dishes covering the kitchen. “We’ll be back by the afternoon. There’s food in the fridge. Try to maybe limit the sugar…?” she nodded significantly at her daughter, who was now lying on her belly on the counter with her face in the pile of waffles, doing a very good imitation of the dog.
Sam nodded, trying to keep a straight face. “Anything else I need to know? She is potty trained, right?”
Elena let out the kind of exasperated sigh that she usually reserved for his brother. “Sam, she’s nearly five. Plus you know when she needs to go because she starts dancing around like her feet are on fire.”
“Ah yeah, Nathan used to do that. Always too busy to stop and pee.”
Elena shot him a strange look. He guessed she forgot that he’d pretty much been his brother’s carer since Nathan was the same age. They stood in silence for a moment, watching Cassie, who was now dangling pieces of waffle over the countertop for the dog to catch.
“Well,” Elena said eventually, “Thanks for today. We appreciate it. Really. It’s nice to have you around more often.”
“Hey, what are uncles for?” He fidgeted, feeling a little hot and awkward under her scrutiny.
“Sammy? Can we play catapult?” Cassie asked suddenly, springing back up and sending the waffle plate spinning.
Elena looked between them with a well-worn expression of suspicion. “What, exactly, does ‘catapult’ involve?”
Sam made hurried shushing gestures towards the kid, “Uhhh, I don’t exactly recall…”
“We take all the cushions off the couch and put them on the floor-“ Cassie explained to her mother, as Sam’s waving became frantic and Elena’s frown deepened.
“And then Sammy lies on his back and I do an aeroplane on his feet, like, on my tummy…” She spread her arms out to the sides and lifted up one leg behind her to demonstrate, but her balance wasn’t great and the counter was slippy with syrup and she pinwheeled for a second before toppling sideways and-
Elena let out a gasp and jolted forwards but Sam was there before her, one safe arm around the little girl’s waist, holding her fast before she got anywhere near the hard tiled floor. A flash of shock and the threat of tears crossed Cassie’s face, but it was soon replaced by a delighted smile when he lifted her up by her leg and held her upside down, studying her as if he'd just pulled a particularly large fish out of a net.
“And your mother doesn’t need to know about the catapult game,” he told her, flipping her back up the right way and setting her down on the floor. Elena shook her head, beyond the point of bothering to argue.
“Catapult?” Nathan strode back into the kitchen, pulling a fresh t-shirt over his head. “Hey, we used to do that when we were kids, remember? You'd throw me over your head and-”
“Jesus, Nathan,” Sam groaned, face in his hands.
“Your daughter’s a fan, too,” Elena told her husband with a tight smile, jerking her chin at Sam.
Nathan looked from Elena to Sam to Cassie and gave a slow nod. “Ah. Well. She’s got good reflexes, right?”
“Yeah, takes after her uncle,” Sam smirked.
Elena crouched down in front of the kid and dusted crumbs off her face. “No catapult today, okay? You’re meant to be taking it easy. All the TV and snacks you like, how does that sound?”
Cassie gave a happy squeal and scampered off to the living room with the dog bounding after her.
Elena straightened up and watched her go, “Despite evidence to the contrary,” she said to Sam, “she’s getting over a really bad cold and needs to rest.”
“Yeah, she looks… really sick,” Sam nodded seriously.
“Thankfully, she took after me rather than her father when it comes to getting sick,” Elena explained.
“What the hell does that mean?” Nathan protested, but Sam’s face split into a dangerous smile, knowing exactly what she meant.
“Right? Like he’s the first person in the world to get a sore throat or a hangover."
“Ohhh hangovers are the worst. And you can’t even be sympathetic because they’re self-inflicted,” Elena bantered, mimicking Nathan in a deep goofy voice, “I think I’m gonna die, I think I’ve got alcohol poisoning, I think my brain is leaking out…”
“Wait, this isn’t fair-” Nathan tried, but his wife and brother had already descended into sniggers, leaning on the counter for support, eyes twinkling with shared mischief.
“You ever seen him get a splinter?” Sam asked. “Holy shit, ho-oooly shit, the drama…”
Elena was snorting with laughter by now, “I mean sure, he’ll get himself shot, he’ll dislocate something or try to shake off a concussion and he’ll be like ‘Ah, I’m fine, lemme just climb this mountain,’ but my God, he stubs his toe and suddenly he’s at death’s door.”
“You think he’s bad now, imagine him as a teenager,” Sam said.
“Alright, alright,” Nathan stepped in, arms up in defence. “Enough. ‘Lena? I thought you wanted to get going?” he hinted emphatically, nodding to the door.
Elena wiped tears from her eyes and patted her husband on the shoulder. “Alright, let me just say goodbye to Cassie.”
They followed her into the living room where Cassie had already dragged off all the couch cushions and was making a clumsy arrangement of them on the floor, ready for the inevitable catapult.
“Where are you guys going, anyway?” Sam asked, eyeing their rucksacks and walking boots. Were they off on an expedition? Without him? Worse - leaving him to babysit? That wasn’t right at all…
“Hiking!” Elena replied brightly. “There’s a great trail just behind the house – we’d normally take Cass too, but she’s still not a hundred per cent and we’d probably end up carrying her half the way.”
“Hiking?!” Sam barked, staring at them both with incredulity. “You mean… Climbing shit… for fun?”
“I believe that’s the official definition,” Elena drawled, ignoring the whole swearing-in-front-of-her-daughter issue.
Nathan grinned, “Hey, gotta stay frosty, right?”
Sam shook his head in disbelief. He’d had enough of scraping his way up mountains and swinging across ravines and scrabbling along ledges to last him a lifetime. In fact, this whole sitting around eating waffles thing was suddenly looking a lot more appealing. He plonked himself down on a cushion and was immediately cannon-balled by a blond bundle of small child, knocking him backwards with a grunt.
“Alright, well, you kids enjoy yourselves,” he said from the floor. “Cassie and I are definitely not gonna be playing catapult at all today, right, little boots?”
Cassie replied by sitting on his chest and wiggling her little feet in his face. The dog followed her lead, flumping down on his legs and leaving him utterly pinioned.
“Riiiight,” Elena said, herding her husband towards the door, “Good luck with that.” Sam smiled as he listened to them bicker-flirt all the way down the hall and out the front.
“So,” he said, eyeing the kid with a thoughtful expression, “I’m thinking we make a foxhole in the yard and pelt your parents with water balloons when they get back. You down for that?”
Cassie considered it, looking so much like her father for a moment that it almost took Sam’s breath away. “Okay. But catapult first,” she countered.
“Uh uh. Coffee first,” he said. He wasn’t usually up this early, let alone doing acrobatics with a four-year-old.
She bounced emphatically on his chest, driving all the wind out of him. “Catapult!” she demanded. And there's her mother’s side.
“Alright, alright, jeez…”
He shoved the dog off and raised his legs up in the air, balancing Cassie’s stomach on the soles of his feet as gently as he could. She stretched out her arms, fluffy bed-hair sticking every which way, chubby little legs wobbling behind her - flying.
“You ready?” he asked her. She beamed down at him with such glee that the twisting feeling in his chest spread out into an aching kind of love that he’d never felt for anyone other than Nathan. He remembered playing this game with his brother in the early days of the orphanage and Nathan laughing so much he almost choked. It was well worth getting caught and punished to see him smile like that. They never got many chances to just be kids…
“Come on, Sammy!” Cassie’s voice jolted him back. He gazed at her serious face. Now, this one… this one’s life was gonna be all play if he had anything to do with it.
He took hold of her shoulders and adjusted his aim so she’d flip safely over into the pile of cushions. Nathan was old enough and ugly enough to take care of himself now, but this one – Sam couldn’t bear to imagine anything happening to her. He caught her eye to make sure she really was ready. Her eyes were wide with excitement and pure, complete trust. He melted a little bit inside before breaking into a conspiratorial chuckle and adjusting his grip.
“Okay, kiddo. One, two, three, aaaaand catapult!"