Chuckling to herself Lena sipped her tea and immediately decided that Eugene’s suggestion of brandy would have been far more welcome – fortunately for them both Eugene was one of the few people in the world Marlena would not be stubborn with on pure principle. Indeed, as though the idea had been hers in the first place she got out of her seat and opened the sideboard where she knew a bottle dwelled.

“How is Helga?” She asked as she poured, her hand steady despite the fact that it was a quite different question to his. Helga had been unwell after the birth, or so she had heard, but Lena had no more wanted to see her potentially sickly sister than her new nephews. When had that happened? They had never been close but somehow she now thought of her own sister as being the most distant of creatures. “You must have seen her.”

He was, after all, quite a significantly better person than she was.

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MJ: still raising the graphics bar as of 2022