THE EASTERN SEABOARD, UNITED STATES

A week after Beth becomes sick

Sam pounded the wall in frustration as quietly as she could, so as not to wake Beth or Tootie.

She wasn't quiet enough.

Beth's eyes opened slowly, as if the movement caused her a terrific amount of effort, and she eyed Sam with compassion and concern. She couldn't keep her eyes open for long, but she fought the weight. "Sam," Beth said softly, barely audible, but Sam froze.

Sam turned and faced her little sister, her vision edged with worry bordering on hysteria. She was going crazy. It had been eight days and Beth had only grown worse. Her steady administrations of their precious aspirin and water had had no apparent effect. Beth's colour was high, her brow, forehead, and hair sweaty, her eyes tired, but her chapped lips were raised in a tremulous smile.

"Sam." Beth coughed, and the rattle tore right through Sam. Beth flinched and then tried to speak again. "Don't worry so much. I'm—"

Sam growled. "If you say you're fine, so help me—" Sam paused and crumpled, breaking into breathless, quiet sobs.

Beth tried to sit up. The effort hurt her chest and she started coughing much worse, then she had to give up and lie back down. She closed her eyes and stretched out her hand towards where Sam was leaning back against the wall. Only a few seconds passed before Sam was at her side, holding her hand, and back under control.

Sam sighed with a long exhale and then raised her chin stubbornly, back, more or less, to her normal self. "I'm going for help. You need real medicine...I don't know what else to do."

Beth nodded and let her eyes settle on Tootie, who was tucked in on his cot, fast asleep on his belly, his butt sticking up in the air. He breathed slowly in and out and Beth was thankful for the millionth time that, somehow, he hadn't gotten sick yet. "Tell Ammon I said thank you, even if he can't help."

Sam snorted but gave no other reply. She unlocked the door, opened it, then locked it behind her as she left. Once outside, under the evasive light of the partial moon and the endless shadows that only seemed to appear in the half-dark, Sam sprinted. Her bare feet made no sound on the pavement and she practically flew over the concrete and around corners and alleys that she really had no business running through at night. But she almost welcomed a confrontation to take the edge off of her nerves.

She didn't meet anyone in the dark, however, and her lithe steps eventually led her to Ammon's doorway. The door was locked, and she huffed in frustration. She knocked firmly and insistently, eyeing the street with caution until she heard movement from within. It sounded like a table fell over. Finally, the door yanked open forcefully amidst cursing and Ammon's glowering eyes met hers. His expression changed dramatically, his eyes widening in surprise. He gaped for a second, then yanked her in and shut the door behind her. He towered over her for a moment, at a loss, then asked, his voice breathless, "Something's wrong. What is it? What's wrong?" His voice rose an octave on the last word.

Sam tried to keep her voice even as she replied. Her hand involuntarily covered her eyes, pressing, keeping any more traitorous tears at bay. "It's Beth. I think she needs antibiotics." Her throat was tight, and the words were hard to get out.

Ammon nodded once and lifted his storage-room key from around his neck. He spoke softly, asking questions as he unlocked the door and gathered up a few supplies. "How long has she been sick? What are her symptoms?"

"A rattling cough, a high fever, headache, nausea, weakness...she's been like this for over a week, but it's getting worse all of the time." She met Ammon's eyes as his head poked out of the door frame for a few seconds. "She can barely move," she whispered.

Ammon took a few long strides and gripped her arms with his huge hands. "She's going to be just fine, Sam. What about the wee lil' man? Has he shown any symptoms?"

Sam shook her head back and forth silently, shocked that he'd touched her.

Ammon noticed her discomfort, but he didn't let go right away. Instead, he searched her eyes. She looked past the point of exhaustion, and he doubted very much that she'd slept much at all in the past week. Finally, he let her go and stepped back. "I will be back in just a second."

Ammon strode through his storage room agitatedly and wished he had access to fresh food. They were all malnourished. With a final, quick decision, he slipped two bottles of multivitamins that he had saved for his personal use into his bag and searched among the assorted medicines he had until he found a box of expectorant and a bottle of penicillin. Taking a step towards the door, he turned around and selected several cans of broth and chicken noodle soup.

When he had locked his storage room again and shrugged on his jacket, Sam stared. Her eyes followed his every movement as he slipped on a pair of boots and double-knotted his shoelaces.

"You're coming?" she asked, even more confused than before.

"Don't be daft, Dark One. Of course I am coming with you. It won't hurt your reputation to be seen with me," he grinned smugly, "and I want to see my patient for myself."

Sam blinked. "Your patient?"

He ignored her huge eyes and pure astonishment and opened the front door. "After you."

The street outside was cold, but Sam didn't notice the bite of the concrete against her bare feet. The journey back to The Hole was timeless and surreal. She couldn't believe that she was going to let someone into their home. She wasn't convinced she could do it, in all honesty. When they paused at a corner, she couldn't help but stare up at his dark face.

As they neared the garage, Ammon chuckled when he caught her staring again. "You should see your face. You look as though you are going to face a firing squad. Are we almost there, then?"

Sam's eyes narrowed and countered the rise of heat in her cheeks. The garage was only around the corner. She stopped and leaned back against the wall of an abandoned barbershop. "Yes, we're nearly there. Ammon, I..." She gritted her teeth and squared her shoulders, meeting his warm gaze with her cold one. "If you harm them in any way, I will make you suffer before I kill you."

Ammon tried not to burst out laughing, which was his first instinct, but he nodded as stoically as he could. After a breath, he said, "I would rather die than harm a child. It might be the end of the world, but I am not yet a monster."

Sam swallowed. "I know, I know," she said quietly, then closed her eyes, drawing strength and resolution from within.

"They make you vulnerable," Ammon whispered, wishing fleetingly that he could do the same. "I feel as though I care greatly for them simply because of how special they are to you. I would never hurt them."

Sam's throat thickened and she turned away to hide her feelings. She was so tired and stressed and spent that her emotions were much too close to the surface. "Let's go," she said after a moment.

Sam took a deep breath as she lifted the key from around her neck. She could feel Ammon's presence at her side so strongly, so acutely, it felt like she was standing much too close to a bonfire. Her hand shook slightly as she unlocked the door and knocked. She could hear Beth's rattling cough as she opened the door and Toot's exclamations of joy at her arrival. He must have woken up. Sam frowned at him as she closed the door behind their surprising guest.

Both Toot and Beth stilled and Toot's eyes grew comically wide as his mouth opened and stayed open as he stared up, up, up, and up at Ammon. Toot's little head was leaning back, his eyes were bright, and suddenly he was grinning from ear to ear. Before Sam could stop him, Toot ran up to Ammon and cried, "Up, up!" and tried to scramble up his legs.

Ammon bellowed out a laugh and bent to hold the little wild boy. He was having trouble focusing. He couldn't keep his eyes off of Toot or Beth, and he kept looking back and forth searchingly between them. He settled for approaching Beth's bedside as he held onto the curly-headed little tyke.

Beth's eyes were too bright from fever, her long blonde braid loose and damp, her freckle-covered cheeks red and her lips chapped, but Ammon was sure that he'd never seen a more beautiful girl in his life. She was too young, yes, but he was awestruck.

He was careful to relax and school his features, because Sam was watching him and she didn't miss anything. Toot was running his fingers along his jaw, feeling his stubble and giggling in delight, and a tight feeling crept into Ammon's chest. He never would have imagined it, but he knew suddenly and clearly that he wanted this. He wanted family.

Swallowing past the rising jealousy and longing, Ammon folded his long frame and sat in a straight-back chair next to the bed, swinging Tootie up onto his shoulders. Toot laughed and started playing with Ammon's close-cropped curls. Ammon couldn't help smiling as he dug through the bag sitting in his lap. He gripped Toot's legs gently with his other hand so that he wouldn't fall and then scooted the chair closer to Beth, feeling her forehead and cheeks. Her forehead was scorching, and he wished he had had a thermometer so that he could get an accurate reading.

She started coughing, and the rattle was painful to hear. She coughed for a long time. Tootie tried to climb off of him and onto her bed, but Ammon held him fast. "Easy there, monkey," he cajoled, "let her rest, okay?" Ammon met Sam's worried gaze and held eye contact as he thought. Finally, he turned back towards the girl and smiled. "You are in luck, you know. My mother was a nurse practitioner. She was," he chuckled breathily, for it was still hard to think about his family, "ah, quite the overlord, actually. Education was everything in our household..." He swallowed, watching Beth's face, then cleared his throat and pulled out a small but full bottle of general antibiotics, penicillin. He handed the bottle to Sam and helped Beth to sit up fully.

Beth smiled before she swallowed the two tablets that he instructed her to take. "She sounds lovely, like a strong woman." Beth's voice was soft and a little weak, but she spoke clearly. "Both of our parents were teachers, so education was very important as well. I always wanted to be a teacher, too, until..." She quieted, then took a sip of a bottle of water and leaned back against the wall, closing her eyes.

"And what would you teach, in a better world?" Ammon inquired, curious.

"Oh," Beth sighed softly, "music, like my mom."

"She was special," Ammon stated, because he knew it was the truth.

Beth nodded and Sam came around the bed and scooped Toot up into her arms, retreating with him to his play corner. She didn't often get down on the floor and play with him like Beth did and he was delighted and kept handing her pieces of wood to stack.

Ammon leaned forward and felt along Beth's neck, checking for swollen lymph nodes. He pulled a small torch (flashlight) out of his pocket and asked her to open her mouth as wide as she could. Her throat was red. He stood. "Do you mind if I use this light to look in your ears?" he asked.

Beth sat up straighter and shook her head. "No, not at all." She tucked her damp curls behind her ears.

He gently turned her head from side to side, trying not to get captured by her soft gaze upon him, and shined the light as carefully as he could into her ears, but they, at least, did not appear to be infected or irritated at all. He paid attention to the sounds she made when she was breathing and sighed as he sat back. "My best guess is that you have a severe case of bronchitis or pneumonia. If you take the antibiotics and the cough expectorants I brought twice a day for ten days, I think you should feel as good as new. Be sure to rest, even when you feel better."

Beth reached for his hand and smiled up at him gratefully. "Thank you so much. You didn't have to do all of this."

"Nonsense. Someone has to keep Sam in line, and I am certainly not up to the task."

Beth laughed, then started coughing and tried to stop. He handed her the water bottle again and when she could, she took small sips. After a quiet minute, she asked him, "What would you have done?"

Ammon leaned back in his chair and laughed self-deprecatingly. He scrubbed at his short, curly hair for a few seconds and then sighed. "My answer three years ago would have been easy and very different than what it is now. I wanted to fight. Boxing. I was, ah, a natural, I suppose. I maintained a high enough GPA to satisfy my parents, but my head was always in the ring. We fell out when I was sixteen, because they wanted me to start my applications to university and to pursue a career as a doctor or a lawyer or—well, they sent me here to live with my uncle, who owned the store where I now... I was so sure of what I wanted, I was willing to defy them. I was only here in Boston a few months before the—before everything changed. Now, I...I don't know."

Beth bit her lip and nodded with a sigh. She knew what he meant. The last few years had changed everything.