THIS CHAPTER IS A TURNING POINT. I'LL LET YOU READ AND THEN GUESS WHAT THAT TURNING POINT WILL BE. ps. the painting referred to in this chapter is a real piece of art that is/was in the white house. check it out. tiny bit of humor in the heaviness that is this chapter.
"You're a professional peacemaker."
The words echoed through her brain throughout the day.
Russell brought issues passing the ESI bill to her.
"You're a professional peacemaker."
Conversations with her staff about an upcoming event.
"You're a professional peacemaker."
Meeting after meeting about issue after issue.
"You're a professional peacemaker."
And at two in the morning when she took her glasses off and set them on her desk, she agreed. She should've known better. She should've diffused the situation instead of running headfirst into the conflict. She dealt with diplomats with more grace than she'd shown her own daughter.
The tall stacks of papers strewn across her desk mocked her inability to fix things. They were investigating every person involved in anything having to do with Emma's kidnapping. They'd turned stone after stone to find the journalist. Nothing was turning up.
Elizabeth couldn't figure it out.
And she couldn't figure out what Emma needed from her.
She was accustomed to finding solutions to situations. She didn't come up against much that she couldn't figure out. And now, with some of the best intelligence agencies in the world, she hit a brick wall.
But staring at it for hours wouldn't help. At least not anymore than the hours she'd spent already. Might as well go get a few hours of sleep before the next day started up again. Hopefully Henry would be asleep so she could just get in bed and try to sleep. She didn't feel like arguing with him tonight. Not when he'd been right. Those were the worst.
She pulled her heels back on, and slid her glasses back on her face. "Heading home, guys." She said to her detail and she walked towards the Residence, and they followed at a discreet distance.
She was pretty sure she'd walked from her office to the Residence almost a million times, some of them were probably in her sleep. And the two am walk was a quiet one normally. No Russell informing her of something else in the world falling apart. No Daisy trying to push her towards doing some interview or press release. Just her and her thoughts. Sometimes a welcome thing. Sometimes not.
She walked down the hallway, and then did a doubletake before stopping and backing up. Down one long hallway, she saw something she'd never seen before on her 2am walks: sitting on the floor in the middle of the hallway was Emma. Elizabeth stood there, watching her daughter sitting with her legs crisscrossed, petting the cat who was playing on the ground in front of her. Emma must not have seen Elizabeth yet, because she continued talking to the cat. And Elizabeth strained to hear what she was saying.
"'ana saeid li'anak lam tafham al'iinjliziat hqan hataa alan. lan taerif 'anani 'akhtat fi alkalam 'aw la 'astatie altadhakuru. la tumanie 'iidha tahadathat kayf 'asheur birahat 'akbar , 'alays kadhalika?"
I'm just glad you don't really understand English yet. You won't know that I get words wrong or can't remember. You don't mind if I talk how I'm more comfortable, do you?
Elizabeth watched as Emma just kept petting the cat, who graciously allowed it. Hearing Emma say she was more comfortable speaking in a language different than her own hit Elizabeth hard.
"ealaa al'aqali maeak ya zazu , last mdtran lilaistimae bishidatin. huna , alkulu yurid altahaduth maei. la 'ahad tahadath maei hunak maratan 'ukhraa. 'awamir qasirat faqat. alan han alwaqtu. wayasheur eaqli waka'anah qad yanfajir fi baed al'ahyani."
"At least with you, Zazu, I don't have to listen so hard. Here, everyone wants to talk to me. No one talked to be back there. Only short commands. Now it's all the time. And my brain feels like it might explode sometimes."
Unsure of what to do, Elizabeth just stood there. She didn't want to startle Emma or interrupt her. But she didn't want to continue to eavesdrop either. She knew either one would probably have consequences, so she just picked one.
Quietly rapping her knuckles on the wall like she was knocking on an office door, she whispered, "Hey, Em."
Emma looked up towards her, looking a bit embarrassed as well as caught off guard. "'ana asfu." Then, as if correcting herself, Emma translated, "I'm sorry. Was I bothering you? Am I not supposed to be here?"
Walking towards Emma, Elizabeth asked, "limadha 'ant asfu?" Why are you sorry?
Emma's eyes sparkled for just a second before she recovered herself and said, "I don't know why. I mess up enough I've just gotten used to apologizing." Then, gesturing to the cat, she said, "He wouldn't sleep and I couldn't, so I decided to explore as much as the new dude would allow."
"Can I join you?" Elizabeth asked quietly. She completely expected Emma to respond with a snide rejection, but to her surprise, Emma nodded her head.
"You can have your choice of seating options." Emma said with a turned corner of her mouth showing an attempt at humor as she gestured to the floor around her.
Elizabeth kicked her heels back off, and lowered herself to the ground, conscious to keep the distance between her and her daughter enough to not overwhelm Emma. Trying to add into Emma's humor, Elizabeth pointed at the picture on the wall across from them and said, "I come here and look at this picture of…" She squinted to try and read the caption beside the painting "… a woman in a mosquito net?" She looked at Emma with a smirk and said, "Yup. That's what that says. I come here and look at it all the time. Very normal."
Emma smiled.
Zazu had stirred and, curious about the newcomer to the space, he walked over and sniffed Elizabeth's extended hand. After a second, he rubbed his face against her hand, and tried to climb up into Elizabeth's lap.
"Emma, I wanted to tell you…" Elizabeth started.
"Mom," Emma interrupted, "I'm sorry about earlier." Emma looked up sheepishly at Elizabeth. "I don't know, it just feels like … we fight all the time."
"Emma, it's me who should be sorry. I shouldn't have yelled." Elizabeth quickly said, unable to let her daughter take blame for what happened. "I feel like we are just talking past each other all the time."
Emma agreed.
Then it was quiet. Mutually. As if they both wanted to sit in the fact that they both agreed on something.
Tired of exploring Elizabeth's lap, Zazu attempted to jump from Elizabeth's knee to Emma's lap, but only made it about halfway before he landed on the ground. They both chuckled as he shook himself before Emma picked him up.
Treading lightly, Elizabeth said, "Emma, I want so much to help, but I just don't know how."
It was quiet. Emma's left hand caressed the kitten while her right hand tapped nervously on her knee.
Then, with a genuine tone, Emma said, "You don't know who I am."
Elizabeth wanted to jump in. Wanted to ask what that meant. Wanted to say that even though she was older, she was still her little girl. But she bit her tongue. And gave space.
And Emma continued, "Imagine if you were moved from where you are now to where you were four years ago. Sure, you'd …" Emma searched for the words, and, when she couldn't find it, she spoke in Arabic, "ealaqat kanat jayidatan," Then she apologized, "Sorry."
Elizabeth translated it so Emma could hear the words she was looking for, "Have good relationships?"
Emma nodded, then continued in English, "… have good relationships, but you right now aren't that person you were then." Emma's fingers tapped a bit harder. "I'm not the 12-year-old kid I was then. And no one knows who I am now."
Elizabeth marveled at how self-aware her daughter was in that moment. "Em, You're right." Looking up at the weird picture to not make Emma feel interrogated, Elizabeth asked another question, "Can you tell me a little bit about who you are?"
Silence.
Maybe Elizabeth had pushed too much.
"I'm very strong." Emma said plainly. "I feel like everyone thinks I'm a weak person. I can do things."
"Like what?" Elizabeth asked, interested to know.
Emma's tone brightened, "I can lift things that Jason probably couldn't lift. And I can pull a stubborn horse just about anywhere."
Elizabeth could hear the pride in her daughter's voice, and Elizabeth said, "There's a skill."
"And I'm also very good at cooking."
"A skill that you most definitely did not get from me." Elizabeth said, wanting to jump for joy when Emma laughed out loud. Then, Elizabeth asked, "So outside of you telling me these things, how do I get to know you?"
The silence that grew safer each time it happened settled once again.
Then.
"I don't know."
Elizabeth agreed, "There's an answer that we all know but hate saying out loud."
Elizabeth's head turned to look at her daughter and saw her lips trembling. And, without thinking, Elizabeth reached her hand out to comfort her daughter. But the minute Emma saw that, she pulled away, using her hands to physically move her body farther away from Elizabeth. Seeing her reaction, Elizabeth knew she'd made a mistake, and she pulled her hand back. "I hate being touched."
"Em, I'm sorry." Elizabeth started to apologize, "It's just…"
"Why does everyone want to touch me? It's like this…" and this time Emma, didn't apologize for not knowing a word, instead she just kept going, "'iikrah with absolutely everyone. Why?" While Emma tried to cover the frustration with anger, her lip continued to shake. "I hate it."
"I'm sorry." Elizabeth repeated. "I think it's a compulsion because we want to make you feel better. And we're glad you're home that sometimes we want to feel you to make sure you're real."
Emma shook her head and looked into Elizabeth's eyes and said, "Don't."
Elizabeth nodded, hoping her body language would show that she was serious. Hoping to continue the conversation but turn it a bit, she remembered Will's instructions about the paternity question, and she asked, "Would you like to talk about your father?"
Elizabeth tried to read Emma's face, watching the way her eyes shot to the ground, she bit her bottom lip, and started to tap her right hand nervously on her knee yet again. But she hoped that the silence would lead, as it had before in the conversation, to a healthy back and forth.
"Yes."
"Want me to talk or do you have questions?"
Emma pointed at Elizabeth.
Nodding, Elizabeth started, "Ok, I'll go. But if you have questions, let me know." A subtle nod from Emma, and Elizabeth said, "First off, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I lied to you. There's no excuse, but there are reasons. The main one being that Conrad was deep in the public eye at that time."
"Afraid of scandal?" Emma asked.
Elizabeth furrowed her brow and looked into the distance, "That was not what I was afraid of. I can't speak for Conrad, but I didn't want you to grow up between two households, one of which would be under extreme scrutiny, not allowing you to have any chance at a normal life."
"That worked out well, didn't it?" Emma said.
"Tell me about it," Elizabeth agreed. "Another reason was that Conrad didn't want to tell his wife."
Emma's eyebrows rose. "You mean, Lydia didn't know?"
"No." Elizabeth answered. "He simply wanted to move on."
Emma was focused solely on Elizabeth as she asked, "When did Lydia find out?"
Remembering the horrible day that had been, Elizabeth said, "When the news broke in the press."
Emma shook her head, "That doesn't make sense."
"Why?" Elizabeth asked, hoping to get her daughter to open up.
Emma hesitated, then brushed it off, "I don't know, just feel like someone would suspect something if that was their husband."
Thinking about Henry's reaction to it, Elizabeth agreed. "Yeah, but I can't really say anything about their marriage."
"What did… Henry… say?" Hesitancy flooded the words.
"Truthfully?" When Emma nodded, Elizabeth gave it to her straight, "He was angry with me because he was hurt. We didn't speak for a few months. I was sure he would divorce me." She swallowed hard, hating to think about that time. But she knew thinking about that brought her to, "But we worked through it. Long road, but we did." And a smile warmed her as she looked at her beautiful girl, "And when you were born, I've never seen a prouder father than Henry was at that moment."
Confusion mixed with relief flooded Emma's face. And she asked, "And Conrad? Was he…"
Elizabeth shook her head. "We came to an agreement that worked best for everyone involved. He didn't want Lydia or the public to know. I didn't want you to grow up between two families. And we agreed that Conrad would stay out of the picture, and Henry and I would raise you just like we felt you were – our daughter."
Without skipping a beat, Emma pointedly asked, "Can I meet my father?" And Elizabeth could feel Emma watching every movement and reaction.
"If you want to, you can." She stated plainly.
Emma nodded and looked at the ground, "Ok." Then, like she was backpedaling, "Maybe eventually."
"Let me know when you want to, and I will set it up." Elizabeth assured her. "That was a deep conversation. Any questions?"
Emma thought for a moment, and Elizabeth tried not to smile as Emma bit her lip while she thought. "Yeah, just one."
"Just one? Maybe I did pretty well."
"What do I call … your husband?"
Thankful for her spy training at that moment because without it, she wouldn't have been able to hide her hurt at hearing Emma refer to Henry that way. But Elizabeth moved on, "Well, I think that depends on what you feel comfortable with." Then she added, "I know he understands how difficult this is. And if you wanted, you could talk with him."
"Ok." Emma said plainly.
And there they sat for a few minutes. She was trying to get used to all the quiet. Maybe everyone in their life needed to sit together and be quiet. Words seemed to hurt sometimes. And after the heavy conversation, they both needed quiet.
With the one other question Will had given her, Elizabeth broached the question. "What's the hardest part about life right now?" She expected the silence that had permeated everything.
But there was no silence.
Immediately Emma answered. "You."
Elizabeth looked away from Emma like she'd been slapped. Her mouth ran dry immediately and her stomach turned over and over. She tried to take a breath, but felt like the air had been knocked out of her. And before thinking, she croaked, "Me?"
Elizabeth's hands started to shake as she listened to Emma.
"You're all mixed up in all of the horrible things." Emma said plainly.
Only the words hit Elizabeth. She couldn't even understand tone or timing.
"I think we fight because whenever you talk, all I can think about is that you lied to me for my whole life."
She adjusted her space on the floor, trying to find feeling in her legs and hands and anything that wasn't her emotions.
"It was horrible over there."
Elizabeth remembered the horrific information from the interview.
"They told me things I thought I knew were untrue. Things about me. Things about my body. Things. I knew they couldn't be true. They couldn't. But then they told me about you and how you lied to me my whole life. Every single day. And it was TRUE."
And without thinking, Elizabeth closed her eyes. Trust issues, Will had said.
"And that was true. So the other things were too."
Elizabeth shook her head. She stuttered, "That's not…"
But she didn't even think Emma had heard her. The words kept coming. "Sometimes, when I see you, it's like… you're tied up in all of it… and…"
"Please don't say that." Elizabeth now begged, turning her face away from her daughter.
"I can't see you without so many emotions and anger I can't shake."
Elizabeth now felt she was being attacked, whether that was true or not. Simply needing to get some semblance of control back, just from her body, she stood to her feet, anchoring by digging her toes into the carpet. And she found her voice slowly coming back with authority as she responded, "How can you say that?"
Now Emma stood to her feet as well, and Elizabeth saw her face was red and tears dripped from her eyes. And Emma responded, "Because that's what happens. And I spend every conversation we have pushing past it, but it's not working."
Elizabeth rocked side to side on the balls of her feet. When she couldn't calm herself that way, she set her hands on top of her head and bent over, sucking air through her mouth in attempt to not pass out.
"I can't…"
"No" Elizabeth breathlessly interrupted, "Give me… a … minute." She couldn't get air. She counted to ten. Then to ten again. And she could feel her heart calming just a bit, and she started to come back into her body. Once her breathing was enough that she didn't think she was having a heart attack, she tried to say something. In pieces, she said, "And how… what do… what do… you want… from… me…"
"I want to go live at the farmhouse." Emma said immediately.
"Absolutely not." Elizabeth said. Emma's solution was so out of the question that as Elizabeth focused on that, she clung to her sanity a bit more. "You're not… leaving me… us… your family." Finally able to breathe again, she straightened out and again shook her head. "No. I lost you once, you're not… leaving."
"You aren't listening to me." Emma accused. "You just said you know it's hard, and I tell you what would help me, and you say NO!"
"Want to hear it again?" Elizabeth paced back and forth and shook her head, "No."
Emma's eyes narrowed and focused on Elizabeth's face. "I have to remind myself that I love you every time I see you." Her voice escalated as her words sliced through Elizabeth's soul, "I HATE IT HERE!"
Proverbially and literally, Elizabeth dug her heels in, and she yelled back, "I DON'T CARE. YOU'RE NOT LEAVING. PICK ANYTHING ELSE, BUT YOU'RE STAYING HERE WITH YOUR FAMILY."
"Elizabeth?" Henry's sleepy voice coming from behind her shattered through the tiny bit of consciousness she'd clung to. And her body moved before her brain knew what was happening. And she turned around and ran to him. He grabbed her arm to help her stand up while she turned to face Emma, gathering strength from him. "Elizabeth, what's happening?"
"I told her I want to move to the farmhouse." Emma said loudly. Borderline yelling, but not quite.
Henry didn't react as fast as Elizabeth had, but he shook his head as well, "Em, you know that's not possible… you live with us and we live…."
"That's not all she said." Elizabeth choked, but still stood her ground. "You're staying here." Then she said, "Pick something else because I'm not losing you again."
Now a full scream came from their daughter as she paced the width of the hallway. "I HATE IT." She yelled. And then switched languages. "' 'akrah ruyataka. 'iinah mithl alsijn huna." I hate seeing you. It's like prison here. Emma ran her hands through her hair, as she paced and yelled. "'iidha kan la buda li min albaqa' huna waltahaduth maeak waruyatuk…" If I have to stay here and talk to you and see you…
"Elizabeth, what is she saying?" Henry asked, his eyes wide and his tight, protecting grip on Elizabeth.
But Elizabeth just listened, clinging to sanity for as long as possible.
And Emma turned and walked towards Elizabeth. And Elizabeth watched as Henry placed himself between them.
"I'm afraid I'll hate you." Emma said in English. "And I don't want that. Let me go." She yelled. "I just need SPACE."
And Elizabeth said what needed to be said. With each word, her heart broke more and more. "You have to stay here."
Emma shook her head in disbelief and hopelessness.
But Elizabeth continued. "But if talking to me or even seeing me is that horrible for you…" She swallowed hard as the words came out, "Then we won't talk unless absolutely necessary."
Henry shook his head as he turned to Elizabeth, "What are you doing?" He must have known how much that didn't match anything that Elizabeth wanted.
But Elizabeth just watched as Emma began to pace yet again, and finished her proposal. "I'm at work most of the time. And the place is big enough, even when I'm not working… you can go wherever here."
Emma still looked pained, but the pacing calmed. "And what if nothing changes? What if I still feel this way?"
"Then…" Elizabeth hated what she was about to say, but she knew it had to be said, "If in six months you still feel this way…" She put the last bit of strength behind the words she said, trying to convince Emma it was the truth – because if her daughter felt the same way she did right now in six months, then it was hopeless and there was no need to keep trying. So she agreed, "… you can go to the farm. But six months."
"And until then, you promise to give me space?" Emma asked hesitantly.
"No." Henry questioned Elizabeth, "You can't agree to this." And he quieted his voice as he asked, "Can you handle that? You're barely…"
After Emma had described what it was like to have a relationship with Elizabeth, there was nothing else to be done. And Elizabeth made eye contact with Emma and nodded her head, "I promise."
And it wasn't until Emma had walked away from them and turned the corner – it wasn't until then that Elizabeth fell to her knees, every ounce of strength completely gone, perhaps forever.
