A/N: See Chapter 1 for Disclaimer. I also want to warn all of you that Chapter 7 is going to be the most intense and heartbreaking chapter of Locked yet. You definitely need to have tissues on standby. Thank you for coming with me this far. I know the ride hasn't been easy. ((HUGS)) to everyone out there who needs one today. God bless you all.
Chapter 7: Released
The day that Andrew returned from Portugal, he had many men in Royal Security replaced, although mercifully, Shades was one of the few palace bodyguards who had remained true to us all along, and he rightfully retained his place as our Royal Head of Security. Not long after that, Joseph and I made arrangements with Shades to leave the palace for a visit with Mia at Viscount Mabrey's home. Unfortunately, Arthur knew that Mia was still adamant about not wanting Joseph and me to know about what had happened to her, and he knew that she would never agree to allow us to see her no matter how hard he and others tried to persuade her. Therefore, we all knew that we had no choice. If Joseph and I were ever going to get our little girl back in our lives again, we knew that we would simply have to force the issue. So we went to Arthur's house with Shades and Charlotte that day without Arthur or anyone informing Mia in advance that we would be there to see her. It was the only way.
We arrived at two o'clock on the dot, and when we got there, Arthur and Gretchen told us that Mia was in her room sleeping. Understandably, given the hell that her poor body had been through, Mia now grew tired very easily, and she usually had to take at least one nap during the day. Naturally, we told Arthur and Gretchen not to wake Mia. I wanted her to get all the rest she needed and I didn't want to tire her out. And Joseph, Shades, Charlotte, Arthur, and Gretchen felt the same way, so we all just sat down together and talked for a little while.
Then at twenty minutes past two, Gretchen stuck her head in Mia's room and saw her yawn and move a little bit, and she came back into the living room and told us, "I think she's beginning to wake up."
Joseph and I then immediately rose from our seats and walked back into Mia's bedroom. After we went inside, Joseph stood near the door while I quietly approached my granddaughter's bedside and sat down on her bed. When I actually saw my baby girl's burned, charred, scarred face and body with my own two eyes in those moments, I just died inside. It was just as Joseph and Arthur had said; it was exactly as the pictures had shown. All her hair and her eyebrows were gone, as was her nose, her lips, and her ears. And all ten of her fingers were gone as well. And the sight of her skin, her poor skin…it was all so very heartbreaking. As I looked down at my poor, dear baby, I would've given everything I had, all my money, all my possessions, even my royal position, to change places with her.
A few moments later, Mia's face twitched a little, and she opened her eyes. And in the next second, Mia looked around the room with her functioning right eye, and she saw me.
"Grandma," she said, and it was in that instant, when I heard Mia's voice coming out of that poor little body, that I just broke down into sobs. When I was only looking at Mia, I could pretend that the badly burned body I saw before me belonged to someone else and not to her, but when I heard her own voice coming out of that body, I could deny it no longer. It really was Mia, my Mia, who was lying there on that bed in front of me.
For the longest time, neither one of us uttered a word. We just clung to each other and cried so hard. And then finally, I looked at Mia and told her in an emotional whisper, "You deserved…so much more. So much better. I am truly sorry."
"It's not your fault, Grandma," she said very kindly and graciously.
"It's much more my fault than you know. Many years ago, when you were still in college, Martin Stuart approached me and asked me to use my authority as Queen to shut down a story about him that was on the verge of coming out in the press. A story claiming that he was a pedophile and a child trafficker. I very stupidly chose to believe Stuart at the time when he claimed that he was innocent, and I protected him. It was because of me, because of my poor judgment of character, that you inherited this awful mess when you ascended the throne. I should have been the one to deal with this, not you. If I had dealt with him like I should have when I was on the throne, he would never have been there to kidnap you and take you away from the palace at gunpoint, and you would never have had to suffer third degree burns to protect Genovia from him. In the past, I had the audacity to complain about you not having the common sense to deal with difficult situations properly, when in fact, I was the one who was sorely lacking in common sense, and I was the one who fearfully and selfishly chose not to deal with things. I have no excuses, Mia. There is no excuse for the way you and hundreds of Genovian children have suffered because of my selfishness and my arrogance and my willful blindness. And I don't expect you to forgive me. Just let me take care of you now, my love. Come back to the palace, back to your rightful home where you belong. Let me do everything I can to help make this cross I stuck you with easier for you to bear. Please."
"Come on, Grandma. Be real. You know you don't want to see this face in the palace every day. Nobody does. And does the great Queen Clarisse Renaldi really want to spend all her time buttoning up my shirts for me and putting on my pants for me and putting on my socks and shoes for me and feeding me my meals and putting toothpaste on my toothbrush for me and wiping my butt for me? Yeah, Grandma. I can't do that for myself, either. So do you want to spend all your time doing things like that for me now? Yeah, I bet you'd get a big kick out of it. I bet it'd be a real barrel of laughs for you. You'd really have the time of your life."
I then put my hand on top of Mia's hand, looked right into her functioning eye, and told her truthfully, "Child, there is nothing more in life I want than to do those things for you. Nothing."
In the next moment, Joseph came up to Mia's bedside, put a loving hand on her shoulder, and whispered, "There's nothing more in life I want either, my sweet little girl."
"I appreciate that. I really do. But I'm not just your little girl; I'm also the Queen of Genovia; the head of the palace. And as the head of the palace, I have to think of everyone there, not just myself. Can you two imagine how horrified everyone there would be if they had to see me every day the way I look now? I would constantly traumatize all the maids, all the guards, all the Parliamentarians, and every Genovian politician and diplomat who ever came to the palace. And I'll bet every single Genovian citizen will just be lining up inside the throne room to come see this monstrosity of a face so they can bring me something for my table!" Mia cried out sarcastically, and her words were a knife to my heart. Yes, Mia was horrifically injured and her physical appearance was painful to look at. But on the inside, she was astonishingly beautiful, and she was absolutely priceless, and hearing her putting herself down like that was devastating.
"After the indescribable sacrifices you have made to keep this country safe, coming to your throne room to see you and bringing you something for your table would be a very great honor for every Genovian citizen regardless of your physical appearance, my dear," Joseph assured her. And of course, he was absolutely right.
"It certainly would be," I agreed. "And getting to be with you every day, getting to spend time with you every day, is also a very great honor for every maid, every guard, and every politician and diplomat who ever sets foot inside the Genovian palace. All the palace maids and security guards have seen pictures of your current physical appearance, my dear. They know what to expect, and they can handle it. I assure you of that."
"And they all feel the same way your grandmother and I feel, sweet girl. They want you to come back to the palace so they can have the honor of helping to care for you, as you have so lovingly cared for all of us. They want that honor more than anything in the world."
"You're not just saying that, Joe?"
"Absolutely not. I'm telling the complete truth, as your grandmother is. If you'll forgive my rather crude expression, we don't give a rat's behind what you look like. We just love you so much, and we want you to come home to us where you belong. We want you back, my love. Now."
After a pause, Mia looked at both of us and said, "Okay. I'll come back."
Joseph and I immediately hugged her and started loving on her, and then I told her, "Thank you, darling. Thank you so much for agreeing to come back to us."
"Yes, thank you, my sweet girl," Joseph whispered. "Thank you so much."
"You have no idea how much we've missed you," I said.
"No idea," said Joseph.
"I've missed you guys, too. Life hasn't been the same without you."
"That holds doubly true for us, precious," I said to Mia as I held her cheek. "Life for Joseph and me these past few years has just been…wrong. So, so wrong. Joseph and me without our little girl…it just doesn't work. Life without you is just so messed up."
"It certainly is," Joseph agreed.
"And I can't tell you how grateful I am that you're not angry at me and that you don't hate me after everything I've done," I admitted.
"I probably would've been furious at you had you told me all of this years ago, before the fire. I have to confess that I'm not being so forgiving because of any kind of personal growth that might've taken place inside my heart over the years; I'm being forgiving simply because I don't have the strength to be angry anymore. I'm too tired."
"We understand, sweetheart," Joseph assured her.
"Darling, you've suffered so much all these years. Too much. You've sacrificed everything to keep Genovia safe. Everything. And it seems that when it comes to our relationship, I've always been the one asking great sacrifices of you. When you were fifteen, I asked you to start preparing to leave everything behind to rule Genovia one day. I asked you to agree to give up the only home you'd ever known, every tiny bit of privacy, your mother, your friends, your entire way of life, so that you could spend your life serving our country. And when you were twenty-one, I never actually asked you to sacrifice your personal happiness and agree to an arranged marriage so that you could become the Queen of Genovia, but deep down, we both knew it was what I wanted you to do. And you were so very generous to even attempt to go through with it for my sake back then. Oh, my precious girl, you really have given up so much for Genovia's sake. For your father's sake and for my sake. And I think that now, after all this time, after all these years, after all the very great sacrifices you've made for Genovia and for me, it's time that you finally started telling me what I can do for you."
"I couldn't agree more," said Joseph. "Tell us what you need from us right now, my dear. Tell us what we can do to make your life easier for you."
Mia then looked over at Joseph and smiled, and she said, "The only thing I need from you, Joey, is your solemn word that you will never, ever change. I've missed you so much and it feels so good to get you back."
With a couple of tears in his eyes, Joseph gave Mia the biggest, most fervent hug, and he kissed her cheek.
In the next moment, Mia turned her gaze to me, and she said, "My answer to you may be harder to hear, Grandma. Are you sure you really want an honest answer to that question?"
"Absolutely," I assured her.
"Okay. Number one: I need you to stop expecting perfection of me all the time. You've always basically expected perfection of me, and that expectation is completely unfair and we both know it."
"You're right, love. You're absolutely right. I know how I always expected you to behave as though you had as much experience as a royal as I had, and I know that was grossly unfair to you, to put it mildly. I'm sorry, darling. I'm so sorry."
"Apology accepted. Number two: I need to finally start receiving unconditional love from you. Whenever things went wrong in the past and I made a big mistake, you were almost never there for me, and you almost always made me feel as though you didn't love me anymore. I need you to stop doing that, once and for all. And I need you to not only have unconditional love for me in your heart; I need you to start showing it. I need you to start acting like your love for me is unconditional. No matter how many royal blunders I may make or how big they may be. No matter how flawed my physical appearance is. No matter what. Do you hear me?"
Tears started streaming from my eyes then, and I gave Mia the most fervent hug, and I kissed the top of her head and I kissed her poor burned, charred face over and over again. And when I finally settled down enough, I looked at her and told her, "Oh my love, I honestly had no idea I'd been making you feel that way back then. I promise you, I never, ever meant to make you feel as though I would ever stop loving you under any circumstances. Mia, you have my most solemn word that that will never, ever happen. There is nothing you could ever do, no royal blunder that you could ever make, that would make me stop loving you. Nothing. The love I have for you, the oceans of love I have for you, is more secure inside my heart than all the gold that's locked in Fort Knox. My love for you is locked inside my heart, locked, and it will never escape and it will never change. You are locked inside my heart, and that will never change. Do you understand? You are a part of me forever."
"Thank you for saying that."
"It's the truth."
"Number three: I need you to start being more sensitive. I know that whenever you receive criticism or insults, it bounces right off of you like Teflon. But after enduring years of rape and verbal and emotional abuse and bullying through my childhood, it can be very difficult sometimes for me to believe that I have value. Even today, after all these years. And when someone I love and look up to as much as you criticizes me for a mistake, even slightly, it can be devastating to me on the inside. I need you to start really being aware of that. I'm not saying that I should never receive criticism whenever I make a mistake, but when that criticism comes from you, I need you to be as careful and sensitive as you would be with…well, with someone who has third degree burns. Because I don't just have third degree burns on the outside; I have third degree burns on the inside, too."
"I understand, precious," I whispered as more tears continued to flow from my eyes.
"Number four: I need you to stop always assuming the worst about me whenever there's a problem and things go wrong. You've always jumped to the worst conclusions about me before you knew all the facts. The way you slapped me and yelled at me and insulted me and jumped to the worst possible conclusions about me back when I supposedly cheated on Andrew still hurts me to this day. You claim on the surface that you believe in me, but when the chips are down, you just jump to unfair conclusions about me without taking the time to learn all the facts first. I need you to stop doing that, and I need you to start believing in me from now on. Really, really believing in me, one hundred percent, like other grandmothers believe in their grandchildren one hundred percent."
I nodded and said, "You're absolutely right, darling. It seems I've always abandoned you and failed to really be there for you whenever things went wrong in the past. I know I'm guilty of always jumping to unfair conclusions about you without knowing the whole story first, and I'm so sorry, baby. You're right that I've never really believed in you one hundred percent like other grandparents do, and I know that needs to change. And it's going to change. You have my word."
Mia nodded, and then she said, "And finally, number five: I need you to start actually acting concerned whenever I have one of my clumsy moments and fall down. You've always drilled it into me how much manners matter, but do you realize, Grandma, that throughout our relationship, you have not once bothered to ask me if I was alright whenever I had a fall? Not once. Not one. Single. Time. With all due respect, what kind of 'manners' is that? Whenever I fell down on a hard floor, or a chair on rollers got away with me, my lady's maids acted like they were more concerned about me than you did, and that always really hurt. So from now on, could you do me a very big favor and ask me the simple question, 'Mia, are you alright?' whenever I have one of my clumsy moments and fall down?"
Thoroughly ashamed of myself, I just continued to cry quietly, and I nodded and I hugged Mia and held onto her tightly for the longest time. Finally, after our long embrace ended, I looked at her and said, "Of course I'll start asking you if you're alright when you fall, precious. And not only that. The next time you have a clumsy moment and start to fall, I'll throw my body down on the floor to break your fall."
"And so will I, love," said Joseph.
"You guys may have to do that an awful lot from now on. With my poor eyesight, I'm clumsier than ever."
"Oh, my sweet girl," I whispered, and then once again, Joseph and I just hugged her, and we couldn't stop loving on her. Having Mia back meant everything to us. Everything. And being with her again, seeing her for ourselves, seeing just how much she was hurting, was devastating to both of us. But it only made us that more determined to do everything in our power to help her. And that was precisely what we were going to do every single moment for as long as we lived.
Word spread like wildfire that Mia had agreed to return to the palace, and over the next several days, the entire palace was buzzing about it. Most people were kindhearted and fair and had the good sense to support and even look forward to her return. Unfortunately, though, there were three people in Parliament who weren't so kindhearted and fair. Sebastian informed me that Lord Knight, Lord Hughes, and Lord Jeffries did not support Mia's return to the palace and that they were planning on voicing their complaints to him and to all of Parliament in the next Parliament session that would be taking place on the day before Mia was scheduled to come back. I was beyond furious, and that was putting it mildly.
The Parliament session took place on a lovely autumn morning in late October of 2018. Sebastian was sitting in his usual place, of course, and Andrew had kindly permitted me to sit on the Parliament throne beside Sebastian, which was his rightful place during a Parliament session, while he sat with all the Parliament members that day.
When the Parliament session officially began that day, Sebastian looked over at the Parliamentarians and said, "Lord Jeffries, you have the floor."
Lord Jeffries, a short, fat, bald old man in his seventies, stood up then and said, "Thank you, Prime Minister Motaz. I wish to start out this session of Parliament this morning by bringing up a topic that will no doubt make everyone uncomfortable, but it is necessary that we discuss it nonetheless."
"And what is that uncomfortable topic, Lord Jeffries?" asked Andrew with a tiny bit of sarcasm in his voice that was barely detectable to me and probably not detectable at all to anyone else. I could only tell because I'd gotten to know my granddaughter's dear husband very well over the years.
"The return of Her Majesty, Queen Amelia, to the palace."
"And why would my granddaughter's return to the palace make anyone uncomfortable, sir?" I asked pointedly.
"I do not wish to be rude, Your Majesty. And I do not wish to offend you, His Royal Highness, Prince Andrew, or anyone. But I must be frank. Your Majesty, Your Royal Highness, Prime Minister Motaz, my fellow Parliamentarians, I feel it is my duty to point out the elephant in the room. Again, it is not my intention to offend anyone, but I must speak the truth. The current physical appearance of Her Majesty, Queen Amelia, is deeply disturbing. And because of the great disturbance her appearance will probably cause to the majority of the people who live and work here, I am concerned that it might not be appropriate for her to come back to the palace."
"How dare you, sir?" asked Arthur as he stood up.
"Viscount Mabrey," I said, acknowledging him and giving him the floor.
"Her Majesty, Queen Amelia, has suffered third degree burns all over her face and body in order to protect our country from a dangerous and violent child trafficker, Lord Jeffries, and you would dare to suggest that it's not appropriate for her to return to the palace, to her rightful home, to be cared for by the people who love her the most? Again, I ask: how dare you, sir?"
"I do not deny the fact that Her Majesty has suffered greatly for the sake of our country's welfare. But even so, even in her frail and injured state, Her Majesty, Queen Amelia, still has a sacred duty to put Genovia's best interests above her own, and in my honest opinion, I–"
"GENOVIA DOESN'T DESERVE MIA!" Arthur suddenly shouted at the top of his lungs. "Genovia will NEVER be worthy of so fine a queen as Her Majesty, Queen Amelia!"
I then stood up and yelled at the top of my lungs, "AMEN!"
In the next moment, Charlotte rose from her seat and said, "Lord Jeffries, you said you did not wish to offend anyone, but your suggestion that Her Majesty, Queen Amelia, should not return to the palace, is beyond offensive, and you should be ashamed of yourself for merely thinking that. And I know you're not the only one who's been thinking it. Lord Knight, Lord Hughes, the two of you should be ashamed of yourselves as well."
"I agree wholeheartedly with Lady Kutaway," said Sebastian. "In these Parliament chambers, we have our discussions and we share our opinions and we have our debates, and then based on what everyone in this room has said, I propose ideas and I propose possible laws, and a vote is taken. But today, I will not allow any votes to be taken on whether Her Majesty, Queen Amelia, should return to the palace, because the whole idea that she shouldn't is beyond ridiculous and beyond offensive, and it is not worthy of consideration. Her Majesty, Queen Amelia, will return to the palace, to her rightful home, tomorrow as scheduled. End of discussion."
"Right on, Prime Minister Motaz," said Charlotte. "Right on."
Many other Parliamentarians also said "Right on" in the following moments and nodded their agreement. It was obvious that the vast majority of Parliament agreed with Prime Minister Motaz, Prince Andrew, and myself, and not with Lord Jeffries, Lord Hughes, and Lord Knight. The notion was then completely dismissed, and the Parliament session continued.
When the session ended a few hours later, I walked up to Viscount Mabrey as everyone else was walking out of the Parliament chambers, and I told him, "Thank you, Arthur. Thank you for what you did."
Arthur smiled and shook his head and said, "No thanks necessary, Your Majesty. I was just speaking the truth. That's all."
"Still, though, I do appreciate it very much."
"It's no problem. Having Her Majesty with me all these years has been both a pleasure and an honor, but I know how much she's missed you and Joseph and especially Prince Andrew. Gretchen and I will miss her a very great deal, of course, but as much as we love her, we know she doesn't belong with us. She belongs with you and Joseph and she belongs with her husband."
"Yes, she does," I agreed. "But even though Mia will be leaving you tomorrow, I want you to know that from here on out, you are family. No matter what, I will never forget how you have taken care of my granddaughter and protected her and loved her all these years. And I want you to know that from now on, this palace is your second home. And I expect to start seeing you and Gretchen around here a lot more often, Arthur. Is that clear?"
"Far be it for me to disobey the Queen Dowager of Genovia," Arthur said with a smile, and then I gave him a big hug.
When Mia returned to the palace the next day, there was a tear in every eye, including Joseph's and mine. When Mia's limousine arrived at the palace, Andrew helped her out, and then he held onto her left arm while I came around and held onto her right, and we walked up the steps and into the palace with Joseph walking behind us. Given Mia's poor vision, Andrew and I wanted to be extra careful about her safety, so we helped her inside and up the stairs to her suite, where she was reunited with Brigitte and Brigitta, who just showered her with hugs and affection and love. And then Joseph, Brigitte, Brigitta, and I all left Mia's suite so she could have some time alone with her husband.
One evening a few days after Mia's return, she and I were sitting together on her bed talking. We got to talking about the lovely friendship that had developed between her and Gretchen over the years. Back when she was living with Arthur and Gretchen in his vacation home in France, Mia had gotten to talking with Gretchen one day about how foolish she felt for denying herself hot chocolate over the years. She'd always been extremely careful with her figure, oh so closely monitoring every morsel that ever went into her mouth, especially since she officially accepted her role as the Princess and later Queen of Genovia. And understandably, after she was so badly injured in the fire, she began to feel so silly for not allowing herself to drink her favorite beverage more often, and she and Gretchen agreed that every night before they went to bed, they would enjoy a cup of hot chocolate together. And when Mia and I got to talking about it that night, we agreed that we would continue the tradition, and then we got up from the bed and started walking to the kitchen together.
"You know something, darling? This is a wonderful idea," I told Mia as we walked down the corridor to the stairs, and she smiled.
But she didn't remain smiling for very much longer. In the next moment, her foot slipped and she fell down the stairs. To say the least, I was scared to death.
"MIA!" I cried out, and then I ran down the stairs to where Mia was lying on the floor, and I knelt down by her side. "Oh baby, are you alright? Are you okay?"
"Yeah, Grandma. I think I'm alright. I just knocked the wind out of myself a little bit. I just need to lie here for a few moments and catch my breath."
"I'm going to go get Andrew and Joseph, and I'll send for Dr. McCloud," I told her, and she nodded. Dr. McCloud was the general care practitioner who'd been working at the palace for the past ten years, along with his nurse, Francine. He was a tall, slim man in his sixties with gray hair and glasses.
A minute or so later, Andrew, Joseph, and I came running to Mia's side. By that time, Mia was already sitting up on the floor.
"It's okay, guys. I'm okay," she said quietly. "The fall just knocked the wind out of me a little. That's all. No big deal. As a matter of fact, I think I'm ready to get back up on my feet now."
"Not so fast, sweetheart," said Andrew as he placed a loving hand on her shoulder.
"Dr. McCloud is on his way. We should wait and let him examine you first before you try to stand," said Joseph.
"It'll probably be easier for him to examine her in our suite," said Andrew, and then he picked Mia up in his arms and carried her upstairs to their suite and set her down on their bed.
Thankfully, when Dr. McCloud examined her a couple of minutes later, he determined that Mia wasn't injured and that she would be alright (or rather, as "alright" as she could be under the circumstances.)
After Dr. McCloud left, I let Joseph and Andrew know that I wanted to speak to Mia alone for a little while, so they left as well. Once they were gone, I sat down on Mia's bed and asked her, "Darling, are you sure you're alright?"
"I'm fine, Grandma. And thank you, by the way. Thank you very much."
"For what?"
"For taking what I said to heart and asking me if I was alright when I fell. Thank you. This is the first time you've ever really acted like you were concerned about me when I fell, and it meant a lot to me. It really did."
"Well speaking of what you told me that day, I want you to know, love, that as soon as Joseph and Shades and I came back home, I grabbed a notebook and a pen and I made a list of everything you said. And since then, I've memorized that list."
"Thank you for doing that."
"And thank you for coming back into my life."
"You're welcome," Mia said kindly.
"I'm going down to the kitchen now. I owe you a cup of hot chocolate, my girl."
"Make that two cups of hot chocolate. You owe yourself one, too," Mia told me lovingly, and I leaned in and gave her a big kiss on the cheek.
"I'll be back in a few minutes," I told her, and she nodded, and then I left for the kitchen.
Over the next year, Mia and I kept up our tradition to have hot chocolate with each other every single night (with the exception of nights when she wasn't feeling well.) And in that time, it was incredibly painful to watch my sweet little girl struggle so very much. And make no mistake. Everything was a struggle for her. Everything was a fight for her. Everything.
However, soon after Andrew had straightened everything out in Royal Security and had successfully purged all of Stuart's minions from our government, we were able to have Helen moved from the long-term care facility in France to her very own suite in the palace that had been renovated especially for her and her needs. We hired a team of specialists, nurses, and physical therapists to care for her in the palace. And that was a very big help to Mia to say the least. All these years, Arthur and Helen's husband, Patrick O'Connell, had decided that it was best for her to remain at the long-term care facility in France under an alias because of the press. It was easier to keep her safe and hidden from the press in France and Arthur and Patrick knew it. If Patrick had had his wife moved from the facility in France to another facility in San Francisco like he'd so wanted to, he knew it was inevitable that the American news media would find out. And of course, if they'd found out what had happened to Helen, it would only have been a matter of time before they found out what had happened to Mia as well, which would've put her in danger of being murdered by Stuart's minions who'd still been working in the Genovian government at the time. So as difficult as it was for Patrick, he allowed his wife to remain in France, and he secretly flew over there with their son Trevor in one of Arthur's private planes to visit her as often as possible. After Mia returned to the palace and after Andrew got Royal Security and our government completely cleaned up, he, Joseph, Shades, and I all had a long talk with Patrick. And even though it was yet another painful decision for him to make, he did agree to allow us to start caring for Helen in the palace for Mia's sake rather than have her moved to a facility in San Francisco. It was quite a sacrifice, but after the unbelievable hell Mia had been through, Patrick understood that it would be immensely helpful to her to be able to see her mother and spend time with her every day, even though she was comatose, so he graciously agreed to it. Thankfully, since everything was out and all of Stuart's minions had been dealt with, Patrick and Trevor were able to fly out to visit Helen far more often. And having Helen in the palace with her was indeed a huge help to Mia's heart. It meant so very much to her to be able to spend time with her every day.
But tragically, in early September of 2019, Helen finally passed away. And for Mia, the loss was absolutely devastating. And it didn't only affect her psychologically. It affected her physical health as well. Just two days after Helen's funeral and burial, Mia, whose heart had already been significantly damaged from all her burns, suffered a massive heart attack. She didn't experience what a person usually thinks of when he thinks of someone having a heart attack. Her heart cells didn't die off because of a lack of oxygen caused by a clot or atherosclerosis. Mia suffered what doctors call a Type 2 myocardial infarction, or a Type 2 heart attack, in which the cells of Mia's heart began dying off because her heart needed more oxygen than it could get.
I never will forget what happened that day. Mia was lying in bed in her suite, and I was sitting on the side of her bed, and she was telling me how deeply she appreciated her stepfather allowing Helen to be buried in the palace cemetery beside Philippe when she suddenly got very dizzy. In the next moment, she passed out and just slumped over into my arms, and then she stopped breathing. I immediately picked up the phone and called security, and then I called Joseph before I got Mia down onto the floor and got down on my hands and knees and began CPR. When Joseph and Shades arrived, Shades took over for me, and Joseph informed me that the ambulance was on its way.
Shades and the paramedics that soon arrived did manage to get Mia's heart beating again, but a few hours after we got to the hospital, when the doctors had the results of all the tests they'd done, they told us that Mia was in multi-organ system failure. Her heart, her lungs, and her kidneys were all shutting down. We were going to lose her, they said, and soon.
Mia was so strong. She fought hard, and she fought well. She clung to life for the next three weeks. And at four o'clock in the morning on the twenty-fifth of September in 2019, she was still stubbornly fighting. She was really hanging in there, and I was so proud of her, and I made sure she knew it. I was sitting in a chair by the side of her hospital bed, which of course was in the main room of her hospital luxury suite. Andrew and Joseph had been there with Mia the past two nights, so now I was taking the night shift so they could get some rest. Mia was raised up in bed with an oxygen mask over her face, and she was hooked up to a nearby heart monitor. She also had an I.V. in her arm. When her eyes opened, I smiled at her, and I began stroking her arm.
"You're doing such a good job, my love," I whispered. "You're fighting so well. Grandma's so proud of her little girl. So proud."
She then motioned that she wanted to take her mask off, so I took it off for her, making it easier for her to speak.
"I want to hold on, Grandma. I really do. I want to be there when the babies come."
"I know you do, precious. I know you do. I know how hard you're trying; how hard you're fighting. And you're doing an amazing job. But darling, I don't want you to keep fighting anymore if you don't want to. And I don't want you to worry about the babies. Even if you're not here on earth with us when they come, you will see it. I promise you. You'll see it from heaven. You'll have the best seat in the house."
"Really, Grandma?"
"Really, my love."
"It's really okay for me to rest? It's really okay for me to stop fighting and let it happen? You really don't mind?"
"Of course not, baby," I whispered as tears came to my eyes. "No one has earned the right to stop fighting more than you have. And if you need to stop fighting and rest now, I want you to know that I understand. I understand completely."
Tears filled Mia's eyes then as she told me, "Thank you, Grandma. Thank you so much."
"I thank you, baby girl. I thank you so much for every moment you've spent with me; every moment you've given me. I love you so much, Mia. So much," I said in an emotional whisper, and then I put her oxygen mask back on. And in the next few moments, I felt the Holy Spirit prompting me to get in bed beside her and take her in my arms and hold her. And that's precisely what I did. I held my baby girl in my arms as she drifted off to sleep.
Then at ten minutes past four that morning, Mia's heart stopped beating, and the beeping of the heart monitor in the background erupted into a loud whine. A nurse came in immediately, and knowing that Mia was now D.N.R., she simply turned the heart monitor off and left, allowing me to just hold Mia in silence.
As I held my baby in those moments, naturally, I was heartbroken and devastated, but that wasn't all that I was feeling. As difficult as this might be to understand, as insane as this might sound, in those moments, part of me was actually feeling joy. Pure joy. Mia's death was not a tragedy and it was not a defeat. It was a release. After so many years of intense suffering, Mia's spirit had finally, finally been released from a body that had become the cruelest prison, and I was so happy for her. After all this time, Mia's spirit was finally experiencing true freedom in heaven with our beloved Lord, and I was so grateful to Jesus for her freedom. I was so grateful that Mia's spirit was now released and free to experience an entire eternity of the greatest peace and joy and healing possible. With Jesus, Philippe, Helen, and Rupert by her side.