I'm sorry this update took so long. Prince Henrik's death really took a lot out o me (TMI). I'm also sorry this one happens to be as short as it is... oh, well. I Promise more in the future.

Elizabeth constrained herself to the corner of the couch. It appeared larger to her then than it had been… She caught her thoughts. She needed to get out of the banal trance and focus on reality. It was something she had a great mastery of-ever since the age of fifteen. She learned to prepare herself before she gave herself over to hope.

Gently closing her eyes, Elizabeth leaned her head against her fist. As she opened her eyes, she forced herself to think about the dreadful events of that day.

She thought about the call. Accidents were becoming a more common occurrence with Henry, but when she set the phone down on the receiver she couldn't shake herself of the feeling that this one was different-even still as she sat on the couch.

"Why did you have to do this?" She whispered as her fingers brushed over her lips."

She thought about the nurse-the first person she met with any solid information on her husband's condition. A concussion and a heart attack, the result of crashing into a row of trees.

Elizabeth sighed, the idea of a heart attack… She couldn't. Henry was perfectly healthy for his age… but maybe that was it-they were both getting older. What really worried her was the unsuccessful first stent-that was supposed to be it. Now, she waited once more.

What if he died. She needed to let herself go there. She thought of her kids immediately. Stevie was grown and was the much-needed anchor. But if Henry went… she couldn't look at her little girl. Elizabeth held the sweetest of memories of Stevie and her dad. She was his first princess-headstrong-but nevertheless his princess. It brought a smile to her face for a moment to think of their messes made in the kitchen, their little book clubs, and the stories Stevie would bring back from the days spent with her daddy at UVA.

Sadness carved over Elizabeth's gentle smile as she thought of Alison. She knew exactly how Alison would react and it wasn't particularly comforting knowledge. Alison was their emotional one-the child that would always run to their room.

Elizabeth broke down.

She doubted herself. If Henry died… Alison…

She cried. It was becoming real again, and she knew it needed to be. Elizabeth knew she needed to visit a future without Henry-she needed to know, if only in her imagination.

Through her tears, she turned to Jason. Her baby, who she knew little of in the present. He was removed from her-she never meant it to be that way. He was inseparable from her when he was younger. A smiled appeared once more. He didn't take a liking to Henry back then. He was hers. But he was less of hers, today. Henry managed him now-his volatility, his snark-she couldn't, she didn't know how.

If he died… she would lose her holding on the world. It could happen, there was no use playing herself there.

Somewhere she would find the strength to move on into a different life.

She fell asleep by thinking about his smile: that big grin he saved for her. It was the one waiting for her on her wedding day at the end of the aisle. His hands shaking, his cheeks stained with tears-through quivering lips, he held a big grin. As she reached him he leaned over and whispered a breathy "Hi."

That was the man she fell in love with and that was the man she was in fear of losing.