"I'm sorry." Beth closed her eyes. "Jamie, I really…"
He shook his head and pressed his face into her hair. "Baby, there's nothing to be sorry for. It's…" His voice broke as he allowed the tears to fall. He had promised his father to stay strong, but if he couldn't be honest to his wife, what was it all worth?

"Take care of him."
It was more the sudden calmness of her voice than her words that made Jamie's heart race up once again. "What are you talking about?"
She gently pulled back to look into his eyes, and there it was again, his beloved spark of fire, radiating out of her eyes. Only this time, he suddenly understood, Beth was about to burn herself.
"Beth…"
"He's not ready yet" she interrupted firmly, entwining her fingers with her husband's and guiding their hands to her swollen belly. "You and I, we made a promise we would take care of him. No matter what, no matter how. You promised me, Jamie."
"Beth, no…" Actually, he had made her promise. Promise that she would go on if he was killed on duty, promise that she would become happy again. Jamie had forced the promise on her long ago, after Andy's death. Beth had been devastated, as he had known she would be – Andy had been her protector and best friend, even more after their elder brother had died – as he knew he had been after Joe's death. But then he had been so consumed with his own grief that, for a few weeks at last, couldn't care much about his family's pain. How could he help them getting over Joe if every cell in his brain was denying he was gone? He couldn't be. He had to come back, how were they to live without Joe? They needed him, everyone needed him. After his death it seemed clear to Jamie that Joe was the center of the family, the one nobody could live without.
It had taken a lot of strength, and even more time, to accept that his big brother would never come home again. That he never again would help Jamie out, that Jamie would never again have the chance to say how grateful he was for his brother.

Seeing Beth being shattered under the weight of her brother's death had brought up the memories and the pain, fresh as on the first day. Only now it was multiplied by the knowledge that the woman he loved was suffering too, that she was living through the same nightmare Jamie's family had been thrown into, and that there was no way to change it. After the first shock Jamie had been able to push away the thought of his brother, to store the pain away, and make room for the equally stabbing pain of being helpless. Beth didn't want to see anyone, partly because she didn't want to burden them with her grief, partly because she then would have to accept it.
Denial. Anger. Depression. Different to Jamie, Beth had skipped the phase of bargaining with death. After weeks of tears and days of silence, she had one night opened the door Jamie had patiently been leaning at, and let him in. Acceptance. This night Jamie had feared for her life. He had hoped it would be better once she let somebody in, but it had very soon become clear that Beth was ready to say goodbye. She never put it in words, but Jamie felt the pleading, saw it in her eyes. Pleading for the permission to die. Jamie had never felt so helpless in his life.

How he had made her promise to keep on living, he didn't know anymore, but when the sun rose, Beth had agreed. Under the condition that Jamie gave his word for hers.
Of course he had promised. There was nothing he would not have done for her to live.

"I will not risk our son's life to save mine" Beth said firmly, "the therapy can't start before Thomas is born, and he is not ready yet."
"Maybe he is" Jamie prompted, "twenty-five weeks is not impossible, there have been worse…"
"I said I will not risk it!" She squeezed his hand painfully. "Our baby deserves all the time he needs. That's fifteen weeks to go."
"You don't have fifteen weeks!" Didn't she see it? Could she really be so stupid? For a moment Jamie felt the urge to grab his wife and shake some sense into her, till the soft sad smile would leave? Didn't she understand?

Beth frowned. "Ready in there, Harvard?"
He slumped down, the rage gone as fast as it had come. Of course she saw. She felt it, she knew she wouldn't last.
"Beth…" With shivering fingers Jamie circled his wife's face, caressing her cheeks, her nose. "Please don't leave me."
She leant forward to kiss him, then stayed close, her forehead touching his. "I know I can't give him fifteen weeks" she whispered, "but I whatever power I have, I will give him. You have to let me do this, Jamie."
"You're asking me to let you die?" He chuckled sadly. "Again?"
Sighing, Beth leant her face into the palm of his hand and kissed it. The scars around her left eye shone violet in the light, underlining how pale she was. How came he hadn't noticed? How came Beth hadn't noticed?
What had any of them done to deserve this?

"No" Beth looked up at him again, fire burning in her eyes. "I want you to let me save Thomas."