Maxon

America and I had only just started eating our lunches when we got the phone call from Kenna informing us that Magda was in the infirmary. "What do you think happened? She's not crippled, she wouldn't have fallen down the steps," America reasoned as we raced downstairs.

"Why don't we just ask when we get there?" I suggested to her, not wanting her to worry herself with something that may just be a minor accident. I liked to think that it was something minor even though I had the nagging thought that Kenna wouldn't have called us if it weren't serious. The closer we got to the hospital, the more confident I felt that we wouldn't be dining with Magda that night in the Great Room.

Kenna was waiting for us out in the hallway with her arms wrapped around herself. America didn't even hug her; she just dashed past her to go see Magda. "Hey, Ames, wait…" Kenna asked her, pulling her back by the elbow. "We need to talk." James emerged from the entryway and stood behind Kenna almost protectively.

"What's wrong? Is Mom okay?" America demanded frantically.

Kenna hesitated and James answered for her. "It's difficult to explain."

"What could be so difficult to explain to me? Just tell me what's wrong." America was starting to get angry and frustrated. I put a hand on her back but she shook it off as she took a step toward her sister. "Kenna, tell me."

"Mom couldn't breathe this morning," Kenna began gently, tears brimming in the corners of her eyes.

America laughed, the sound coming out dark and unnatural. "What do you mean, she couldn't breathe? She doesn't have asthma or anything. Why couldn't she breathe?"

Again, Kenna tried to say something but she turned away, leaving James to finish for her. "Her body is failing her, America. She's suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis; ALS."

America took a step back toward me as we both absorbed what James had said. We had heard of ALS plenty of times with all of the benefit balls and hospital openings we had attended over the years but we'd never had firsthand experience with it. My wife seemed to be in shock but I was already processing and had just one question. "If she was having trouble breathing, that means the debilitation is pretty advanced. How long has this been going on?" I asked, looking between James and Kenna suspiciously. Sure, we hadn't seen in a few months but she was the picture of health then.

My question seemed to have alerted America because now she was going after Kenna again. "Kenna, how long have you known?" she asked in a low, dangerous voice.

Kenna looked at America with desperation in her eyes. "Ames, you had so much going on with Derrick and Amber; we didn't want to burden you…" she tried explaining.

"Burden me?" America repeated. "You didn't want to burden me by telling me that our mother was suffering from a major degenerative illness?" Her voice was starting to rise so that by the time she had reached the end of the sentence she was yelling. "That was months ago, Kenna. Months. How many times have I seen you since then and yet you still never said anything?"

"It wasn't the right time…"

"Oh, and now it is? When we're standing outside the hospital after Mom has a breathing spell?" I knew that America was angry but this was also her taking out the anguish she was feeling. Since becoming queen she had learned not to break down over things but now she just took all of her feelings out on other people. I wasn't sure which was healthier.

Kenna sighed. "I just…once more time went by I was scared to tell you. I know I should have told you sooner but…"

America interrupted her. "What was your first clue that you should have told me, Ken? It couldn't have anything to do with the fact that she's all we have left for our parents, right? Oh, no, I forgot. You have in-laws. Once Mom dies you have a replacement." Kenna's face completely crumbled into tears.

"Hey! That's not fair," James exclaimed, putting an arm around Kenna and pulling her away from America.

"No, America is absolutely right," I defended her, not appreciating the way James had just yelled at her. "Magda is all both of us have; we should have been told as soon as you both found out. Hell, we should have been the first ones to know. Especially since we're the ones that have been paying for her cushy lifestyle, as well as yours."

"Maxon…" America warned, putting her hands on my chest.

James' face got beet red as he stared me down. "We could have taken care of Magda just fine without you. Have you forgotten that I was a Four? Besides, maybe you wouldn't be in this position without America being in the Selection in the first place."

I balked at his words. "What in God's name are you talking about?" How dare he challenge the life that America and I had built in the last twenty years. Sure, we had our ups and downs but I couldn't be more content with my decision to marry America.

"Think about it. If America weren't here and she hadn't been so outwardly against the caste system, maybe the rebels wouldn't have been so aggressive in their attacks. Maybe your parents would still be here. And maybe if she had just stayed home like she wanted to, Shalom wouldn't have been so stressed and wouldn't have had a heart attack."

"How dare you blame America for his death. How dare you come into our home and blame her for that attack! She is not at fault in any way and you have no idea what you're talking about with the rebels."

"That's enough!" someone yelled from behind us. We all turned to see Dr. Ashlar standing in the entryway, clipboard in hand. He took advantage of our stunned silence to say, "Mrs. Singer would like to see America."

She bowed her head and walked through the doors to the hospital with me right on her heels, not wanting to spend another minute in that hallway with James or Kenna. Both of them were despicable in my eyes. Before we reached Magda's room I stopped America. "Ames, you know, she's not going to look good," I warned her.

Her eyes were still slightly wild with anger but they softened at my words. "Maxon, I'd really appreciate it if everyone could stop trying to protect me."

I nodded and pushed the door open, letting her duck under my arm so she could enter. Magda was hooked up to a ventilator, the machine pumping air into her lungs for her. Arthur was sitting with his face in his hands next to her bed. I immediately went to him and shook his hand, only imagining what he was feeling seeing his love suffering like this.

At the same time though I was watching America carefully. She slowly reached a hand out to hold her mother's hand. She and Magda weren't as close when America was growing up but I knew that since our marriage they had become extremely close, especially since she was America's only parent left.

"How long does she have to be on the ventilator?" she asked suddenly, looking at Arthur sharply. I recognized that look in her eyes, the one that she had whenever she was in game mode and prioritizing problem solving over emotions.

"Dr. Ashlar said until tonight at the latest. We're gonna have to see though," Arthur answered.

America nodded and seemed to think something over. Finally she asked, "How bad is she? How far has it progressed?"

Arthur took a deep breath and I echoed it automatically, waiting to hear the prognosis. "She's in a wheelchair."

"But how…if she's in a wheelchair, how did she get around last night?" I asked, knowing that this palace wasn't constructed with handicapped people in mind.

"Aspen helped," he said reluctantly.

"Aspen knows?" America exclaimed. "Who else knows?"

Kenna entered then, still looking anxious with the way she was wringing her hands. "Ames, everyone knows," she admitted.

"You mean you even told Kota who hasn't set foot in this country in a few years?" Kenna's silence was all the answer we needed to know that Kota had in fact been made aware of his mother's illness. We were truly the last ones to know.

Dr. Ashlar coughed from where he was standing in the doorway, a clipboard in one hand and a packet of tissues in the other. He gave the tissues to America before looking between the two sisters. "If it is okay with you, Mrs. Orders, I would like to go over Mrs. Singers charts with America and Maxon alone."

James looked like he was ready to protest but Kenna laid a hand on his arm to stop him. She probably could see why Dr. Ashlar wanted this conversation to happen with just America, Arthur and I present. With one last glare toward me, James and Kenna left, discussing whether or not to call Astra.

I held out a chair for America and she seated herself, me standing protectively behind her as Dr. Ashlar sat down on a stool across from us. "So I'm sure Arthur has caught you up to speed by now. I understand the delicate situation here between you and your siblings, America and even though I'm supposed to be objective, I agree that you should have the most say of your siblings when it comes to your mother's health. Of course, Arthur reigns supreme over you since he is her partner but I figured you two could talk about things together."

"What kind of things?" America asked timidly, her voice quaking with fear.

Dr. Ashlar sighed and I could see that he was gearing himself up for delivering bad news. "She's not going to get any better, America. I'm afraid that the time has come for us to decide on the quality of life we want her to have. Do you want her to spend her last days here, her body being forced to work by machines or do you want her to live out that time in peace in her home?"

America drew back and blinked at him, her gaze blank. "I don't understand…"

"She's dying, America," Arthur clarified. He choked on a sob and shook his head. "I'm sorry."

"No," she snapped, springing to her feet. "No, she's not dying."

Dr. Ashlar apparently didn't know how to react to her denial. Here he was, the man with all of the answers, being told by his queen that he was wrong. I would be caught off guard as well. All I could do was put a supportive hand on her should but she quickly shrugged it off. "America, I don't know what else to tell you. I wanted to include you in this because your opinion matters to me."

"There's no reason for my opinion to matter because you're all wrong. She's fine. She's a strong woman, always has been, and she'll get through this," America insisted.

"Ames…" I began, wanting to remind her that this was a terminal, degenerative disease that we were talking about here but when I saw the pain barely hiding in her eyes I decided to keep my mouth shut instead. "You're absolutely right, Ames. Let's just take a deep breath and hang out here for the day," I suggested.

She frowned, looking slightly confused for a few moments before saying, "I was actually pretty busy this morning looking at some budgets so I think I'm going to work on those."

We were all quiet as we looked at her. This was a very different America than I had ever seen. Twenty years of marriage and I was still discovering new sides of her and I wasn't sure how much I liked this one. This version of herself that would work herself to the bone in order to suppress what she was really feeling. It wasn't dissimilar to the woman she became when she was suffering from postpartum. The difference was that with postpartum she didn't really know what she was doing. Now she was completely aware of what she was doing and had no intention of changing that.

Dr. Ashlar wordlessly stepped out of her way. It took me a decent few minutes to finally gather my wits and chase after her though. I caught up to her halfway up the second floor. "I can help you with those budgets," I offered, trying to get her back on track. If I let her keep going down this path it would only lead to an emotional breakdown and as selfish as it sounded, we really did not have a luxurious amount of time for that.

"They're budgets for my food programs and schools, Maxon. The only time you've laid eyes on them was when you signed your approval," she said in a somewhat bitter voice. "Just…just let me get this done, okay? If not it'll be bothering me all day."

That's what will be bothering you all day? I wanted to ask but I held my tongue. I knew America well enough that I needed to let her just do her thing. Then again, her mother was dying. When she finally snapped out of this, would she be upset that I didn't try to help her? "Okay," I conceded. "Will you be at dinner tonight?"

She shrugged, as if the idea of eating was as foreign to her as aeronautical physics. "If I can get everything done that I need to get done." I gently pressed my lips against her forehead and watched her continue up to the third floor. I turned and went to the Women's Room, sending several guards to collect all of the kids in the meantime. If I couldn't help America make the decision of how to proceed with her mother, I could at least fill in our family.

They were there within minutes. Amber looked less than enthused and judging by her appearance, she had just woken up from a nap. Shalom and Win were having an animated discussion about ballet world gossip while Annie doodled on the little notebook she constantly had stowed in her back pocket. Khalil cowered slightly when he passed by me, no doubt recollecting the long lecture he had gotten from me mere hours ago.

"No one is in trouble," I prefaced, seeing the worry in their faces. Khalil visibly relaxed at that, shrinking down into the sofa. "I just have some tough news for you all."

"Is Mom pregnant again?" Shay joked, sounding almost bored by the possibility of that being news.

I was shocked by the suggestion though. America and I were done having kids. We had stopped having kids ten years ago when she decided to have surgery that would prevent us from ever having that as a remote possibility. Amber answered before I could though. "There's no way. Just let Dad finish."

I smiled appreciatively in her direction. "Thanks Amber. Anyway, as I was saying, your mother and I did spend some time in the infirmary this morning but not for that reason. It's actually your grandmother; she is…well, she's not doing so well," I said, not knowing how to really say it gently.

"When you say she's not doing well…" Win said quietly.

"She's dying."

Amber's eyes filled with tears immediately and she covered her face with her hands. Shalom put an arm around her shoulders and pressed his head against hers. I sat down on the coffee table in front of all of them so that I could be on their level.

"How?" Win pressed. Her face was as unreadable as ever as she just looked desperate for information.

"She has ALS," I answered. I really needed America to be here with me for this. My hands were wrapped around the edge of the table so that the kids wouldn't see them shaking but I knew that they could see how hard I was trying to keep myself together.

That was Amber's final straw. She completely folded herself into Shalom, clinging to him like her own life depended on it while he hugged her back just as fiercely. Win stood up and started pacing near the windows as Khalil rubbed his hands together continuously. Annie just gave me a confused stare. "What's that Daddy?" she asked innocently. She honestly looked a little scared from seeing her sibling's reactions.

I took Win's seat next to her and put my arm around her small body. "It means her body isn't working anymore honey. Your brain is what controls your movements, right?" She nodded. "Well she can't do that anymore. She can't move by herself." I didn't want to go into the full gory details of it. Not how she couldn't breathe and not the painful death she would eventually come to.

"But can't Dr. Ashlar help her?"

"Sometimes people get sick and there isn't any medicine that can help them."

"But Daddy, you can do anything. Can't you help her?" She blinked her big brown eyes up at me and I felt my heart break for what seemed like the twentieth time that day.

I shook my head and pulled her closer to me. "Not this time. And I can't do anything honey. I'm just an average person with a lot to be responsible for." She still looked puzzled but let it go.

"Can we go see her?" Win asked, walking back toward me.

"That sounds like a great idea." Without another word she was out of the room and racing to the hospital, Khalil and Annie following behind eagerly.

Amber had calmed down a bit but both she and Shalom had red rings around their eyes from crying. "Where's Mom?" Shay asked. Somehow he'd been perceptive enough to not ask about her until the others were gone.

But what could I tell them? "She's…coping," I hedged.

"So she's not with Grandma, is she?" Amber asked.

"No, she's working."

Amber slouched on the sofa, cupping her stomach with both hands. "Why does she do that? Why does she just shut everything out like that?"

I sighed heavily. The way I saw America was so different from how everyone else saw her at times. I understood how her mind worked (most of the time) so I could understand her motives but people who didn't know her as well sometimes misunderstood her. I could hear the judgment clear in Amber's voice as she asked me why her mother was doing this.

"She's had a lot of pain in her life, you know? I think she's just tired of dealing with it so this is how she's reacting." I couldn't go into details with how deeply she still grieved her father and Celeste and my mother and August. I couldn't make them understand the emotional fatigue that only I could see in her. "She can't be strong all of the time," I added, thinking about how many times she'd been forced to wear a fake smile on camera or as she talked to her family when behind the scenes, there was a major crisis occurring.

"Can we go to the hospital?" Amber asked Shay and I got the feeling that they wouldn't be leaving each other's sides for the rest of the day. He agreed and the three of us all went down. Dr. Ashlar quietly told me that there'd been no change in Magda's condition and I thanked him for all of his help, making a mental note to put extra money into his paycheck that week.

Gerad helped me get everyone to the Great Room for dinner. I thought it best for us all to take a break from the hospital and give Arthur some time alone with Magda. America came in about halfway through but remained distant throughout dinner, only eating half of the food in front of her. Her lack of appetite worried me more than her indifference. She barely spoke before we went to bed that night, merely telling me that she loved me and then rolling away from me on her side and going to sleep.

At some point in the night I woke up and realized that her side of the bed was empty and cold. "Ames?" I called into the empty room, letting my eyes adjust to the darkness. For a brief moment the old terror that she had been taken from me pierced through my heart until I remembered the number of guards stationed outside our room and monitoring the activities on the third floor. If someone so much as had a gun on this floor, they would know immediately.

I peeked in her room but that was empty. Even our sitting room was deserted. The next place I checked was our study which is where I found her, standing behind her desk with a book open in front of her. "America?" I said, grabbing her attention. She didn't look up at me though. "Ames, what're you doing?"

I approached her and saw that it was a medical textbook, probably snuck from Khalil's bookshelves. She was leafing through furiously. "There has to be some sort of cure. Or at least a way to develop one," she muttered. She kept babbling about medicine and science and a lot of things that neither of us knew anything about.

"America, stop. Please," I begged quietly, putting a hand over hers to stop.

She looked up at me, the sadness in her eyes making her look desperate and crazed. It was a look I hadn't seen since her depression following Annie's birth. "Surely we can pay to find a cure. Right? We have all the money in the world. Can't we develop one? Please Maxon, tell me we can."

I shook my head slowly and gently shut the book, using my other hand to hold her chin so that her gaze was locked on mine. "There's nothing we can do. I wish more than anything that we could save her but this isn't a fairy tale. There will be no miracle cure."

"But miracles happen everyday. Why can't we have a miracle for once? Do we not get miracles because we're king and queen? We're people too. We feel pain, we grieve, we are as human as a pauper."

"We've had our fair share of miracles," I reminded her. "Annie is alive and healthy when she was born so early. We met and fell in love when the odds were stacked against us."

Her face crumbled and she looked down at the closed book. "I can't…I can't lose her too," she finally sobbed. "She can't die. I'll have no one left. I can't lose her Maxon." She collapsed in her seat but I sat on the floor and pulled her into my lap so that I could hold her properly. "I just can't lose her. It hurts too much."

I was the only person in her life who knew the pain she was facing with the reality of not having a mother or father around anymore but I was still clueless when it came to comforting her. It was just like when her father had died. I wanted to tell her that everything would be okay and that she would get through this but I couldn't. Not when I knew that it was a lie. She would move past this eventually but she'd never be the same.

I held her until her sobs subsided and then she finally fell asleep. Moving gingerly, I lifted her up and headed back toward our room. When I looked outside in the dark hall, I saw a shadow moving to the staircase. Some guards bowed to them and when the shadow turned to the side I recognized the swell of Amber's stomach and smiled to myself, knowing that she would be well taken care of for the night.

Amber

The baby was restless, kicking my kidneys with the clear intention of not letting me go to sleep. I had turned over from one side to the other countless times, trying to get the baby in a comfortable position so that maybe she would calm down but after three hours of little success, I was ready to give up.

Shalom was still curled up at the foot of my bed, sleeping soundly. I felt kind of bad for leaving him in my room in the middle of the night but I needed my sleep and there was only one person I knew who could help me. I crept quietly out into the hallway. I looked down the hall and saw Dad emerge from his study, Mom held tightly in his arms. I felt a slight pang of jealousy, wishing I had someone that would hold me like that. Then I reminded myself that I did have someone like that and he was sleeping right below my feet.

The second floor hallway had less guards on it but they all still greeted me by name, bowing reverently. My hand shook as I knocked. Part of me was hoping that he was a deep sleeper and wouldn't answer. When no answer was forthcoming, I knocked again. I knocked three more times and still didn't get an answer so I turned and decided to go back up to my room. Tears stung my eyes even though I had no reason to be that upset. I was just looking for some comfort.

When I got to the stairwell though, Kile was halfway up, staring at me with a look of pure amazement. "Amber, what are you doing here?" he asked breathlessly. He looked tired and worn down, his shoulders actually slumped over. I realized that there was a real possibility that he had spent the majority of his night working in the hospital.

I opened my mouth a few times, caught off guard and utterly unprepared to talk to him. With few other options, I took off and practically tackled him. all of my pent up frustration came out as I cried into his shoulder. He stayed still and embraced me, telling me that it would all be okay and that he would take care of me and the baby.

And then he said the very words I'd waited probably my whole life to hear him say. "I love you Amber Schreave."

I couldn't say it back and he knew that but I hoped that the way I looked at him was enough for him to know that it was there. "You look tired," I commented.

He shrugged. "Occupational hazard. You look you could use some sleep as well." He dragged a hand down the side of my face, pausing to cup my cheek and wipe a tear away with his thumb. "Let's get you in bed."

I followed him to his bedroom and climbed into his bed, not even asking which side he liked to sleep on. This all just felt so natural that it seemed like whose side was whose was no big deal. Kile went into his bathroom to change and I took the time to look around the room at his belongings. His walls were lined with bookshelves. It looked like one was occupied completely by medical textbooks and notebooks. Another was spilling over with African artifacts.

Kile came in just a few minutes later, dressed in plain pajama pants and a gray shirt. "Made yourself at home?" he teased, laughing at the way I was already curled up under the covers. I sighed contentedly, closing my eyes and waiting for him to get into bed behind me. Finally I felt him come toward me, curling up in a loose big spoon. "Sleep well, my love."

I smiled at the endearment, shutting my eyes. And the baby fell asleep with one of Kile's hands cradling it.