"What's wrong with her?"

Henry's voice, which somehow has managed to break all the walls he's put up since the last time he's heard it in person is barely audible and despite his exhaustion (because, god, he's not had nearly enough alcohol today to deal with this), he tries to somehow think straight without spontaneously collapsing again.

Then again, Alex really didn't think he even owed that answer or really any to Henry given it had been 5 years of fucking agony on his side, despite it being partly his own fault as he hadn't exactly /told/ Henry about June in the first place.

It wasn't like he hadn't intended to keep her from him, it happened all too naturally.

Alex had been awfully run down after Paris. So much so that while he was in Texas for those first two months, he didn't know how he functioned. He'd pushed though however, as he was the President's son and the constant sick feeling swimming in his stomach could always be his anxiety on a highwire act, so he thought nothing of it much.

It's only at the lake house, after that night of booze and karaoke and falling deeper in love with Henry more that he finds himself booking a doctor's appointment when he fails to stop throwing up from the early AM hours to actual daylight and there's blood involved.

(Pretending to his father when he went out to breakfast that he'd just had a rough night was probably the start of the acting career he'd suddenly pick up in the months to come.)

The day he found out he was literally carrying what could be the heir to the British throne in decades time (very long, very not likely decades time), he'd gone so numb that he'd sat in the driveway in the car for about 2 hours before Pez had come round to get something out of the fridge and found him. Thankfully, he managed to make up a paper thin excuse in the meantime saying he'd just gotten back from traffic and hoped he hadn't seen the far off look in his eyes of questioning terror.

God, he and Henry had barely, /barely/ been together all that long. Yeah, of course, they had practically starved off eachother since New Year's, but it was still nothing to say it was a full blown relationship. The e-mails they'd been sending eachother had been one thing, but to skip all those steps, no, the entire manual for how to be in a relationship was fucking overwhelming.

It was made even more worse by the wound that opened and subsequently never closed when Henry left and then rejected him.

It was most likely why after June was born he became a full blown alcoholic. Literally the second Alex could hand her off to his mother and father, he was out on the town like nothing had happened. Like his entire body still didn't ache, like his midsection wasn't covered in stretch marks from what once had been, like his chest wasn't constantly sending shooting pain down his sides or up his back from not being used, like he cared that he was still alive.

Somehow, his parents didn't pick up that he was drunk almost every second of the day until June started getting sicker and he didn't even notice, his whole world blurred and smudged like a Rorschach. It was only when June ended up developing Endocarditis while they were on vacation in Mexico visiting some of his father's relatives that Alex truly felt something again, the panic flooding his system drowning out the cold the alcohol flowed though him and making the rose tinted contact lenses he seemed to have slip, even if it was only for a moment in retrospect.

As he watched over his daughter, her tiny 7 month old body trying to fight it's way out of pain and suffering, Alex had guiltily done some thing he may live to regret, but he deserved them.

Unfortunately, when June got her diagnosis, it didn't stop his need for a bottle, as much as he'd wanted it to do. It just made him more reliant on it. He didn't know if June noticed that he was different when drunk than when he wasn't as she got older, but he hoped for her sake that she didn't. He just wanted to be her Dad, June's dad, not some drunk with a kid.

That was what he knew he looked like now though, in front of what was supposed to be the love of his life, just standing there a shadow of his former self as the Prince of England waited on him for once, instead of the other way around.

Shakily, he knew he shouldn't, but he reached into his pocket and took out two mini shots, draining them quickly before anyone including the nurses could protest and then dumping them unceremoniously in the waste bin, turning back to the prince with set shoulders as he looked at him, an expression of shock and horror on his still perfectly handsome face.

God, Alex, get over yourself.

"It doesn't matter what she has, Henry." It came out more bitter than it intended to, dripping with something akin to venom. "I'm not accepting your charity. You didn't want us when we wanted you. You told me to leave, so I left."

He knows that he sounds fucking harsh considering everything, but it was the truth and no amount of anything can fix that. He's not the only one who knows that either as Henry's eyes drop in a way to Alex that screams guilt, but not loud enough to really get to him.

(Well, okay, it is getting to him a little bit, but that's because the hit, as he's taken to calling them, hasn't reached his blood yet.)

The room is silent and Alex thinks he might have won this time (finally he's won against Henry for once!) and stood up for himself, like he should have 5 years ago. Instead though, Henry moves, physically moves and takes off his suit jacket, puzzling Alex to no end before he says something to Shaan that makes the equerry nod in agreeance before leaving, the nurse following him shortly as Henry puts his jacket on a nearby chair.

"Um, what in the /fuck/ are you doing?"

"I'm staying here." Henry's voice is more resolute than Alex has ever heard him before and he's seen Henry do speeches that have sounded similar when he sees him on TV before he's able to change the channel to not see his face. "We may not exactly be on the greatest of terms, Alexander, but I just watched my ex-boyfriend, who is cripplingly upset and in the middle of a breakdown, skull two vodka shots in a children's hospital ward while our-"

Henry grimaces at referring to June as their daughter collectively as he knows it will upset Alex further more than likely, so he retries. "-while your daughter is sleeping beside you. I will admit, I did ask you to leave and I've regretted that every moment since, but I beg of you, please do not ask me to leave you in this situation alone."

Alex wants to fight, wants to protest, wants to grab Henry and tear him apart, but all he can muster up to fight back with is: "Don't you have princely duties? Like babies to kiss and shit like that? You know, cause the Crown /asked/ you to?"

Henry knows the inference of his family's status still hurts Alex, as much as it did in their argument in Henry's quarters 5 years ago before all of this, but he'll be damned if he lets it get in the way of both trying to mend bridges with Alex and finding every little thing he can about his daughter. "The Crown does not control me. Not now when I am in this room. In this room, Alexander, I am Henry Fox. Out there, I am the prince. I do not wish to be the prince with you."

Alex hates this. He hates him, he hates the world, he hates all of it. He hates how fucking hard Henry is trying to get him to see reason, he hates how fast he's falling for it and he hates how tired his own brain is, even with the white lightning starting to fire through it.

Close to ripping his hair out, Alex acts like a temperamental teenager and kicks his chair across the room with a scream disguised as a grunt to avoid startling anyone outside, letting it slam into the wall quite violently before he stalks off the short distance to go sit in the corner on the floor where Henry and June are not, his back to them as his face collapses into his knees where he's brought them up to his face and shaky tears start to fall.

He can hear Henry get up from where he's sitting, but the latter whips around fast before he can get somewhere. "Don't fucking come near me."

The silence overtaking the room again balances out his heartache at the very least.