Freedom 21


It had been almost four hours since Henry took Alex back to his bedroom to get ready for Alex's skype therapy session with Carmen and June was getting antsier by the moment. Pez and Nora had tried to distract her, together and separately. As had Bea, and Amy. Oscar had tried too, but only to an extent. The worry was written just as clear on his face as it was on June's.

By an unspoken agreement, they had all been avoiding the hallway that ran between the bedrooms, the bathroom at that end of the house and the bedrooms. With all of them keeping to the living room or kitchen, no one had an y idea what was happening down the hallway, behind the closed and locked door of Alex's room.

"What should we do when they finally come out?" Nora asked. A strange question to come from her, but June was just as relieved that Nora had asked it. That way she didn't have to. Nora hadn't directed the question at anyone in the room in particular and it seemed that no one really knew the answer either.

Shaan waited to see if anyone else had an answer before he spoke. "If Mr. Claremont-Diaz accompanies His Royal Highness out of the bedroom, do not rush at him. No matter how worried or concerned you are. Ask in a low soothing tones before touching him. Respect his boundaries. He may not be able to handle touch."

"Soft touches, if he says it's ok." Bea added, remembering all of the times that henry had returned from his own therapy sessions, physically and mentally drained and wrung out. "If Alex is still mute, don't rush him or force him to talk. He will communicate when he is ready."

"Don't go too far the other way too." Shaan advised them. "Don't baby or offer to do things for him. If he is still in the same state as yesterday, let Alex guide you."

"Henry will have a good understanding of what's going on." Bea confided in them. Bea looked up and noticed that Oscar was paying attention too. "Hen's been in therapy since he was fourteen, he has some tools to help Alex. Alex was communicating with henry yesterday, just follow hen's lead. He will make sure all of Alex's needs are met."

"You guys seem to have a great grasp on it too." Oscar said softly. He had never been sure if the prince had been in therapy, but thinking back on what he knew of the man, and what had transpired in the young man's life so far, Oscar wasn't surprised that Henry had been in therapy.

"There aren't many members of the royal family who haven't been in therapy." Bea murmured.

Pez snorted loudly. "I can think of a few that should have therapy."

"Ok, Mr. Okonjo, you've made your point." Shaan reminded him. Shaan knew exactly whom he was referring to. "No need to start naming names."

"I can" Bea sassed and Shaan rolled his eyes, immediately interrupting her.

"Beatrice Elizabeth Mary Charlotte Fox Mountchristen-Windsor, bite your tongue."

"Alright." Amy interrupted with a cut it out motion that everyone understood.

Oscar had taken everything they had said on board, but it didn't mean that he wasn't still worried about his son. Slipping away from the kitchen, he made his way down the hallway towards the bedroom. He couldn't hear anything. No low, hushed voices, no crying or tears, no murmurs of comfort. He debated whether or not to knock. He was going to offer lunch, as an excuse for his presence. He knocked gently on the door and there was no answer. He opened the door and saw the two of them, huddled together in the middle of the queen bed, Henry's body plastered to Alex's, wrapped around it like a protective cocoon.

It made his heart ache for his son. While he hadn't been in therapy for many, many years, he remembered how much of a physical toll talking, examining, dissecting and contextualizing your thoughts and feelings could take on your body. How emotionally tired it made you. How sometimes sleep was the only way forward.

Closing the door back over, Oscar decided to let them sleep. Henry was exhausted too and missing one meal wouldn't hurt them.


Ellen pinched the bridge of her nose in a sigh. She had been in this meeting for close to five hours now and they had done nothing but go around and around in circles. The meeting was with the White house lawyers, her personal lawyer (even though, many years ago she was a lawyer, herself), Zahra, the boss of the CIA, plus the head of the operations team who had taken the assassins into custody in Athens, Catherine, Martha, Philip, the head of the FBI, the UK's PM and MI6.

"What it all boils down to is, we have no tangential evidence linking Her Majesty to the assassination attempt on His Royal Highness Prince Henry and the First Son." The boss of the CIA announced, looking at the corner of the screen where the live link to him was.

"I confess, Mrs. President. I have no excuse, except for following my grandmother on blind faith." Philip offered, sincerely. "At the time of the incident, I had not seen the errors of my ways. I have since been enlightened and have begun intense psychotherapy to deprogram myself from her influence. Under her reign, there is a culture of internalized homophobia and xenophobia. My wife, my mother and I have begun taking steps to eradicate that culture from within the palace."

"Whilst that is noble Prince Philip, I fear it to be too late for your brother." Ellen lectured harshly. "It has been a lifetime for him, hasn't it? With no one to turn to."

"It has recently come to my attention that my husband always suspected." Catherine added and saw the look of disbelief creep up on her oldest son's face. "Arthur was the one who purchased the island and built the house. He had the sole intention of it being a retreat for Henry. A place where he could escape his reality."

"May I interject?" Zahra asked, standing up and coming into Ellen's frame on the teleconference. "I am Zahra Bankston, Shaan Srivastava's fiancée. Whilst Shaan and I keep our work very separate from our private lives. I can categorically state one thing to be true about Prince Henry. Something that both Shaan and I have noticed at different times. Prince Henry changed when he and Alex got together, no matter how much the little shit annoys the hell out of me, Alex has been good for him. Just as he has been good for Henry. Shaan told me recently that Henry never used to be closed and shut off, before Arthur died. Now, he doesn't have much fight in him, for the things he wanted in life. Yet, when Henry left Alex in Texas before the leak without a word; Alex stormed Kensington looking for answers. Were either of you aware of that?"

"Henry left?" Catherine asked, her voice small. "But he loves Alex."

"Henry has had it drilled into him for his entire life that he had to do whatever it took to keep the crown happy. Even if it was at a personal expense to his heart." Zahra elaborated, hoping to drive the point home. "He had heard so often, in his formative years that he didn't matter. What he wanted did not matter. That his thoughts, fears, desires, wants and needs, they did not matter. Only the crown. To have the idea of an arranged marriage rammed down his throat with ultimatums of marriage to a woman or the military, he lost more of his own fight. To have it suggest that he would 'grow out' of his sexuality. Clearly someone over there needs an education, you cannot simply "grow out' of a sexuality. It is not a choice.

But when he met Alex, Henry began to fight. He fought to make time and space for Alex in his life. He fought his feelings, he denied them. He hurt his own feelings and Alex's. Alex showed him that it was ok to fight for what you want, what your heart wants. When the emails leaked, and Henry fought for them. When he stood up for Alex and their relationship. He fought to keep Alex. Not just to prove to Alex that he meant something to him. But to prove to himself that he deserved something ... someone."

"And Alex?" Martha asked. She knew of Zahra Bankston by reputation. She was the President's Chief of Staff. Hired outside the establishment. She had been working side by side with Ellen Claremont, since her very first election, back in Texas. She was ruthless. She had made fully grown men cry. She had earned a nickname on Capitol Hill as the Bulldog. Right now, Zahra was showing Philip exactly how she earned that moniker. "What about him?"

"I have known Alex since he was four years old and although he may be the bane of my existence most days; it is safe to say I know him well. Well enough to know that Alex has always been running at million miles an hour and when he is on caffeine, it's even faster. It wasn't until Henry came on the scene and rearranged his brain, that Alex started taking things day by day. Living in the moment. Henry taught Alex to slow down and appreciate life, or you'll miss everything it has to offer. Even if I didn't figure out that it was Henry who'd had that effect on him, at first. Trust me, I knew Alex well enough to know when he was trying to pull something over me. When I found them in that hotel room in Brooklyn, after the DNC. The last thing I was expecting to see was the spare prince of Wales tumbling out of a closet, buck naked, scrambling into a pair of boxer shorts a size that I knew did not belong to him. When Henry had slipped into a shirt too, and I asked Alex, "Would it make any difference at all if I told you not to see him again?" Alex looked over at Henry, looking rumpled and nauseated and terrified at the corner of the bed. "No." Was his immediate reply. Alex didn't even have to think about it. Alex was sure.

On more than one occasion, I have heard Alex tell Henry that he quietens his brain and allows him to think. To focus on his surroundings. Forgive me for overstepping, but Oscar and Ellen have spent years trying to get Alex to slow down. As has Leo, June, me, Cash, Amy and a handful of other people along the way. Here comes Henry, and he manages to reach into Alex in the best way and calm his soul."


Around the late afternoon, Alex and Henry ventured out of the bedroom. Both freshly showered and put together, as if they had just greeted the morning and not spent the afternoon in bed together. Everyone was cautious about the dealing with Alex, in point they were too afraid to say anything, so they said nothing at all.

Alex joined his father and Shaan in the kitchen, while Henry saw at the bench on peeling duty. Everyone still seemed to be walking on eggshells around Alex and it was beginning to grate on Henry's nerves. Henry wanted everyone to treat him normal. Alex was still relatively new to therapy and part of accepting the fact you need help is that everyone continues to act normal around you. Normalisation, in its simplest form.

When dinner was served and everyone had filled their plates, Alex let his cutlery clatter on to his side plate and the clatter echoed through the room, causing everyone to look at him, startled. Henry squeezed his thigh under the table for support and he felt Shaan's hand on his back from the other side of him. "Hen, Baby, I am beginning to think that I am invisible to everyone else."

Shaan smothered a smile, but not very successfully. Henry smirked at the rest of the people gathered and Bea smiled into her water glass. Suddenly, Oscar let out a booming laugh. "Oh Mijo, I never thought I would be so happy to hear your voice again."

June wept, openly sobbed into Nora's shoulder and Nora's eyes bugged open wide in amazement. "So you did find your voice, Alejandro?" She asked, in a contrite, yet sarcastic tone.

"Nor!" June hissed at her, in a chastising tone. "Oh Alex, I have been so worried." June flung out of her chair and rushed around to the other side of the dining room table and wrapped her little brother up in a giant hug. Alex tentatively returned her hug, trying not to flinch at the ferocity of her hug.

"Alex, I am happy to see that you're more with now." Bea smiled at him and sent her a wink.

"Thanks, ya'll." Alex replied softly, letting the Texan drawl through.

He wasn't back to normal. He still felt far from normal. But he had managed to get a few words out, which was more than anyone had been expecting. Except Henry. He had helped him find the tools to use some of his voice tonight. Even if that was all he said. It was a step in the right direction.

"After dinner I was wondering if the two of us, Alex and Oscar could have a chat in Alex's room?' Henry asked Shaan in a low whisper, as June, Bea and Nora were clearing the table. Pez was at the table, but he pointedly did not hear what henry had said. If he did, he was wise enough not to comment on it. "It's important."

"Of course, Sir." Shaan answered politely.

"Sure, Mijo." Oscar added, keeping his voice low. "Whatever you need."


"What is it, Mijos?" Oscar asked, concerned. It hadn't been hard to follow Alex and Henry into the bedroom and ask for privacy, as soon as the plates from dinner had been cleared, Pez was requesting the girls presence in the den to workshop some ideas for his latest shelter.

Shaan had followed Alex into the room first, while Henry finished up in the kitchen and Oscar was getting the status report from the shift change.

Shaan took his observations of Alex closely and made some mental notes. His love had been pestering him, as to Alex's physical and mental condition. She would never tell him how much she really cared for him and how concerned she was for him. So he took the opportunity to study Alex. With a scheduled phone call between them for 2200 hours, he would be able to give his darling a full report and maybe, just maybe, make her happier than she has been.

"Darling, this was your theory." Henry encouraged him. Oscar had rolled over the desk chair to sit beside Henry and Shaan on the loveseat sofa, while Alex took a seat on the small ottoman (that Alex usually used as a coffee table) opposite the sofa.

"Right, bear with me." Alex took a deep, calm, steadying breath and relaxed. "We know that Queen Mary does not like Henry being gay. That she ordered him to end the relationship with me, despite giving us her full support only the day before? Shaan and Henry had the plan and we know what happened with the assassins. They were caught."

"What are you getting at, Mijo?" Oscar asked softly. He was worried his son was overdoing it, mentally.

"Hen, when you and I were ... keeping it casual," Alex smirked at Henry, knowing that wasn't exactly the correct term for 'hooking up every chance they got, all over Europe and the US.' He returned Alex's smirk and the young couple pretended not to notice the barely contained look of mirth on Shaan's face too. "Hen, he once made a joke that the Palace assassins are well trained. They wouldn't get caught."

Henry screwed up his face. He didn't remember the exact conversation. He looked at Alex and tried to recall it. He and Alex had talked so much crap over and flirted so heavily, how was one supposed to remember what they'd said. "Oh..." Henry finally remembered the conversation. It had been the night of the great Turkey debacle. He had said it in frustration, but he had been making his point too.

"I'm really going to have you offed," Henry tells him. "You'll never see it coming. Our assassins are trained in discretion. They will come in the night, and it will look like a humiliating accident."
"Autoerotic asphyxiation?"
"Toilet heart attack."
"Jesus."
"You've been warned."
"I thought you'd kill me in a more personal way. Silk pillow over my face, slow and gentle suffocation. Just you and me. Sensual."
"Ha. Well." Henry coughs.

"He said, and I quote; 'You'll never see it coming. Our assassins are trained in discretion. They will come in the night.' " Alex said, and the puzzle pieces were sliding into place for Shaan too.

"You both saw it. They used the lights in the cottage." Shaan realised. "Royal assassins would not be so careless or sloppy.