Chapter Text
“Chelsea, it’s time to go!” Hillary yelled up to her daughter for the fourth time in five minutes. She was quickly starting to lose her patience. Hillary huffed and headed up the stairs, taking them two at a time. She pushed open Chelsea’s partially closed door. “Chelsea Victoria Clinton, I said to get ready. You have a plane to catch!”
Chelsea lay on her side facing away from her mother, unmoving. “I don’t feel well mom. I don’t want to go” Hillary sighed. She sat on the edge of the bed and smoothed her hand down her daughter’s back.
“You have to go see your dad. You haven’t seen him in over a month” Chelsea rolled over and faced her mother, her eyes brimming with tears. Hillary’s heart broke. The divorce had been difficult on most everyone, but none so much as on Chelsea.
“I just don’t feel well mom. Can’t I go another day?” Hillary swallowed down the lump in her throat.
“Sweetie I know that you don’t quite understand everything, but your father and I have an arrangement and you have to go see him” Chelsea nodded slowly and sat up. Hillary stood from the bed to allow her to get out. She felt awful making Chelsea go to Bill’s, but she didn’t want to have another issue with him. He’d already, well his wife had already accused Hillary of trying to turn Chelsea against them.
She and Bill divorced acrimoniously three years prior when Chelsea was four. He’d had an affair and Hillary had not been able to forgive him. After much back and forth and him trying to fight the divorce he finally gave in, two years later he remarried. Hillary was shocked that he’d moved on so quickly especially when he fought her so hard about the divorce, but after he announced his candidacy for President she felt she knew what it was all about. He didn’t want her, he didn’t want to be a divorced candidate.
“Mom I’m ready” Chelsea’s small voice brought her out of her thoughts. She smiled at her daughter and ruffled her curly mass of hair.
“Ok sweetie and remember be good for your dad ok” Chelsea nodded, albeit reluctantly. Hillary fought the nagging suspicion that she shouldn’t send her daughter away, that maybe she wasn’t feeling well, but Bill and Marissa had drug her back into court one too many times accusing her of trying to keep Chelsea away, that she ignored her inner trepidation.
Hillary drove Chelsea to the airport, Bill sent a private plane to pick her up. He was apparently rolling in dough these days with all his campaign donations. He’d arranged for Chelsea to meet him in Florida, where he was doing his latest campaign stop and then they’d go back to Arkansas for a few days. Hillary kissed her daughter’s forehead, she noticed it was slightly warm, but it was a pretty warm day in New York, so she chalked it up to the day’s weather. They said their goodbyes, she had to fight back tears as Chelsea’s little legs climbed up the stairs into the plane.
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Two Days Later
Hillary rolled over and grabbed her phone. She had no clue who could be calling her at this time of night.
“Hello” her voice roughened by sleep.
“Was this your idea of a joke?” she sat up in bed immediately recognizing the drawl of her ex-husband.
“What are you talking about?”
“For fucks sake I am in the middle of a presidential campaign. I can’t be getting sick and what do you do? You send a sick kid to me!” he was furious at what he thought was his ex-wife’s attempt to sabotage his campaign. Hillary only heard sick kid and her stomach immediately dropped, Chelsea had been telling the truth.
“What is going on with Chelsea?” he scoffed.
“Like you don’t know. She’s sick, I’ve been up with her all night. She’s running a fever, vomiting, complaining of being achy. Clearly she has the flu.”
“I didn’t know she was really sick. I thought she was trying to get out of coming to visit you” she couldn’t help the little dig.
“Well, this is on you if I miss any campaign stops.”
“Oh my what a sacrifice William, having to miss a few campaign stops to take care of your daughter. Don’t worry about it I will be there tomorrow to get her!” Hillary was furious at his attitude, she disconnected the call not letting him get another chance to respond. Hillary jumped out of bed and began making plans to get to Arkansas to bring Chelsea home.
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She rushed into the hospital. Her heart thudding in her chest, the sound of blood rushing filling her ears. Once she’d arrived at the Governor’s Mansion she was told that Bill had taken Chelsea to the hospital. She wasn’t sure if he was being overly cautious or if something else was happening. There was a bad bout of the flu going around despite Chelsea being vaccinated that didn’t seem to matter much with this particular strain.
She nearly ran into the waiting area, Bill sat with his hands in his head and her heart dropped into her feet. He heard her approach and looked up at her with red puffy eyes. Hillary’s stomach twisted into knots.
“What’s going on?” he shook his head. She noticed Marissa slowly rubbing her back and she had to fight back the bile rising in her throat. She chalked it up to concern and fear for Chelsea’s well being.
“When she woke up this morning she was covered in bruises. She could barely be touched without screaming in pain. I don’t know what’s…” his words cut off by a choked back sob.
“What are the doctors saying?” he shook his head.
“They took her back as soon as we got here, and we haven’t heard much” Marissa filled Hillary in. Hillary not one to sit around and wait walked out of the waiting room. She was going to get answers about her little girl.
Hillary approached the reception desk, Bill followed closely behind. “My daughter was brought in and I’d like to know what is going on?”
“The doctor will be in to talk to you two momentarily” Hillary was about to protest when Bill grabbed her arm. She swung around at him, shooting daggers.
“Hillary, let us wait for the doctor to come speak with us. Making a scene isn’t going to change anything” she didn’t respond, only pushed past him and back into the waiting room.
Bill sank back into a chair once they were back in the waiting room. Hillary paced the room, glancing at Bill and Marissa occasionally. She rolled her eyes when she saw her rubbing his knee and seeming to give him a pep talk.
“Mr. and Mrs Clinton?” the doctor came into the room and approached Bill and Marissa. Hillary became irritated.
“I’m Chelsea’s mother” she said through clenched teeth and the doctor realized his mistake.
“Sorry, Ms. Clinton…”
“Rodham, not Clinton. What’s going on with my daughter?” the doctor looked between the two of them and they knew it wasn’t good news.
“I’d like to speak with the two of you alone” they quietly followed him into a private family room. The last thing she wanted to do was sit, but she sat next to Bill across from the doctor. “We’ve done extensive testing on Chelsea and really there is no easy way to say this, but your daughter has acute myeloid leukemia” both parents sat stunned into silence. Neither of them expected this to happen.
“How can that be? She’s always been so healthy?”
“We don’t exactly know what causes this, but it does appear from her test results that it was caught fairly early.”
“What can we do to treat it?” Bill asked.
“There are several treatments we can try, but first we need to do additional testing. We are going to keep her here for the time being” they both nodded.
“When can we see her?” Hillary asked, her voice shaking with emotion.
“I’ll have a nurse come get you momentarily” the doctor stood and left them alone. They both sat shell shocked at the news. Hillary suddenly dropped her head and the sob she’d been holding in finally came out. Bill looked to her, head down, shoulders shaking and pulled her into an embrace. He kissed the top of her head.
“She’ll be ok darling. We’ll make sure of that” she just nodded against his chest as the world seemed to be crumbling around them.