the fallen star

seeking, but not finding

"Hold on!" America suddenly runs out of the room, and comes back a few seconds later with a glass of water.

"Here you go, Mama." She hands me the glass and I smile tiredly at her.

"Thank you, princessa." I cough, taking a few large gulps of water, which immediately helped my dry throat.

"What time is it?" I ask, putting the glass on my bedside table.

"It's 12 o'clock." America answers, looking at me nervously. "I thought you were just tired so I let you sleep. But then you wouldn't wake up and I saw blood on your face and your forehead was hot, so I panicked."

I feel guilty for scaring America, she shouldn't have to find me like this. I'll have to be more careful in future.

"I'm sorry I didn't make you breakfast, Ree. And I'm sorry for scaring you." I apologise to the brunette, as she crawls onto my bed to sit next to me.

"I'm just glad your okay." America smiles. "Do you need anything? Any medicine or do you want some food?" She rambles.

"You could grab me a paracetamol from the medicine cabinet." I offer, hoping it would help my growing migraine. "They are in a labelled packet."

America nods, immediately jumping off my bed and running to the kitchen.

I chuckle lightly at her eagerness, before mentally kicking myself that I didn't clean up the blood from myself, as well as the floor.

Barely a minute later, America runs back in with the pack of paracetamol tablets.

"Here you go." She places them on my lap, carefully climbing back onto the bed.

"Thank you, princessa." I smile, gratefully taking the tablets and dry swallowing two of them.

"Do you want anything to eat?" America asks, as I wipe the dried blood from my face.

"Have you eaten?" I ask, to which she shakes her head.

"I was too worried about you..." She admits, making my heart pang.

"Okay, well I'll get up in a second and make us some lunch. How does that sound?" I offer, even though I don't feel very hungry, America must be starving as she's usually eaten a meal fit for a super soldier by now.

America hums uncharacteristically in agreement, laying her head on my lap.

She's usually much more excited about the prospect of food... I unconsciously start running my hand through her brown mid length hair.

"I'm glad you okay." America let's out a deep breath.

I smile at the girls kindness. "Thank you, sweetheart."

~~~

It was later on in the day, and I was feeling almost completely better despite a lingering headache, so I was giving America her first home schooling session.

She's never had an education due to her past, and even though I myself haven't really been to school since before the bombings, I knew the basics enough to teach America, who was proving to be a different student.

She was reluctant to put in any extra effort to subjects that she didn't like or understand, so the maths I was currently trying to teach her was proving to be a challenge.

"But who cares about stupid division?" America asks for the fifth time, throwing her pen onto the table for emphasis.

I sigh, rubbing the bridge of my nose. "It's basic maths that you need to get, America. I'm not gonna make you do algebra or circle theorem. I just want you to know the basics." I try to reason.