Page 34 of Sheikh's Quarantine Triplet Baby Daughters

Diane

Diane's quarters at the palace were the largest place that she had ever lived, but after just a few days, she started to feel cramped and claustrophobic.

The moment that she had learned she had been exposed, she was willing to shut herself away to see if she would develop symptoms, but she hadn't expected to be as bored as she was now.

"It won't be forever," said Dr. Ramamurthy through a tablet. "Two weeks, and of course the minute you have any issues at all, we can provide treatment. You are in the safest place for yourself and your children, and hopefully at the end of this, you will only scold me for being over-protective and nothing else."

"I would never scold you," Diane said, and Dr. Ramamurthy rolled her eyes.

"Maybe see about spreading some of that tolerance to the king. He's had some things to say about being in isolation as well."

Of course due to his proximity to her, Samyar had been put in isolation as well, though Diane privately thought that he had gotten the better deal. They had found an area of the palace that they could sanitize and isolate for him, and he was in total communication with everyone else. Of course that took him further away from her. He wasn't just a few doors down any longer, and she was feeling that keenly.

"I will do my best," Diane promised, and after she hung up with her doctor, she video called Samyar.

"Hello, beautiful," he said when he picked up. "So nice to hear from you."

"Stop scolding Dr. Ramamurthy," she said. "She's doing her best to keep us safe."

"Has she been accusing me of scolding her? That is nothing but slander, I only want more information and—"

Diane laughed.

"You've been scolding her. Darling, just be patient, we're fine."

That was another strange thing. A kind of peace had fallen over her since she had been in isolation. Someone very clever had rigged up the ancient dumbwaiter to her rooms, and her meals came through a small hatch in the wall. She spent hours on the balcony, looking out over the grounds, and yes, she was bored, but it could have been so very much worse.

Samyar was of course still working to keep his country safe and to manage aid to their neighbors on top of it, but he called her whenever he could. Even a few words before he had to go give a speech were enough to brighten her day, and she was bemused by how strange the world had become.

"You know, kids, there was a time when I had no idea what the world was going to bring," she said one afternoon on the veranda. "Now I know what every day is going to look like, and I'm still confused."

She wasn't sure she had ever had this much idle time to think before, and when it occurred to her that these were things her children might want to learn about in the years to come, when the pandemic was just ancient history, she started to write them down.

Of course, Diane was an academic – she had written plenty of papers that she was passionate about. However, she had never journaled before, and now the words poured out of her. Her feelings for her children, her vast love for them and for her their father, came out on the paper, and she wrote so fast, she had more than forty pages by the time she mentioned them a little shyly to Samyar later.

"Let me see," he said immediately. "That is, if they're not too private?"

"They're not private at all," she said wryly. "It's just what I've been thinking and feeling. It's been good for me to get it out of my head, you know. You can read it if you want. Some of it's about you, anyway."

"Then I definitely want to read it."

She sent the pages off to Samyar, and then, somehow, she forgot it. Dr. Ramamurthy said that it was normal that she was a little forgetful, and she took her supplements faithfully to make sure it didn't get any worse.

If she were being entirely honest with herself, Diane would say that being in isolation was actually something of a relief at this point, despite the skin-crawling sense of confinement and the worry that at any point she might start to develop symptoms.

The world felt as if it were on the verge of falling on her head. Here, things were much simpler, even if they were much quieter.

"I don't know," she said late one evening, tucked into bed with the tablet propped up next to her on a pillow. "Does that sound kind of crazy, the idea that I'm sort of happy that I'm away from it all?"

From his own bed, Samyar let out a long breath.

"Of course it doesn't," he said firmly. "It's only natural. You felt as if you were under siege, and right now, whether it's forced upon you or not, you have shelter. There's nothing wrong with that in the least."

"It's not real shelter, though. I don't like being without you."

The last sentence slipped out, but she was glad it did so when she saw how it made Samyar smile.

"I don't like being without you either," he said quietly. "Diane. I want to talk with you about—"

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