by Brown, Tara
That actually made sense, but I was still mad. “But he didn’t. He sent me to Canada. And Sheila tried to get me put in rehab, like a crackhead.” My eyes began to water too. “You were my best friend.”
She swallowed. “I still am.”
“You’re not. You’re nobody to me now. I hate what you did to me. I got hurt because you drugged me. Look at my scar. You lied and said I cut myself?”
She shook her head. “I never did. I told her you fell in the rosebush—she made that up. I never spoke to your dad. I only called Sheila. I was just supposed to give you the bottle and get you to drink it. She was going to drug test you with your dad. The plan had been a go for a week. You shoplifting like an idiot was what made it worse.” Her words had grown venomous. “Sheila ruined me as much as she did you!”
“HOW COULD YOU FALL FOR HER SHIT?” I jumped at her. I didn’t even know what I was doing. I leapt at her and shoved her to the locker. She pushed me back and we fell, gripping each other. I slapped my hands like I was fighting with Suzzy, but when she hit me in the eye with her flailing, I smashed her face into a locker. It was chaos.
The next thing I knew, we were being pulled apart. I was still kicking at her and we were both crying and screaming.
The last thing I saw was Aiden’s back as he threw me over his shoulder and walked out of the school.
There are four things in the world a teenaged girl cannot live without:
Lip gloss, Leggings, iPhone, and Katy Perry.
I know I should say self-worth but the song “Roar” is like almost having self-worth!
Chapter Ten
Prince NOT SO Charming
“Son of a bitch, FIN!” He paced and watched the video again. I didn’t understand why he was so worked up. So the video had gone viral? It wasn’t as if you could even see my face in it.
His face was beet red and he looked like a psycho. “How can I explain this to my family now?” Aiden had never yelled at me before.
Tears started to leak out of my eyes.
He dropped to his knees in front of me. “Why are you doing this to yourself?”
“What?” I sat frozen, not sure I understood what was happening. “It’s my fault?”
“I know. I know you’re sorry, but this might be irreparable.”
I closed my eyes for a second, getting a grip on the things he was saying. “I’m not sorry. I was asking you if you think this is my fault?”
“Of course.” He nodded. “You acted like a child. You always act like a child. You just can’t seem to be an adult no matter the cost.”
I shoved him hard. “WHAT COST?”
His eyes flared, “ME! I am the cost! I can’t be with you. Don’t you see that?”
I jumped up off the bench and walked away, shouting back at him, “NO, I DON’T SEE THAT!”
He ran after me, spinning me around to face him. “I am fucking royalty.”
I laughed sarcastically. “You’re fucking royalty?”
“Oh my God.” He groaned, covering his face with his hands. He looked psycho, like “I should probably run away” psycho. “You are the most irritating girl I have ever met in my life. You’re infuriating. I feel like I’m having—what do you call that?—a stroke.” He turned and paced, rubbing his chest with his fist. “I am a prince. I am the second in line to the throne of Andorra.”
“What does that even mean? Is this like fantasy camp? ‘Cause this isn’t funny. You were scary there for a second.” I didn’t know where Andorra was, but I had a bad feeling he might say Middle Earth, and Jess had already made me watch those movies. There was no way I was dating a guy who loved them.
“I. AM. A. PRINCE.”
“Like the musician? I mean, what does prince mean to you? Is it a symbol?”
He gaped. “What does that mean? Can you not understand English? It means I am a member of a royal family. I am a prince, as in my cousin is Prince William. It also means I cannot date a girl who is hell-bent on bringing about her own destruction. It means that if you have a drug problem or cut yourself or drink too much or make sex videos or have multiple partners or make a bloody fool of yourself, I CANNOT DATE YOU!”
My body was numb and my heart was racing.
Prince William?
He said a prince, as in Prince William?
Suddenly, a few things started to make sense, like little pieces clicking into place. “That’s why Jack said he liked Canada, no paparazzi. That’s why everyone was so nice to me, they thought we were dating, and you being a prince—oh my God.” I staggered back, light-headed.
“Just take a breath. It’ll be okay. It doesn't mean anything. I’m still me. It just adds rules, and only really in social settings.” He sighed and looked like he was about to say something, but his phone rang. He held a hand out. “Just wait.” He answered it. “Yes?”
I backed away from him slowly, muttering to him, but mostly to myself, like a nut. “Oh my God.” My mouth was dry and my heart was rapid. “That’s why it was so funny I thought you were an employee at Lakeside. Of course.” I wiped the instant sweat from my brow and walked farther away. He was not good for me. No—no. I was not good enough for him.
My sweaty hands gripped my hips, desperate to hold something. I was short of breath. I couldn’t even see straight. “Oh wow.” I covered my face with my hands and walked, not sure if I was going to recover from that. His manners and his stiff upper lip and his friggin’ attitude. His demanding ways and controlling everything. That was why Hattie had told him all about me. It was a warning. “SHIT!”
I turned back. He was still on the phone. Standing under a huge tree in his school coat and shaking his head, he looked like a prince. It made sense. It made everything make sense.
His confliction over having sex with me was clear. Imagine getting me pregnant and being stuck with me. I gagged a little. I wasn’t good enough. “Oh wow.” My stomach twisted. I needed Linna. It was an unexplainable need. We had been friends forever and her betrayal had broken my heart, but in that moment, I just needed my friend, the friend I had always imagined her to be. I pulled my phone out and sent her a text.
The place we hide, fifteen minutes. We need to talk!
She sent back an instant “KK.”
I took one last look of him. He was like a portrait. I snapped a photo of him standing there with one hand, holding the phone to his ear and the other running through his dark hair. He looked torn. I examined the photo. In my head, I called it “The Conflicted Man,” and it made me smile before I turned away and ran from him as fast as I could.
I stopped at Starbucks and grabbed two pumpkin spice lattes and walked to the spot. It was the library. We didn’t study or read, but we liked to sit under the books and whisper. It was quiet and the last place anyone would think to look for me.
When I rounded the corner, she was sitting in our spot, holding two Starbucks coffees. I smiled bitterly and she rolled her eyes. “We are so predictable.”
I slumped down next to her and started to drink my coffee.
“How’s your eye?”
I shrugged. “Fine. Sore.”
“My head is sore too.” She picked at the lid and I noticed her nails were chipped and her lips were chapped under the gloss. Her roots had grown out and she had bags under her eyes. “I’m sorry.” She started to cry again.
“Me too.”
“Not as sorry as I am.”
I spoke in a low voice, “My heart is broken and I need my best friend.” I didn’t completely want to forgive her, but I needed her. I missed being with her. Only a girl like her understood a girl like me.
Linna’s lip quivered. “My heart is broken too. I just wish I had done so many things differently.” She covered her face and sobbed. “I’m so ashamed.”
I didn’t tell her about him. I sat and listened to her talk when she stopped heaving and sobbing.
“My parents sent me to my grandma’s for the last couple weeks of summer. My mom told me she was ashamed of me
and she didn’t want to see me for a while. She couldn’t stand to look at me. My dad still hasn’t spoken to me. Aaron came over and broke up with me. He said he needed to hear it from me—why I’d done it. When I told him it was for him, he lost it. He was so mad. He said he never wanted to see me again. I didn’t sleep or eat. My grandma knew what had happened; she saw the link on my Facebook page. She said she was disappointed I had turned out so bad. They closed my Facebook and took my phone and iPad.” I could see the desperate sadness in her face for the first time. It was real. She nodded. “I know it may not seem like it, but I am sorry. I don’t even know what I was thinking. I don’t have an excuse.”
I reached over and took her hand in mine. “I’m sorry too. I haven’t been a good friend. I shouldn’t have flirted with Aaron. He shouldn’t have even considered me an option. I knew you liked him. Deep down, I knew it. I’ve been a shit and you’ve been a shit and now we’re both shit.”
Linna ran her finger down the scar. “I called Sheila’s cell phone when you fell. There was so much blood. She told me to call an ambulance, but she got to Carter’s before it did. She told me to go ‘cause I was drunk and she would take care of it. I was so scared. You were hurt and I’d drugged you. I played along to protect myself, and I should have stood up to her and defended you.”
“You saved me. You just didn’t know it. I was spiraling hard. I’d been so drunk and stupid I didn’t even see where it was going. I could have lost my V in Carter’s yard or pool and not even noticed.”
She smiled. “Well, now you can lose it to that hot guy.”
“No.” I covered my face with my hands and cried harder. “I can’t. I’m not good enough for him.”
Linna wrapped herself around me. “You are. You’re awesome. Fin, don’t cry.”
“It doesn’t matter. I can’t ever see him again.”
She whispered in my ear, “That’s a pity ‘cause he’s standing right there.”
Aiden watched us from the end of the aisle. He opened his mouth to speak, but I backed away and mouthed to Linna, “I gotta go.”
She looked at him. “What did you do?”
He scowled at her. “What did I do? What did you do?”
I scrambled to my feet and ran from the aisle. I assumed he wouldn’t run in a library so I bolted for the main floor. I got to the front doors when I heard him call me. The librarian shushed him, but he shouted my name again. I raced through the door and behind the library. I pressed my back against the gray brick wall and took deep breaths. I didn’t know what to do about him. I glimpsed down at the ring on my finger.
“Don’t run! Just let me explain.” Aiden came around the corner, also out of breath.
“You lied to me about being from Britain.”
He stopped walking and put out his hands, like I had a knife or something. “I never lied. My mother’s family is British. It’s a very long story.”
I looked around. “Well, does it look like I have anywhere I can go, seeing how you clearly run faster than I do?”
“You’re pathetically slow.” He exhaled deeply. “My father’s family is from Andorra. My mother’s family is French royalty. My mother was married to him as a peace treaty to the people of Andorra who wanted their own royal family. They claimed to be worried about the state of affairs in Europe, specifically the Union. We’ve been run by the French President and the Bishop of Urgell, in Spain, for a very long time. But my people have demanded the treaties be redrafted and they be allowed to have their own monarchy. This fight has been going on for some time. My father’s family managed to stay out of it until they decided upon his bloodline as the most viable option for a king. My mother is a French Princess, according to bloodlines, so she was France’s option for a suitable marriage for the Andorran king they had approved.”
I was very lost. “What is Andorra?”
“A country.”
“A country? In Europe?”
“Yes, Fin.” He nodded. “The country that is a tax haven for many foreigners, but only one third of the population has the right to vote or own a majority of shares in any company. The possibility of growth is there, but the older generation is stubborn and tries to hang on to the old ways. In the old way, only the few have the rights of voting and ownership which bred corruption. Having a king on the throne changes that, especially since the king and queen are aligned with the French and the British. My mother’s family is also related to the English royals. My mother’s maiden name is Windsor. Charles is her second cousin. Her family, Jack and Millie, are English on one side and French on the other. Now all Andorrans are equal under the law of the king. It’s not an absolute monarchy, but it is a voice for the citizens who are not full-blooded Andorran. My brother is next in line. He is already married and settled into becoming king.”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
He laughed. “Not many have. We are a small country, like Monaco.”
“I’ve heard of Monaco.” I was desperately trying to keep up. “So you’re a prince, but not a ruler?”
“Right. I’m allowed to have companies of my own and live wherever I please.”
“Are you allowed to date whoever you want?”
He cocked an eyebrow. “It’s whomever, and not exactly. My family has to approve. It doesn’t have to be planned like my brother’s, but it has to be approved.”
I laughed bitterly. “I see the dilemma. So where is Andorra?” This was some bullshit. He was bullshitting me.
“Nestled high in the Pyrenees Mountains, between France and Spain.”
“There is something between France and Spain?”
He sighed. “There is. It’s got the best skiing and outdoor activities in the world. It is an entrepreneur’s dream.”
I slumped against the wall and sat down, not paying attention to the fact I was in a short kilt. “I don’t really know what to say.” He frowned, but I was still stunned. “Sucks to be you, I guess.” The look on his face broke my heart, my already broken heart. “Sucks to be me too.”
He walked over and sat next to me. “It does suck, as you Americans always say. I could have a normal life if the girl I was with could keep her pants on.”
“Screw you.”
“If my family ever finds out about your YouTube videos or your shoplifting escapade, they will kill me. They will make sure I never see the light of day again.”
“If my family ever finds out about you, they will out me and make sure your family kills us both.”
His hand slowly, as if a bit afraid of my reaction, reached across and took mine. “What can we do?”
There was nothing to be done. What could we do? I was never going to be a princess, and he was never going to be allowed to sit at my place, watching stupid movies. But there was one thing I was curious about. “How did you get to come to my school?”
He chuckled a smug laugh. “I am classed as a visiting dignitary, but technically an exchange student. I graduated already, but I explained that taking a semester at a school in a typical US town would be beneficial to our understanding of the American market and its everyday consumers. My parents bought it.”
I leaned into him and smiled. “See—even that load of bullshit sounded fancy and Shakespeare-ish. How did you get an English accent?”
“My mother is English, my nanny was English, my relatives on one side are mostly English, and I attended school in Switzerland where we were taught to speak using the Queen’s English. But I can speak Catalan, German, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Italian. I’m learning Greek and Croatian right now.”
I looked over at him. “But can you speak text?”
He smiled back. “Till my thumbs ache and my joints cease to move.”
“You can’t ever just say yes or no, have you noticed that?”
“You attacked a girl at school today like you were being paid to, and you’re going to pick on me for my enunciation and proper sentence structure?” I got lost in his eyes. They were bright and clear again. The an
ger and confusion seemed to vanish. He bent and brushed his lips against mine. “I am so very relieved to have unloaded my deceptions and avoided truths. I may not have lied, but I did keep things from you on purpose. I imagined you would be like most American girls and love me because I was a prince, not because you got to know me.”
“Do I really seem that shallow?”
“Yes. See—I answered with one word.”
I shoved him playfully. “It doesn’t count. You were being mean and you just had to boast about it. That negates your one-word answer.”
He kissed me again. “You didn’t deny your feelings for me being love.”
There was no keeping the smile from my lips. “You already said it first.”
“You found the secret note?” His eyes went to the ring.
“No.”
He laughed. “When did I say it then?”
I ignored him and tried to open the ring. It didn’t open like a locket. I was scared I might break it so I held out my hand. “When you sent me that letter with Jack’s love and Millie’s and yours. Open it.”
He sported a devious grin. “No. You can’t have it until you solve it yourself. That was just like me sending my love to a friend though.”
“I’m just a friend then?”
His blue eyes lit up. “Yes.” I scowled and he laughed. “A friend who I have flown an awful lot of kilometers for. A friend I have tried persistently not to think about at all times of the day. A friend I’m not sure I can live without. A friend I plan for.”
I nodded at the ring. “Then you should open this for me.” I pouted. “You’re mean.”
“Truly, I’m not. But I am curious. What are we to do about this predicament?”
I shrugged and picked at the ring. “I don’t know. What do you want to do?”
“I want to steal you away and start construction on a rather large hole.”
“I never should have showed you that friggin’ movie.”
He kissed my cheek. “Can we try to do this without anyone knowing anything? Can we just see if this is what I think it is?”
