Romancing the Throne

by Nadine Jolie Courtney

  I wish I could text Libby. Job hunting is right up her alley: she’d know just what to do. She’d probably even tweak my CV and take me into London to pound the pavement.

  But I feel embarrassed. Too much time has passed, and my reaction to her and Edward now feels a little like an overreaction. I don’t know how to make things normal again. The joke is: the one person I’d normally ask for advice about the entire situation is Libby herself.

  After yet another round of email applications sent into the ether on a Saturday morning, I’m starving. I slide on a pair of wellies, grab an umbrella, and head downstairs to brave the rain on the way to the dining hall.

  It’s been raining for the better part of the winter, almost nonstop since we’ve returned from break. Unlike Libby, I can’t stand the rain. Normally it would put me even deeper in a funk—however, for some reason, it cheers me up. It’s like the weather is on my side by matching my mood.

  Inside the dining hall, I’m loading up my plate with food, about to head back to my room—lunches belong to Libby and Edward, of course—when India appears next to me.

  “Hey. Come sit with us.”

  “What about Libby and Edward?”

  “They’re not coming today. Come sit!” she repeats. They must be off campus—the weekend lunch invitations are getting more and more frequent.

  I follow her to the table, where everybody makes a big show of seeming happy to see me.

  “Hi, Charlotte!” says Alice.

  “Hey!” Flossie says, smiling.

  “Lunch together like old times—yay!” says Georgie. She elbows Oliver, who plasters a smile onto his face.

  I look at them suspiciously. They’re all acting really weird.

  Tarquin just grunts at me, stuffing a sandwich into his mouth. At least he’s being the same idiot as always.

  “So, are you going to come to Donatella this weekend, Charlotte?” asks Flossie.

  India looks at her weirdly.

  “Oh, I’m invited this time? Thanks.”

  They seem to shift in their seats. Finally, Georgie speaks. “Sorry about that.”

  “Can’t we all be big boys and girls?” says Flossie. “I’m sick of everybody tiptoeing around the elephant in the room. Libby and Edward are throwing a joint birthday party next month, Charlotte. We just got a text that we’re invited.”

  “You mean, you’re all invited.”

  “Well, yeah. Exactly.”

  “So that’s why you’re all being weird?”

  Georgie looks miserable. “We didn’t want you to feel left out. We feel awful about the Donatella thing. You told India you were doing homework that night, and it just kind of . . . happened.”

  I shrug. “Whatever. I’m getting used to it.” I take a bite of my pasta. “So, where is this big shindig? Don’t tell me you’re throwing it for them and not inviting me, Floss.”

  She shakes her head. “Of course not.”

  Tarquin pipes up. “They’re throwing a big bash at Windsor Castle. It’s going to be epic.”

  Now this is a low blow.

  I’ve been fascinated by Windsor Castle since I was a kid. It was the one place I always fantasized about having a behind-the-scenes tour. And not only am I not invited, but all my friends are going without me—to celebrate Libby and Edward.

  I’d almost start crying if the entire thing wasn’t so ludicrous. Fun joke, universe. You win.

  “Why am I not surprised? Enjoy.”

  India looks nervous. “You’re okay with it?”

  “What else can I do but laugh?” I say, my mood dark.

  After finishing lunch, we girls walk back to Colvin.

  “Ugh,” says Flossie.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” Her eyes dart behind me.

  I turn around to see what she’s talking about. In the car park across from the student center, a driver is loading Libby’s and Edward’s bags into the boot of a Mercedes sedan. They’re standing hand in hand, and then Edward helps Libby into the car, the driver closing the door behind the two of them.

  I’ve taken to studying in the library. Colvin’s unofficial open-door policy means that I feel exposed at all times. When my friends pop in, I’ve started to feel on edge. I know it’s probably not fair, but I’ve started associating them with all the drama—even India.

  On the rare occasions when Libby walks by my door, glancing in and then looking away, it only makes me feel sad.

  I have a massive midterm assignment due Monday for my graphic design class, and I’m only halfway done. Instead of buckling down and focusing, however, I can’t stop watching YouTube beauty tutorials. My favorite, Kyla Buzz, is an American girl from Texas who talks as slow as molasses and has a dreamy-techno soundtrack playing while she applies her makeup. I heard she gets millions in advertising, so she’s started doing travel videos, putting on makeup in cool foreign destinations like the Great Wall of China, on safari in South Africa, and the top of the Eiffel Tower. To be honest, she slightly irritates me, and yet I can’t stop watching her videos. They’re mesmerizing.

  Part of me feels grumpy at times that I didn’t hop on the YouTube tutorials train a few years ago like Libby kept suggesting—I can do makeup way better than half these girls—but whatever. That ship has sailed, and now it’s too late to make my mark in the space.

  “Hey, you.”

  I look up to see Robert. “Hi!” I say, taking off my headphones.

  He leans against my cubicle, gesturing to my computer screen and grinning. “Hard at work?” On screen, Kyla is now applying her mascara on a dragon boat in Hong Kong, with the harbor lights and skyscrapers behind her.

  I flush. “I’m super busy, actually. Just taking a homework break.”

  He smiles. “I’m only teasing. You should see how much time I waste when I have an English paper due. Suddenly, I find myself on Wikipedia needing to know what’s the national dish of Jamaica, or why Bonnie Prince Charlie’s rebellion failed.”

  “I can answer that one!” I say, clicking out of YouTube. My graphic design project is now the only thing left on the screen.

  “That’s right—I forgot you were a history buff.” He looks back at my computer. “Wireframes?”

  “Yeah, I’m taking a graphic design course. Last term was learning how to code, and this term is all about apps and mobile design.”

  “A whiz at history, a pro at coding—is there anything you can’t do?” he says, looking impressed. “I wish I knew how to code, but I hate maths.”

  I sit up a little straighter, feeling proud. “I mean, it is difficult, but you’d be surprised—there isn’t a lot of maths in coding.”

  “No?”

  “It’s more like being diligent. It’s a lot of checking your work. I shouldn’t like it, but I do. It’s cool when you’re done and you’ve actually created something.”

  He pulls a chair out, sitting down next to me. “So what’s this? You made it?”

  “Yeah,” I say, clicking around the screen to show him details. “It’s kind of like Instagram, but for beauty.”

  “That sounds like a million-pound idea.”

  “Ha! I wish.”

  “Tell me more.”

  I pull out my phone, showing him Viewty. “Well, I’m obsessed with this app, which kind of does the same thing. Girls upload their makeup photos, hair photos, stuff like that. But the search functionality is terrible.”

  “It’s hard to search?”

  “Yeah. And they need more categories—they just have like hair and makeup and skincare, but it should go by brand and by style inspiration, too. Sometimes I want to do a mod sixties look. Sometimes I want to see cool steampunk nail art. There are so many good beauty looks people have uploaded on here, but it’s impossible to find them. You have to spend like minutes scrolling and scrolling and scrolling.”

  “Interesting.”

  “And this one,” I say, opening a home-decorating app. “I love it for DIY bedroom inspiration, but I have to scroll
through all the boring stuff for old people’s sitting rooms and back gardens—stuff I don’t care about. I want to see bedrooms girls my age have done.”

  His eyes light up. “Okay. Tell me more.”

  “I want an app that’s like a cross between these two—like a DIY Instagram. So not just people uploading their crafts, but also their beauty tutorials, their style hacks, stuff they’ve made for their bedrooms. And I think just for teenage girls. I don’t care about a lot of the home improvement stuff I see on there, or the furniture renovation stuff, and I seriously don’t care about nursery decorations and baby showers and wedding decor, which is like all over Pinterest. I just want stuff for beauty and fashion and maybe my bedroom. I think a lot of other girls would, too.”

  “So that’s what this is?”

  “Well, no, not exactly. That’s what I want to do, but that’s a ton of work. I’d need to be coding for years before I could do that—if ever. So I’m just trying to do a baby version of it for my midterm project.”

  “But if you could really do it, you think there would be a market for it?”

  “Oh, yeah, definitely. Those apps are huge.”

  “May I?” He takes my phone back, scrolling through the app and looking interested. “I see what you mean about these other apps. The UI isn’t very clean, either.”

  “What’s UI?”

  “User interface. It’s like how the app looks and works—as opposed to UX, which is all about the user experience.”

  “How do you know all that? Oh, right—your brother.” An idea pops into my head. “Do you think he’d be interested in checking out a mock-up?”

  “Of your app idea?” Robert looks down at the phone, scrolling through each app for a few more seconds. He looks back up at me. “Yeah—could you put one together?”

  “Of course. I could do some sketches of what the home screen would look like, the feed, the user profiles, all that stuff.”

  “That would be great.”

  “And I’ll do a few paragraphs about the idea, too. Like the names of the other apps that are kind of similar, but why I don’t like them.”

  He grins. “You never know. Doesn’t hurt to try, right?”

  “Exactly. There’s always room for competition—look at Facebook after MySpace, or Lyft after Uber. You don’t have to be the first. You just have to be the best.”

  “I’ll take fifteen percent as your agent, please,” he jokes.

  Libby’s been pushing me to do this for ages. Even though we’re not speaking right now, I still feel her presence. She’d be proud.

  My stomach flutters. I haven’t been so excited about something in forever.

  I blow off studying for my exams and spend all weekend sketching out concepts instead. Late Sunday night, I’ve finally finished putting together my idea: a comprehensive DIY lifestyle app for teens. A few hours of internet research in the library helps me find templates for business plans, so I even write up a five-page document explaining the basics: the concept, who’d use it, similar apps, and a few sentences on how I might make money off it down the road. I found an article in Inc. magazine about my favorite existing DIY app, and they mentioned that they make money by forming partnerships with brands and using affiliate links. I don’t know if that would work for me, but I put it in the plan just in case, adding the idea of letting people sell their crafts through the site, like Etsy.

  I email the proposal to Robert on Monday morning, who passes it to his brother, Bill. In between the madness of exams, we exchange a few back-and-forth emails that week. It certainly seems like Bill is interested, but I’m not exactly holding my breath, either.

  I mean, I’m a seventeen-year-old girl. Is some investor I’ve never met really going to fund my app? Dream on.

  nineteen

  ROBERT: FREEDOM!!!

  ME: I know—I’m SO relieved midterms are finally over. How’d you do?

  ROBERT: Okay, I think. U?

  ME: Decent. I hope.

  ROBERT: So, listen, crazy news. Are you free tomorrow?

  ME: Yeah, why? Was planning to veg—first Saturday without homework in forever.

  ROBERT: Wanna go to Paris?

  ME: WHAT?!?!

  ROBERT: My brother wants to meet you.

  ME: OMG, seriously?

  ROBERT: Super serious.

  ME: YES!!!

  ME: Paris in the springtime!!!

  ME: Shit. I don’t have any money. My parents cut off my credit cards

  ROBERT: He’ll fly you out. The flight is like twenty quid

  ROBERT: It’ll be in and out, just there for the day

  ME: I don’t care if I’m only there for an hour. Paris!!! Aaah!!

  Saturday morning, Robert arranges for a car to pick us up and take us to Gatwick Airport. We land in Paris after a quick hour-long flight, where another car is waiting at Charles de Gaulle for us. I press my nose against the glass as we make our way into the city, craning my neck for glimpses of the Eiffel Tower and Sacré-Coeur in the distance.

  “You’re acting like you’ve never seen buildings before,” Robert says, smiling at me as our car makes its way up through the southern end of the city into Paris. The wide boulevards are lined with buildings that look like cream-colored Lego blocks. Everything is uniform, elegant, picture perfect.

  “Never these buildings. It’s my first time in Paris.” A few of my friends took a weekend trip to Paris with their parents when I was younger, but we just never had the money. And after Mum hit it big, we started taking yearly beach vacations to exotic, faraway places like the Maldives. Paris is in our European backyard, and yet I’ve still never been—like people who have lived in London their whole lives and never been inside Westminster Abbey.

  I take in the tree-lined streets, the packs of teenage boys with skinny jeans and messy hair, the bicycles and mopeds whizzing by. Something about this place makes me feel at home.

  “You didn’t tell me it was your first time!”

  “You didn’t ask,” I say, smiling at him.

  We make our way farther into the heart of Paris, the Eiffel Tower so close I feel like I could reach out and touch it, finally pulling up to the George V, a grand hotel just off the Champs-Élysées. “My brother’s Paris office is just around the corner, so he has all his meetings here,” Robert says.

  We walk into the lobby, where a floral arrangement as tall as I am is majestically displayed on a marble coffee table in the center of the room.

  “Le bar, s’il vous plaît,” Robert says

  “You didn’t tell me you spoke French!” I say.

  He grins. “You didn’t ask.”

  The bar is charming, with soft yellow up-lighting and a total Moulin Rouge vibe. The tables have black marble tops, and the chairs are wood-paneled with maroon upholstery. His brother sits at one of the corner tables. He’s younger and more normal-looking than I expected—dressed more like a university kid than a businessman, in a hoodie and jeans. He stands when Robert walks over, throwing his arms around him and engulfing Robert in a big hug.

  “You look like shit!” he says. They have the same northern accent.

  “You smell like poo,” Robert replies.

  Brothers are weird.

  “Bill, this is Charlotte Weston,” Robert says, introducing me.

  Bill and I shake hands; he pumps my hand vigorously up and down. “Great to finally meet you! I loved your proposal—it’s a great idea! The DIY market is incredibly hot, and of course beauty—well, that’s a multibillion-pound operation. I think there’s a market for this. It’s just a matter of getting the word out! I have some thoughts.”

  Unlike Robert, who’s a great listener, Bill loves to hear himself talk. I barely say a word during the hour-long meeting, but it doesn’t seem to matter—Bill clearly has it down to a science, and I’ve already answered a lot of his questions in our back-and-forth email exchanges. By the time Bill dismisses himself, downing a double espresso, smothering us both in hugs, and then literally running o
ut of the room to his next meeting, we have a deal. Bill’s going to fund the app and set me up with his designer and developers. In exchange, he’ll help me create a company and will get 50 percent of it. I’ll be sole founder. My parents will have to review the paperwork, but I’m sure they’ll be thrilled.

  During the meeting, I try to keep it together and seem professional. But once Bill leaves, I lose it. “Holy crap!” I say. “Is this real?”

  Robert high-fives me. “I told you he moves fast. When he sees something he wants, he pounces. But you sure you’re okay with fifty percent?”

  “Definitely. He’s putting up all the money. And I don’t know the first thing about apps. This is what he does.”

  “That’s not true. You put the business plan together. You did the sketches, you know the DIY marketplace, you explained the competition to him. You’re selling yourself short.”

  “Thank you,” I say. “But it seems like a fair deal. Fifty would be too much if I were a real company, but he’s only investing in an idea. It doesn’t cost me anything but time. He might lose money. And I’m just a seventeen-year-old kid. He’s like an actual businessman.”

  Robert looks impressed. “You have done your homework. Okay, then, we need to celebrate. Oh, pardon,” he says, flagging down a waiter. “Deux verres de champagne, s’il vous plaît. Perrier Jouet rosé.”

  “I hope you just ordered something super expensive,” I say, joking.

  “To you and your new app. What are you going to call it, anyway? You never said.”

  “I was thinking about Selfsy,” I say shyly. “Like do it yourself, plus selfie, plus Etsy? What do you think?”

  “It’s perfect. To Selfsy.” He grins at me as we clink glasses.

  It feels so good to have somebody say they believe in me again. It makes me feel like a whole new world of possibilities is unfolding before me—and now it’s just up to me to grab them. It’s a great reminder that you can’t control what happens to you—but you can control how you react to it.