Page 51

FIFTY-ONE

ROSE

I expect to find William waiting for me in the office, but there’s nobody here. Seconds after we reach the headmaster’s waiting room, though, he bursts through the door after us. He must have been a part of the crowd when I spoke. Good, no need to update him, then.

“Ahh, William,” I say brightly as he storms up to us. “Found you.”

He stops several feet away from me, and scans my face with disbelieving eyes. “Rose, I…” he trails off, shaking his head, “have never been more disappointed in you.”

Molly, Eleanor, and Danni draw closer to me from all sides. It’s a somewhat protective action. As for me, I let out another laugh, one that turns into more of a cackle. “William,” I say, the laugh turning into a sneer. “I have truly never given less of a damn what you think of me.”

I don’t expect him to reply to that, and he doesn’t. Truthfully, I think he’s too gobsmacked to get a word out if he wanted to. Wordlessly, I turn on my heel and lead the girls out of the room. The staircase to the ballroom is accessible from the nearby hallway, so we hurry down it, pour into the ballroom, and pull the heavy door shut as quietly as we can.

“Your parents are going to murder you,” Molly cries, whirling to face me as soon as we’re safe. “There’s impulsive, and then there’s that.”

“ Was it impulsive?” Danni asks. “That speech felt awfully prepared.”

“Did you guys see that blond reporter in the front?” Eleanor asks, throwing herself on one of the rows of seats. The same seats I used to sit on while Danni rehearsed, back when we first started dating. “I thought she was gonna pass out when Rose said she’s a lesbian.”

“I don’t remember anything,” Molly says, sitting next to her. “I think I dissociated.”

“Oh, she for sure was. She was like, Whaaaat? ”

“Rose?” Danni asks. She’s not sitting. Rather, she’s hovering by the piano, watching me. I walk over to the windows and peek through the curtains. The crowd by the school gates is bigger than it was before. I wonder, how long until the news gets out?

It probably already is, I realize. It may have even been filmed live.

There’s no going back now.

I beam and turn back to face the others. “That felt incredible,” I say.

Danni visibly relaxes, though Molly still seems to think I’m having a nervous breakdown.

“You know this could go either way, right?” she asks. “There’s a chance they’ll let you stay, but the diocese…”

“You think they might not want to place a crown on a lesbian’s head?” I ask, feigning horror. “Why didn’t anyone warn me? This changes everything.”

Danni laughs, and I swirl to face her, then scoop her up into a hug. “Oh, my god,” she giggles as I spin her around. “You’re really happy.”

I start laughing again. Molly now no longer seems to suspect I’m having a breakdown. Rather, she seems to have grown quite sure of it. She looks to Danni for assistance, but Danni seems enraptured by me.

“Can you imagine if they let you stay?” she asks.

“They won’t,” says Molly.

“They might,” says Eleanor.

“But imagine, ” Danni says. “Like, really think about it. Think of what it would mean for a place like Henland to have a lesbian for a queen. There are so many people in this country that would change everything for. No offense to your uncle, but he’s more of the same. Even if you were no good at the job, though, just having you there would make a hell of a statement. But you would be good. Even if you hardly have any power, and it’s only charities, and causes, and knighting the odd person or whatever, I want someone like you up there making those choices. Because you understand what it means to be on the outside over something you have no control over. There are people who need you, the way you are.”

I stare at her. Not because her words don’t make sense. But because it never occurred to me that any part of me would make me inherently more suited to being the monarch than my uncle. I’m so used to thinking of myself in terms of my flaws. Yet here she is, reframing my very existence as an inherent strength.

I didn’t think it was possible to love her more, but every day, every hour, she finds a way. Sometimes—miraculously—she even manages to make me like myself, too.

“Danni, is your mom still waiting for you in your room?” Eleanor asks.

“Yeah, why?”

“Are you going to tell her about the two of you?”

Danni looks to me. “I… don’t know.”

I didn’t bring up my relationship with Danni to the reporters because I didn’t want to speak for her. Not without consulting her first, at the very least. After the week she’s had, it would not surprise me if she’s had enough of the spotlight to last her a lifetime.

“Do you want to?” I ask her.

She takes a step forward, eager and hopeful. “Wait, can I?”

I shake my head and shrug. “There’s no reason not to. We can tell anybody you want to tell.”

Danni is practically bouncing on her heels by the end of my sentence. “Okay. Perfect. Okay. I’m going to tell her.” She laughs at the sound of it. “I’ll talk to her alone for now. But come find us later, okay? I’d like you to meet her.”

Meet her. I get to meet my girlfriend’s mother. How enchantingly, delightfully normal.

I’m in love at first sight with my brand-new reality.

My phone buzzes in my pocket. It’s Father. He and Mum are here to remind me of the other side of my new life, I suppose.

Let them.

“Say what you want to say.” I fold my hands on the table and survey my parents.

The headmaster let us use one of the school meeting rooms for this conversation, for the sake of privacy. It’s quite funny, really, because between the bare walls and the table and chairs, I couldn’t think of a more fitting location to be interrogated. Or, perhaps, let go from one’s job.

Father’s face reddens, then his shoulders drop. “How could you do something so idiotic and rash?” he asks me.

Can he truly still not know the answer to that? Has he not listened to a word I’ve said over the last several months? “I won’t spend the rest of my life terrified someone will see me kissing the person I love.”

Mum closes her eyes as though she’s praying for strength. “You just threw away your future. For a high school relationship.”

“I didn’t. I did it for love.”

She opens her eyes. They’re the same shade of green as mine. A little like looking into my reflection. “You think you love this girl?”

“I know I love her. I intend to be with her forever. But if, for whatever reason, I’m not, there will be another love, and I would’ve had to watch them be harmed, over and over again, in order to force my hand, or protect my name. I would have lived to regret it if I forced myself to go through with your version of my future.”

Father scoffs. “How whimsical.”

“Pardon?”

“ Love? ” he asks. “What of responsibility? And duty? What of growing up, and accepting that your country is worth a thousand times more than your selfish desires?”

I wonder if he’s thinking of the girl my aunt told me of long ago. The one who had the audacity to fail to live up to our country’s lofty moral standards. The one he loved despite it all. Who was sent where he could not follow.

Mum glances at him, and I think she disapproves of his wording. Does she know of the girl who came before her? Or perhaps she thinks he’s being too harsh on me.

“What is it our country needs?” I ask him. “To believe in a lie? Or do they need to feel they can trust we are who we say we are, even if our honesty risks our popularity? Perhaps,” I add, thinking of Danni, “there are even some people who haven’t felt particularly represented by our family, yet might feel differently now.”

Father looks incredulous. “Are you telling me you gambled your future on the hopes that a handful of gay citizens will push to keep the monarchy in place?”

“I’m simply telling you,” I say, “that just because your circles consist of people who would be uncomfortable with somebody like me in power, it doesn’t necessarily mean the country is united in that opinion.”

I say it with confidence, even though, truly, I don’t know for certain. Henland is majority Catholic. And as for how open those Catholics are to change, or progress? It will, like most things, vary from person to person. In what ratios, who can say?

“Also,” I say, “what I did wasn’t a gamble. I just looked at the devil I knew, and realized I’d rather embrace the devil I don’t. Whatever it entails.”

Mum draws her eyebrows together. She seems significantly less annoyed at me than Father does, at least. “I don’t understand,” she says. “Is your life so awful? Why haven’t you discussed any of this with us?”

“Because,” I say in an icy tone, “I don’t feel like coming to you with my problems will help solve them. It feels like providing you with ammunition to use against me.”

“Is that so?” Father asks. Goodness, he’s patronizing. Do I ever sound like that?

“For example,” I say, “not even a fortnight ago, when you were apparently considering removing Danni from Bramppath in order to stop the rumors. Unless William lied about that, too?”

Neither of my parents seem at all surprised by the accusation, which tells me all I need to know. “It was only to protect you,” Mum says. “We remember what it’s like to be a teenager, and to barely grasp the concept of a future. We were afraid you might throw yours away for a teenage romance.”

“Founded fears, clearly,” Father adds.

“You remember what it’s like to be a teenager,” I say, watching Father closely, “yet you thought that trying to ship away the girl I love as soon as you discover our relationship is the kind of behavior that would encourage me to trust you?”

If Father wasn’t thinking of the girl from his twenties before, he certainly is now. A flash of pain—and comprehension—crosses his face. So, then. Despite his obvious efforts to justify his own parents’ choice, he remembers the suffering it caused.

Then he knows the pain he almost handed down to me.

“Did you know William was working with Alfie?” I ask them.

Thankfully, this does prompt a confused reaction from them.

“He and Alfie took it upon themselves to convince me to become engaged to Alfie,” I go on, and their eyebrows shoot up. And so, I tell them. About the forum posts, and the anonymous tip, the attempts to send information to newspapers, both unsuccessful and successful. The bargaining, and the ultimatums.

What I don’t mention—at least, not explicitly—is how much of this entire situation might have been prevented if I trusted my parents to care as much about my personal well-being as they did—and do—about my ability to take their places one day.

What they don’t share—at least, not explicitly—is what they intend to say to William about all of this. From the looks on their faces, however—Father’s in particular—I am reassured William and I might never speak again. And, I believe, the Paget-Harringtons may be hearing from the two of them sooner rather than later as well. But not before we settle the more pressing matter before us.

“What happens now?” I ask. “Do you intend to remove me from the line of succession?” I swallow and draw a deep breath. “For what it’s worth, I do think Albert and Sukey would do well in my place.”

Mum recovers first. “Well, we aren’t there yet,” she says. I don’t allow even a hint of hope to touch my features. “Let’s see what happens now.”

“Yes,” says Father. He still sounds sad, but the anger has dissipated. “We must meet with parliament, and we need to ascertain the initial reaction from the public. You must prepare for the consequences, Rose. If parliament opposes your ascent, we will need to reevaluate the line of succession.”

“I know.”

“And even if parliament allows this, that’s not to say for a moment the people will. And if public opinion drops further—”

“I know.”

Father nods, then surveys me, long and mournful. “It is a shame,” he says, his voice breaking. “I very much wanted to see you serve this country, Rose. You would have done splendidly.”

This shakes me more than anything either of them have said until now. It is, I believe, the first time in years he’s shown any faith in my ability to perform this role well. Only for it to come now, when it’s far too late.

It does not, however, make me regret my decision.

“We will need to work through this together, as a family,” Mum says. “But we will work through it. Whatever the outcome.”

Father touches her upper arm, featherlight, and nods in agreement.

“Thank you,” I say, and, just for a moment, my brash confidence is missing, replaced by a note of fear. For all I had insisted I would bear the consequences, I think no small part of me had worried I would lose their love forever. It’s always felt like a fragile thing. Much more so than their love for each other ever has.

But perhaps it’s less conditional than I thought.