Page 128 of The Thing About My Prince

Sofia and Jeremy went to the Seychelles to stay on a private island some rich media mogul lent them. It’s true what Lexi said—the richer you are, the more people give you things for free.

I tried my hardest to look jolly when Sofia video called me while they were there, but she told me my eyes looked sad.

Isn’t there a saying that eyes are the windows to your soul?

In which case I guess I have no control over my soul, because all it wants is what, or rather who, it can’t have.

I’ve been wandering around in a daze these last few weeks, hoping and hoping that time will do that thing that everyone says it does—heal.

Every time my phone’s beeped, I’ve snatched it up just in case it’s a message from Lexi. I can’t blame her for not contacting me again. I sent her one of the most cowardly non-breakup breakup messages of all time.

But ending it was the best thing I could do for her. It gother career back on track and away from me and a family she would never have wanted to be tangled up with.

I’ve spent countless sleepless nights sitting in bed in the dark, writing texts I’ve never sent to her. It always seems like a good idea when I start them, but they always end up long and convoluted, and, in the end, I always come to the same conclusion—it would be selfish to send it, selfish to get back in touch, because she’s better off not associated with me. The only thing being with me ever brought her was the trouble I always knew it would.

I need to keep my poisonous existence to myself and leave her free to live and enjoy her life uninfected by mine.

Maybe the current life project that I’m embroiled in—searching for a new home—will eat up a whole bunch of time and be a good distraction from the aching chasm inside me.

The owner wants to sell this place and I have to be out in a couple of weeks. I’ve yet to find something I like that’s also reasonably secure, but I’m going to see a bunch more places tomorrow and a couple of them look hopeful.

All this means I have to start paying for a roof over my head. Which means I either need to figure out a new path to making a living or move out of New York City to somewhere where rent isn’t equivalent to the GDP of a medium-sized country.

I totally get that these are rich people problems. Oh, poor me that I have to pay for security to protect me. Poor me that I have to live at the top of a tall building so strangers who think I’ve betrayed my family or that I’ve been sending them messages in their dreams can’t get to me. Poor me that I had connections to only one multibillionaire with a lavish penthouse I could live in rent-free for a few years.

I get that these are not the regular normalities of life. But they are the normalities ofmylife. And they are what I have to live with and cope with on the daily. And for forever.

But looking at these two joy-filled faces on my phone,their noses red from the cold, all bundled up in thick parkas and hats, standing on the viewing deck of a large white truck high above the snow with two polar bears going about their day behind them, gives me a buzz of satisfaction that there is at least one upside to my privilege.

A message from Chase appears up at the top of my screen.

CHASE

Seen this?

He’s included a link to an Instagram post.

When I click, it opens up a video fromTheSentinelmagazine’s account. The camera pans across the rubble of a large building in a dusty brown landscape below a clear blue sky before landing on a woman wearing a flak jacket and a headscarf. She’s walking toward the camera, saying, “Almost forty percent of Yemeni children are not in school. Years of civil war have forced them out…”

My heart jumps at the sound of Lexi’s voice. I don’t hear what she says after that because the only thing my brain can do is wonder how risky it is there, where she’s sleeping, what she’s eating, and how long she’s there for.

Of course I know this is everything she’s always wanted, and I’m damn happy my dad was good to his word and made this happen. But the sight of her there, in the scorching heat, a touch of sunburn visible on her nose now she’s closer to the camera, sickens me with worry.

Is Yemen dangerous? I don’t even know. Wow, how many awful things like these are going on in the world right now that I know nothing about and that millions of other people know nothing about either?

And here I am worrying about which penthouse I might live in next.

Just exactly how fucked up is my existence?

ME

Thanks. No, hadn’t seen it. Wow.

CHASE

She’s good, huh?

ME