37 | Taylor
Taylor
Melina hasn’t texted me back in two days.
She told me she had to think. I was given no timeline on how long said thinking is going to take.
If Melina wants me to give her space, then space is what I’ll give.
I’m just not sure how patient I can be. I’m very close to doing something insane like barging into her apartment or worse, quadruple-texting her.
It’s hard for me to focus on anything productive while our relationship is in limbo.
Maybe yelling at Dad would be a more worthwhile activity than smoking weed and reading articles about myself.
I was ready to explode at the dinner party, but I didn’t, for fear of causing a scene.
I was unaware of what she’d overheard until she told me over text that night.
I understand why she’s pissed. Like other government organizations, the royal security service is authorized to conduct basic background checks.
How often a person visits someone in prison is definitely not information one can get through their employment history or criminal record.
You have to know someone and flash an I work for the royal family for those kinds of details.
The Crown Prince asks for an in-depth summary, his people will give it to him.
The livable part of the palace might be smaller than what people expect it to be.
My dad has taken up refuge on the upper floor.
I understand this is all part of ‘the transition’ (the delightful phrase we’ve been using for my grandmother’s impending death), but I don’t know how he can stand living in this fishbowl disguised as a tourist trap.
The white upholstered furniture and glass tables help update the sitting room, although it’s hard to make a palace feel modern between the stone- carved fireplaces and seventeenth-century paintings.
Amongst the scenery, it’s hard to tell where the future king stops and my dad begins.
He tamps out a cigarette upon seeing me.
“Don’t hide it,” I say without passion.
It’s just pathetic at this point. Every time I see him, my lost hope reinforces itself. I’ve made it adamantly clear to his staff multiple times to not encourage his addiction. Am I the only person who cares?
“Who’s still giving you them?”
“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”
“You’re my father. I don’t need to schedule an appointment. Who’s still giving you them?”
“Antoine,” he says, not looking at me, almost a hint of self-pity in his voice.
“Please fire him,” I beg.
He snorts. “I’m not going—”
“I’m serious. Antoine’s a suck-up. If someone is poisoning you, they’re not in your best interest. Can you switch to vaping at least? If you’re going to have a nicotine addiction, at least have one in the twenty-first century.”
He looks at me over his glasses. “Do I look like someone who would use those things?”
“So you’re smoking to look cool?” I run both hands through my hair. “Like a teenager?”
“Is this why you’re here, Taylor?” he asks more seriously. “For the cigarettes?”
“The lengths your staff goes to please you are ridiculous.”
He sets aside the papers he was reading on a coffee table. “This is about Melina,” he infers. “I’ve never asked them to seek out any information that isn’t in a lawful manner.”
“I’m not saying you’re intentionally encouraging that kind of behavior, but I don’t think you’re actively discouraging it either. You’re the boss. It’s your staff. It’s your responsibility.”
“You’re right.”
I look around to make sure I haven’t fallen into another dimension. “I’m what?”
“You’re right,” he repeats. “If the press found out someone is fishing for private information on the monarchy’s behalf, it’d be a horrible story. I’ll make it a point to be more careful.”
The press didn’t even cross my mind. I’m seeing this more from the perspective of a decent human being. Whatever keeps him to it, I guess.
“Can you apologize to her?” I ask.
I need this to be fixed ASAP. I’m tired of being lethargic, and I’m running out of flour.
He scoffs. “Is she really that upset?”
“She hasn’t texted me back. You scared her with princess-talk when we’ve only been seeing each other for two months.” I give him a tight smile. “Next time, you should bring up her fertility.”
Melina and I haven’t discussed the future. I was going to see if she even likes me first. Obviously, I’d answer her questions if she has them, but I’m waiting until she’s comfortable asking.
“She ghosted you,” Dad concurs.
“What? No.”
“You told me that when someone avoids you, it’s called ghosting.”
“It’s great that you’re trying to expand your vocabulary, but she’s not avoiding me, she’s just, uh, thinking.” Hopefully.
My father stands and wipes the biscuit crumbs off his shirt. “She was eavesdropping on a conversation she shouldn’t have been.”
“Did it ever occur to you that not everyone would want to marry into a family like ours?”
“Of course,” he says. “Your mother turned me down the first time I proposed.”
“Really?” I laugh because I had no idea about this. “That’s embarrassing.”
Dad doesn’t look amused. “And then she changed her mind and proposed to me, thank you very much.”
That’s very progressive of her, especially for the medieval times or whenever they got engaged.
“I completely botched it the first time, too,” he says, looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows. In the reflection, I’m reminded of how much we look alike. “I didn’t even plan anything. Just went down on one knee in the middle of our little house.”
“Which little house?” I figured, besides the Navy, he lived at Clément Manor his whole life, just as I’m fated to until crowned.
“A year into dating, your mother and I wanted to live together, but moving her into Clément Manor was too soon, and we couldn’t get a place for just us without the press assuming we were going steady.
So we moved into the guesthouse on the Thibeaux estate where Julien’s mother and her friend had been residing.
If you live with others, the press will call her a roommate and not a girlfriend.
It was nice, actually. She always felt a little intimidated at the manor when we were first together.
Back then, Mother was still unsure of her.
The guesthouse was like neutral ground. And she always said she liked me en réalité.
” He smiles in a way so pure it would break my heart if it weren’t made of granite.
“I’ll consider apologizing,” he says, his nostalgic beam dropping back to a glower.
“But only because I think she’s good for you.
She seems very—” He waves a hand in search of the word.
“Argumentative. And frankly, we’re all hoping this thing sticks. ”
“Yes,” I say, cracking my knuckles. “Because everyone seems to have nothing better to do than ruminate over my love life.”
He snaps his neck towards me. “This is important, Taylor. Your whole life, I’ve let you play the field and.
..and experiment knowing you’re smart enough to be careful, but you’re thirty now.
It’s time to settle down, don’t you think?
Your grandmother is getting old. She would like to see you hitched, or, hell, an heir or two before she passes.
Something to show her that this centuries-old institution she’s dedicated her life to is in safe hands after she’s gone. ”
“Experiment?” I smirk because that’s a funny word for it. Like the way people figure out if they like dick or not is by having sex with a couple of guys first and then mulling over the decision afterward.
He lets out an indiscernible sigh. One I felt disdained by as a teenager, but have come to feel apathetic towards now.
“You’re on the right track,” he says before I leave. “Marry a girl who’s smart enough to know it isn’t all jewelry and dresses.”
I turn back around. “How could you ask someone to change their entire life for you and not feel like the most selfish man on the planet?”
My mother hated all that fame brought. Paparazzi, large crowds, pomp and circumstance. She never complained around Tom or me, of course, but it was obvious it drained her. She was probably living a peaceful and inconspicuous life before my father shoved her into the spotlight.
Dad’s brows furrow in offense. “It wasn’t a decision. She was the one God chose for me, and it wasn’t going to be anybody else.”
“God?” I whine agnostically.
“Yes, son,” he says. “God.”
No. Not happening. If I were to marry someone and throw them into my dysfunctionally functional family, it’d have to be for a good reason. Being compelled by my own enjoyment or the Holy Spirit would not be included. There would have to be some other particularly definitive logic.
“Why did Mom change her mind?”
He shrugs and answers my question with a single word. “Love.”
On any other day, I might’ve rolled my eyes at the predictable cheesiness from my hopeless romantic of a father, but for some reason, at this very moment, I find his response and my mother’s reasoning more than definitively logical.
What has she done to me?