edited

|Adara De Clare|

What is he going to do?

Nerves fill my body as I wonder what he's thinking of. He told me not to worry about it, but how can I not? The Prince isn't exactly known for his reliability.

I pace around my room, biting my fingernails. I know I shouldn't. It's a bad habit I need to break out of, but every time I get nervous I do it.

Why couldn't he have just told me what he was going to do? Everything would be much easier instead of me stressing about it.

My mind runs a million miles per hour as I try to figure out what he's going to do. Every single idea that pops into my mind of what he could do is nothing good. They all consist of him hurting someone or being his normal dictator self. All bad routes to choose.

Why couldn't he have just incorporated me into this? It would be much better. Then I would be able to see what he's doing and try to keep him in line. I'd probably fail but still, I could at least see what he's doing.

The Prince gives me severe anxiety. I just wish I could say that he's not going to do anything stupid but I don't know that. What if he hurts someone?

Goodness, I don't know if I could take that.

Just then, someone knocks on my door.

"Come in." I tell them.

My mother opens the door and she smiles at me. "Hey, mom." I greet her and she waves at me.

"Hey, sweetheart, guess who came to visit you?" She pushes the door all the way back, showing a shy Via.

I sit up as quick as a cheetah. Disregarding the fact that my mom is right there, I run to Via and I hug her as tight as I can.

"Via!" I yell and she giggles hugging me back.

"Hey, Ara, sorry to drop by unannounced." She starts off then I hush her.

"Don't even say anything, it's okay for you to drop by anytime." I tell her then my mother excuses herself.

I close the door and me and Via sit on my bed. I fall back onto my pillows. "Girl, I'm stressed but first order of business, how are you?" I use my elbows to prop myself up.

Via holds her head down and she sniffles a little. I completely sit up. "Do you have the mental health capacity to hear this?" She asks.

I purse my lips in a smile for her, cocking my head to the side. Poor Via, she really is the bestest of best friends. She always thinks of others before herself. She puts her problems behind everyone else's which is very bad but that's just how she is.

She's the nicest person on earth, it's irritating that other people have taken advantage of her.

"Yes, yes I do, Via. Tell me everything you want to say." I give her permission and she tears up.

She covers her mouth with her hands, sobbing. She looks up to the ceiling and she wipes her tears. "I'm okay, I'm okay. I want to tell you."

She stays silent for a little while but I wait patiently for her. "Okay, so I got called to the counselor's office because my brother tried to kill himself. He's still in the hospital on 24-hour suicide watch. They wanted to get me a 24-hour bodyguard in case I tried to do the same thing. I never understood why they were so overprotective. What did my brother's attempted suicide have to do with me? I'm fine.

I didn't know why he tried to kill himself so I pressured him to tell me. He only told me to ask mom what the reason was. So, I went home and I told mom, asking her what he meant by that. She broke down and said that he never was supposed to find out." She sniffles, sobbing some more.

"Find out what?" I ask her, rubbing her back. She turns around and she buries her face in my neck. She hugs me tight.

"You don't have to continue if you don't want to, Via." I reassure her but she shakes her head.

"No, no, I want to." She takes a moment to breathe properly.

"He. . . he found out that our dad was hurting. . . mom. . . sexually. She slowly expelled it and my eyes widened.

"What?" My voice cracks and tears well up in my eyes. Oh Lord, that's awful.

Her eyes find the ground and she twirls her fingers around and intertwines them together. She bites on her lower lip, trying to stop herself from crying.

"Come here." I open my arms for her and she falls right into them.

"It's getting better now, because mom is leaving dad and she's building a case against him, so everything's going to be alright." She sobs into my shoulder and I rub her back, consoling her.

"Sweetheart, everything is going to be okay. I know it sucks right now but it's definitely going to get better. I'm right here for you." I reassure her.

"I know it's going to be alright, I just want to stop going to counseling. I want to live a normal life right now. I don't want to be burdened with what's going on. It happened, now we're dealing with it, I just want them to stop." She gets up, wiping her tears.

"I understand." I tell her and she smiles at me.

"Anyway, let's discuss your life. The Prince?" She wiggles her eyebrows at me and I blush rolling my head back.

"Noo, Via. What about you?" I ask her my voice soft.

She sighs and she scooches closer to me, "I already said what I had to say. I'm not sad anymore, Ara. Either willingly tell me or I will beat it out of you with this pillow!" She squeals, jumping on my bed, holding my pillow in her hands in an defensive pose.

"All right, all right." I put up my hands in defeat.

She releases the pillow and sits beside me, waiting patiently for me to start talking. "Well, he basically ordered me to talk to Justina—the girl who says she's pregnant with his baby—to see why she's lying. I spoke to her earlier today and it was hard to say that she's lying but same with the Prince. If one of them is lying then it's going to be hard to find out who." I told her.

"I mean, we could just wait it out and see if Justina's belly grows or not." Via says.

"True, but she could have gotten pregnant by someone else but claiming that it's the Prince's." I say and she nods, understanding.

"You're right. What else?" She tells me to continue talking.

"Well, he told me that he was going to do something to make everyone believe that we're dating but I have no idea what he's going to do. Knowing him, it's probably something terrible." I tell her and she cringes, agreeing with me.

"Let's pray that no one gets harmed in this." Via says but we look at one another, knowing that won't happen.

Someone probably, most likely, will get hurt.

•

The rest of the day passed and night came. The rest of the time, Via and I were just playing board games, online games and reading books. It has been a while since we've hung out like this. The past times we have hung out, it was to finish that stupid Art project.

Ick! I hate it.

Now, we're just lying down on my bed, on our phones.

"Oh my gosh, girl look at this!" Via squeals and I look at her phone to see what she's referring to.

I see a post on instagram saying:

THE PRINCE HERE TO CLEAR UP RUMORS!!

On Winthorp channel—which is channel 52.

I see that and I immediately look up at Via.

"So, I'm assuming that this is his plan. To clear up everything himself. Which will be one for the books since for all of his scandals, he's never cleared anyone of them up. Ever, and there were a lot." Via says and I nod, agreeing with her.

"Well, I have to say that this is not what I expected." I told her.

"What did you expect? Mass annihilation?" She jokes.

"Yeah, kinda." I admit and her head snaps to me. She looks at me as if I were insane.

"Girl, I'm just nervous about what he's going to say." Via states my thoughts and I nod at her.

"On the time stamp it says that it's starting in a minute!" She exclaims and she jumps off my bed and runs downstairs with me trailing behind her.

We jump in the couch and she grabs for the remote, turning to channel 52. We go on it and it's an advertisement break. We wait fiddling with our fingers and heavy, fast beating hearts. Anxiety taking a toe hold over us.

Just then, Via looks around the room. "Where are your parents? Did they leave?" She asks me.

I look up and my eyes catch a note attached to the fridge.

"They left to meet with the King and Queen." I answer and she looks at me confused.

"How did you know that?"

"You see that?" I point at the note on the fridge and she nods, "That's what they do when they leave to meet with them." I tell her and she nods at me, understanding.

The advertisement ends and I quickly turn off the lights. The intro to Nancy Winthorp's channel comes on then we see her and the Prince sitting in chairs, opposite from one another.

They begin talking with opening speeches to try and ease the audiences into the interview.

"That's awesome, your highness, however there are a lot of rumors going around. Would you like for us to start with the latest and most shocking rumor? You have a girlfriend?"

Nancy states and I feel Via's stare at me. I shift in the couch, swallowing a ball that formed in my throat. The Prince doesn't shift a muscle. He looks at her as if he's done this a thousand times.

"I know, but it's true. We are together. It's not a rumor, not anymore."

He confirms our relationship and my eyes widen a little. "Oh my gosh, he confirmed it. Not to stress you out, Ara, but you are now a full-fledged royal celebrity." Via tells me and my mouth falls open a little.

"I know and that's unsettling." I answer her.

We continue watching.

Nancy asks him about Justina and the allegations of her being pregnant.

He denies it.

He says on tv that he didn't get her pregnant.

"Yes. I can tell you with full knowledge and honest truth, I've never had any relations with that woman and I never would. This entire time I have been devoting myself to one beautiful, amazing, smart woman. She's the only one for me." Is what he says.

My eyes widen and I can't help the blush that comes up on my cheeks. I know that he's only saying that because he has to. I know he doesn't mean it. In fact I'm sure that he means the opposite. He would torture me in the worst ways if he could.

Via looks at me then back to the tv, she doesn't say anything. Good, I don't think I could be able to answer whatever question she could ask me.

We continue watching and the entire time Nancy is blushing like crazy. She talks about how lucky I must be to be with a man who cares about me so much like the Prince.

Hah! If only she knew what really goes on. They'd be terrified.

"He is so smart." Via tells me. Her eyes glued to the TV, her mouth gaping.

"What do you mean?" I ask her.

"He's not killing two birds with one stone, he's killing all of them." She says with widened eyes.

I look at her confused and she continues.

"He's confirming your relationship with him, he's destroying the pregnancy allegations and he's fixing his image from being rude, mean and psychopathic to a loving man who only wants to provide for you." She says and my eyes widen.

"He is smart." I tell her.

"He'd have to be. He's fooling everyone." She says.

"You must love her very much." Nancy says and I freeze up.

So does he.

His shoulders become tense and he swallows.

"I do." Is what he says.

Via looks at me.

"Wow, he is selling the entire good boyfriend thing. If I didn't know what was really going on I would've believed him." She confesses and I nod.

A tiny part of me nearly did. However, I was reminded of who he really is.

•

Via left after the news due to it getting late. I yawned and bid her bye then I jumped into the shower. After showering I change into my pajamas and I crawl into bed. As I pull the blankets up my body, I hear the whoosh of wind then I see a silhouette by my window seat.

"Is it that hard for you to knock on my window at least?" I ask him but I get no response.

I pull the covers up to my neck out of instinct.

"Y-Your highness?" I ask, gulping. Please let it be him and not someone else.

He stands.

He walks toward me and I begin whimpering. I crawl back until my back hits the head of my bed.

"Why are you afraid?" He asks, his deep voice ringing throughout my room.

I let out a breath of relief. My hand goes to my chest. Oh thank the Lord.

"I thought you were someone else." I tell him.

He sits on my bed beside me. I tense up. He never sits on my bed when he comes over this late. The last time he sat on my bed was when we were discussing the contract thing.

"Didn't I promise to not let any harm come to you?" He asks. Even through the darkness I could see his piercing gaze at me.

"Y-You did, but you can't be everywhere at once." I say.

He shifts. Sitting fully facing me. His hand reaches up and touches my cheek. I pull back out of instinct.

"Sorry." I apologize but he says nothing and places his hand on my cheek. Warmth immediately floods the area. Now, I don't want his hand to move. I look up at him, with wary eyes.

What is he going to do?

"I made you a promise. No harm will come to you." He says, creasing his eyebrows as he means every word he says.

"That's just because of the contract. You don't have to." I stumble over my words.

"I made a promise. I intend to uphold it." He promises me and I nod, gulping.

This is honestly a new side of him I've never seen before.

It's interesting.

"I wonder what everyone is going to say now that you did that interview?" I wonder, still aware that his hand is on my cheek.

He sighs, "I don't know."

"When you see Justina tomorrow. . ." He trails off.

Here it is. His normal self. He's going to threaten me to talk to Justina or else Via will get hurt.

"If, you see her. Let me know if she says anything to you. You. . . you don't have to go and talk to her. Just do what you want." He tells me then he removes his hand from my cheek. The cold greets me once more and I shiver a little.

He gets up off my bed and he stands, putting both hands in his pockets. "Goodbye, Adara. Sleep well." He adds then he disappears.

My shoulders slump. Wow, that was different.

I exhale deeply, then I wrap my cold hands around myself, wondering where the cold wind is coming from. I look at my window and it's open.

He forgot to close it.

I walk to it and I close it, drawing the curtains.

I fall into my bed, wrapping myself in my blankets. When I fall asleep, a smile forms on my face.

I like this him.

It's not frightening.

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