The shower had not helped. If anything, he was feeling worse. In addition to the usual frustration, the nature of this dream had upped the ante with a layer of job-related stress. Joseph decided to take the long way to Clarisse's office by leaving the palace and winding his way through the gardens.
It was a beautiful day. Sun was shining, birds were singing, dew was glistening on the grass. The perfume of the flowers permeated the air. All the other cheery descriptions Joseph could think of to describe beautiful days seemed to fit this one perfectly, and that irritated the hell out of him. A bunny hopped out of the bushes and darted across the path, pushing him over the edge. He desperately longed for the morning to take a sudden turn. A nice mass of storm clouds to cover the vibrant blue sky and cast a cold gray pallor over everything.
He tried once more to have a very important conversation with himself. He started by listing the reasons he could never be with Clarisse.
She was royal, he was a commoner.
She was his Queen, he was her servant.
Really, did he even need to continue? Better keep going. Leave no stone unturned. Some day, one of these was bound to sink in.
She was married, and not to him.
That was a good one. He had always had the utmost respect for the sanctity of marriage, and no matter the height of his feelings or the depth of his pain, the bonds of matrimony definitely provided a stumbling block. He could not rationalize even harboring fantasies about Clarisse when he considered that she was a very married woman.
It worked for the first six months of his employment, anyway. By then, it was as clear to him as it was to everybody else on the palace's payroll that King Rupert had a weakness for women who were not his wife. Rupert and Clarisse were very good friends who liked each other a great deal, lived in the same building, and ruled a country together. They were raising two sons together. Beyond that, there was little about their relationship that could be described as marital.
He threw this back in his own face (he was arguing with himself, after all), and he responded with a mental smirk. Hardly makes her available, he thought sarcastically. Authentic marriage or no, she's utterly devoted to it.
He couldn't argue with that. She had always maintained her vows, as far as he knew. When she married Rupert, she had married Genovia. That was irrefutable. She would never do anything to betray either her husband or her country, even if she wanted to. And it was not in her nature to want to.
In the end, despite the other rock-solid arguments, it was knowing she didn't want to that kept him grounded in reality. Clarisse had never in any way led him on or intimated an interest in him that went beyond appropriate boundaries. She did like him, he knew that. She trusted him, even beyond the required amount for a bodyguard. He stopped short of openly presuming a friendship. He was certain there was one, but despite the audacity of his heart and mind, he was nothing but respectful of her space. He could look at her and recognize comfort, familiarity, and trust, but he never saw anything that remotely resembled love.
In the end, he wouldn't have it any other way. His pent-up love for her was a burden he would willingly bear, but the anguish that accompanied it was something he would never wish on another. He took a deep breath and accepted once more his solitary path, completely unaware that someone was watching him from the balcony off the Queen's office.
To be continued…