Welcome back to CHAPTER SIX—also chapters fifteen and twenty-three if you're rereading! Kinda a bummer to be concluding both my mini-series in a row, but I'll come up with something new soon. This might be a little OOC, but seriously, this chapter basically wrote itself. The ending is open enough I could still add onto it later…and I might…
I still owe the one shot collection "something wholesome" to make up for That One Chapter; hopefully I'll have that done next week. Also, TRNT update tomorrow!
Simple, she said. A romantic walk in the garden, she said. Well, so far, our little stroll in the garden had not been simple or romantic. It was actually closer to agony, hand-in-hand with the princess but stiff as a board. I'd never felt this awkward around Eadlyn, and keep in mind I'd spent three straight years hiding a crush on her.
It wasn't just me. Eadlyn was stiff and awkward too, none of her usual poise. She had no excuse for poor performance: unlike me, she'd grown up under the spotlight, so the knowledge that a hidden reporter was snapping candids wouldn't bother her, and she wasn't burdened by the cumbersome things known as "feelings", so she wouldn't be unsettled by my presence. She'd made it clear; the Selection was just a performance for her.
So why was she visibly nervous about holding my hand?
I had no idea what to do. This was what I'd always wanted, a chance, but I'd never imagined it would be like this, so awkward and unpleasant. If pictures of this made it to a magazine, no one would even believe it was a date. I was blowing it. Should I try some jokes, maybe?
I exhaled. No, jokes were not the way to win Eadlyn's heart—and winning her heart wasn't even the goal right now; I just wanted to make this bearable. The garden at sunset made this picture-perfect scene—as did Eadlyn herself, a work of art even as she appeared to have forgotten how to breathe—and I with my sweaty palms and stiff posture felt like a blight upon it.
The work of art gave me a death glare. "What's wrong with you?" she demanded, voice low. "Why are you being so weird? I thought you liked me!"
"I do like you! But—well, you're being weird too!" I said accusingly.
Oddly, speaking the weirdness out loud was almost enough to make it go away. Snapping at each other felt substantially more natural for us than admiring the hydrangeas.
Eadlyn rolled her eyes, her grip on my hand loosening just slightly. "This was supposed to be easy."
"I have no idea why you would think that."
She paused. It wasn't often the princess gave any consideration to other people's ideas; I was flattered. "I guess I don't either," she admitted. "It just…should have been easy."
In some ways, now that we were at least talking to each other, it was easy. Most of the tension in her shoulders had dissolved; my palms weren't sweating quite as profusely as they had been a few minutes ago. I just had to keep it going. "Tell me why it had to be me, tonight," I requested. "I don't think it's actually because you trust me. First of all, you don't."
"Correct." Eadlyn didn't trust anyone besides her immediate family, and even that was questionable sometimes. She was self-reliant, always had been.
"So why me?"
She shrugged. She was wearing this floaty dress, light blue with long sleeves. I was mesmerized. "Maybe I just wanted someone I knew wouldn't turn down the date."
My stomach flipped. "That could be anyone. They're all too scared of you to turn it down."
"Then maybe I wanted someone who wasn't scared of me."
She was evading the question, and I suspected she would continue to do so as long as I continued to prod. She was right, though. I wasn't afraid of her or the power she wielded. That made me the closest thing Eadlyn Schreave had to an equal, regardless of her crown and my commonness. She still had power over me—I'd handed it to her on a silver platter, telling her how I felt about her—but she'd been careful with that power so far, careful in a way she normally wasn't.
I heard the click of a shutter and tensed. Eadlyn did the opposite, loosening up when she knew the camear was on her. The thought popped into my head suddenly: Eadlyn knew what to do with a photo shoot, but she didn't quite know what to do with me.
It didn't make sense. I brushed it off, turned my attention back to the girl I was sort of on a date with. She tugged me towards the fountain; I followed willingly and unsurprisingly. I'd do anything she asked me to.
Almost anything.
It would've made the perfect magazine cover, the two of us in close embrace with the fountain stream in the background. Eadlyn arranged us effortlessly into the pose she thought would look best, her hands looped around my neck and mine resting on her waist, but when she actually stood up on her tiptoes, I hesitated. "Eadlyn."
Annoyance, instantly. I hoped the reporter didn't catch that part. "What?" she hissed, a tight frown on her face.
"I don't think we should kiss."
I expected her to be confused, maybe even angry, because this was Eadlyn, and everything had to be done exactly the way she planned it, or else. I rushed to explain myself. "The Selection just started. If a kiss made the papers now, I think—and I'm not saying this is fair—you'd be criticized for it. And…"
The next part was harder. I took a deep breath. "And, if we were going to kiss, I would want it to be real. Not just for show."
Her frown deepened; her lips were pursed. I couldn't read her, but I assumed the worst. "Eadlyn, please. Don't have me hanged for this. I know you thought I wouldn't turn you down, but-"
"It wasn't that," she objected. She was staring into the fountain now, camera and perfect pose forgotten. "You're right. They would criticize me, if we kissed."
"Then…what?" I asked hesitantly. I was fond of the princess, but I was well aware I didn't understand her. I tried to joke with her, to lighten the mood. "What, did you want to?"
She paused, ripping the rug out from under me. I didn't understand her, but pausing when she could have and usually would have immediately cut me down spoke volumes.
Eadlyn took her time coming up with the words. "Do you remember what I said to you, the first night of the Selection?" she eventually asked me.
Several examples came to mind. "You thought I signed up as a joke? I'm not like everybody else?"
She shook her head. "I said I'd never thought about you that way. And I hadn't. But…now I have. Just a little, and entirely against my will, of course."
My jaw went slack. I had to fight to keep my composure. "Excuse me?"
She gave me this defensive look—that was pure Eadlyn, her need to defend herself. "You know my country doesn't like me. I've done everything I can think of to get them to like me; that's why I'm putting on this ridiculous pageant." Meaning the Selection, presumably. "But you…I haven't put any effort in at all. You've seen the worst, most frustrating sides of me and somehow still found something likeable. You can't know how that makes me feel. So…I guess I did want to kiss you, a little bit."
My heart threatened to sprout wings and fly out of my chest. I swallowed, summoning all my resolve. "If that's really the case…" I couldn't actually believe it. No way was this real. "…I'm not opposed to it. But not here."
Eadlyn nodded shortly. Her severe frown was replaced with a cautious smile, nervous eyes. She cared about this, really cared. "My room, then. But don't get the wrong idea."
"Wouldn't dream of it," I assured her.
"And I'm not making any promises," she warned.
"Eadlyn, I know."
"I'm just…intrigued," she eventually decided, choosing her words with great care. "By you. The idea of me and you. I want to give it a try."
That was farther than I ever thought I'd get with her. Eadlyn had always been this impossible dream for me, one I'd only recently been bold enough to chase. She took my hand again; it felt different this time. I'd never seen her like this before, never heard her admit to anything as personal as thinking of me "that way". She wouldn't say something like that, regardless of all the cautions she added onto it, unless she really meant it.
It could easily lead nowhere. She could eliminate me from the Selection tonight, and I'd have to see the pictures in tomorrow's magazine knowing I'd never be that close to her again.
But somehow, I didn't think so.