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“I imagine they are.”
What Freya doesn't know is any woman I’m photographed with—be they a friend or a cousin or someone I’ve known for less than five minutes—is labeled as my latest girlfriend. At last count I believe I had dated close to 259 women in the last four years alone.
All in all, they've been right a grand total of never.
And yes, I know that makes me sound like some sort of sad sack with no actual relationship experience. But there you have it.
“It's so funny because last night was the first night I met you, and they're already saying we're dating, which we’re not.”
“Facts should never get in the way of a good story,” I reply.
“Right?”
Thankfully, she slips her phone back into her purse.
“Tell me more about what it’s like to be an actual prince.”
Do I have to?
“Why don't you tell me what you think it's like to be a prince.”
“I’d love to! I figure you sit in a gilded chair, wearing a crown, and make decrees as peasants line up to give you their suckling pigs and baskets of strawberries for your feasts.”
Not even close.
“Then on Sundays you go and inspect the guard at the Trooping of the Color.”
That's Britain.
“During the week you'll turn up at charity events and sip tea and cut ribbons.”
Far too accurate, although I prefer coffee, not tea.
“And I bet you've got a castle in the mountains somewhere where you go and ski and relax.”
It’s on the Mediterranean, and it's more water skiing than snow skiing.
“Anything else?” I ask.
“Oh, you sleep in a four-poster bed with curtains that you close around you.”
“Do I wear a night shirt with matching cap?”
“I bet you do!”
“I think you'll find that’s Scrooge from the Charles Dickens novel, A Christmas Carol.”
“You mean the duck?”
And she thinks I’m the one who didn't “learn stuff” at university.
I give her an impassive smile. Why did my father’s PR people think it was a good idea for me to go out with this woman today? “The duck. Exactly.”
“Oh, you are way cuter than that duck.” She nudges me with her shoulder. “Now, where was I? Oh, that's right. I bet I've got it all a hundred percent right.”
“Right down to Scrooge McDuck.”
She beams. “I bet you get woken up by a chambermaid every morning instead of an alarm clock like us regular folk, and she curtsies to you before she draws the curtains and says ‘good morning, your Royal Highness’ and then she hands you tea and crumpets for your breakfast.”
