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We both stay silent. An owl hoots outside. The rain pitter-patters on the wooden roof; it’s getting stronger again.
“Do you believe me?” he asks.
I shrug. Do I?
“I have proof,” he says immediately, and grabs his phone. So he didn’t get rid of his phone. Or he did, and this is a second phone.
“What is the proof?” I ask.
“I have been leaving voice mail to my mom for the past weeks,” he says, tapping his phone. “Everything is recorded here. I haven’t sent them yet, but I have scheduled them to go out as soon as I die. Which…” he looks at his watch, “could be any minute now.”
“That’s not funny,” I say and he smiles.
“I didn’t mean it to be, my queen,” he says. “But I didn’t mean to upset you either. Here, listen,” he hands me his phone.
His eyes are hooded, red-rimmed and wet. There are purple circles under them. He looks so vulnerable, so open, that my heart shatters.
I don’t take the phone. His hand stays like that, outstretched, his arm reaching out to me over the distance, for a while. Then he places his phone on the floor, between us.
“Take it,” he says. “I won’t need it any more. I might record one last thing before I… Before. If I have time. But I said all I had to say. I’m at peace.”
And he is. Somehow, he looks more broken than any human being I have ever seen, but there is an inner calmness radiating from his blue eyes that I haven’t seen there before.
“I’m not listening to that,” I say, suddenly afraid as I’ve never been before. This phone holds the truth. It holds his voice, his soul, his… It holds his heart. And he just gave it to me.
Up goes that sandy eyebrow.
“You don’t need the proof?” he asks.
“Haven’t made up my mind yet what I need” I say, gathering my knees to my chest. I press them close to my stomach, feeling the need to become a closed ball, to become so tight and so small and so hard that nothing could hurt me. But it’s not bullets that are killing me right now. The pain comes from inside.
The bullet-proof vest is making me too hot, but I love its tightness, its promise of security.
“You need to put on a vest too,” I tell him, and he immediately gets up and does that. “I shouldn’t need proof other than what you tell me,” I say, once he’s sitting back down. Away from me, of course. “Your word should be enough. Is it?”
“Is it?” He repeats, looking entirely lost. He still doesn’t get it: I don’t want him to persuade me. I want him to talk to me.
“Well, let’s hear it from your lips, and we’ll find out,” I reply. “No embellishments. No lies. Just… everything. Tell me everything. Can you do that?” He bites his lip. Closes his eyes. Rubs a hand over his cheeks. It comes out wet. Finally, he nods once. “Good,” I say. “Go.”
And he starts.
/we the rotten royals/
{text message to Crown Princess Olivia’s phone}
I’m so sorry, O. I shouldn’t have written those… I regret so many things. I’m not sure I should have done some of the things I did. I know that I definitely shouldn’t have done some other things I did. I hurt you, and that was the last thing I wanted.
As for the posts, I meant well when I created them, but that doesn’t mean anything in the end, does it? Not when you’re dead. Please don’t be dead. God, I couldn’t live with that. I can’t live without you, O. I never could.
Everyone here is freaking out. You wouldn’t believe the circus that this place has become. The palace, the whole world really. Everyone is losing their freaking minds. The soldiers all over the world are pressing their fingers to the trigger, waiting for the order to pull it the minute you’re discovered dead. To start their war.
And no one knows where you are, or if you still are anywhere.
You would hate this so much. You always hated being the center of attention, but this… This is something else. Half of us are crying uncontrollably, the rest of us are preparing to go into hiding in case the war breaks out. But all of us are broken inside. I am broken.
I’m so sorry. I worked so hard to prevent this very thing, this war, but I never meant for you to be in so much danger. In so much pain. That was the exact thing I wanted to avoid. Believe it or not, I created The Rotten Royals to help. To protect you. To keep you safe.
To stop this whole freaking war.
