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“We are.” She gives me a small smile. “She’s the closest person to me. But, you know, she’s still paid for by my father. He gives her a paycheck to look after me, so as close as I am with her, I wonder what would happen if she were fired or my father decided it wasn’t worth it anymore. Would she stick around? Maybe not.”
“I’m sure she would.”
“Would Ottar?”
I laugh softly. “Ottar would leave so fast it would be like one of those cartoons where you’d see an Ottar-shaped hole in the wall.”
She giggles. “I can see that.”
We stop outside of Harold’s. The front window is all frosted glass so you can’t see inside the bar from the outside. Harold’s is written across it, the paint gold and peeling.
“By the way,” I say, pulling her close to me before I open the door. “I may have told them that we’re already engaged.”
“Why would you do that?” she cries out softly.
“Hey, it’s no worse than what you told your father,” I remind her. “Let’s just say I was feeling optimistic.”
“Do you still feel optimistic?”
I raise her hand up so it’s between our chests. “The fact that you’ve let me hold your hand this whole time gives me a reason to think so.”
Then I open the door.
“Prince,” Harold calls out merrily and then stops rubbing down the bar counter the moment he sees Ella. “Who have we here?”
“Is this her?” Slender Man asks from the booth, his voice so high and anxious I half expect him to start fluttering his hands. “Is this your fiancé?”
“This is her,” I say proudly. “This is the future Princess Isabella of Norway.”
Maud staggers out of her seat and comes forward for an inspection, peering over Ella at close range.
“Getting a good look there, Maud?” I ask, then realize I’ve been speaking Norwegian. I switch to English. “Ella, here, is from Liechtenstein,” I say, putting my hand at her back and leading her over to the end of the bar furthest from the door. “So she doesn’t know much Norwegian yet, except for some swear words. But don’t worry. I’m working on teaching her more swear words.”
I introduce her to everyone, and then once Einar is inside, I go over to the door and lock it, explaining to Harold that because our engagement is still a secret, we can’t risk the public knowing about it.
“And don’t worry, dear,” Maud says to Ella between sips of her martini. “We won’t tell a soul. All the souls we know are either dead or right here.” Then she goes into a long speech about all the lovers she’s had that died, all the classic film stars she knew that died, all the people who will probably die soon, and so on.
Luckily, Ella is enthralled by Maud’s stories of old Hollywood, even if they’ve taken a morbid turn. She also goes out of her way to talk to Guillermo and tell him about herself, then even sits down across from Slender Man and asks him questions.
Believe me, Slender Man normally just talks and talks and when he does he’s this big black hole that sucks the life out of you and the room until you’re crushed under the weight of his horrible luck and life.
As a result, no one ever asks Slender Man what he’s doing because, believe me, you don’t want to know.
But maybe it’s because Ella is drinking more than she normally does, or maybe she’s just so damn happy that she’s out of that house, but she’s actually interested in what he has to say. And for once, his black hole of despair has no chance against her ethereal ray of sunshine. It’s like watching Galadriel have a counselling session with Sauron and actually get through to him.
Fuck, I’m glad Ella can’t see my thoughts. I’m not sure if being a closet LOTR fan would work against me or not.
Later on in the evening, Harold leans across the bar, fixes his one good eye on me and says, “I approve.”
“Yeah?” I’ve been sitting here watching Ella actually make Slender Man laugh. Everyone in the bar jumped at that sound since we’d never heard it before. It sounded like a cat being strangled, but still, it was a laugh.
“She’s smart, she’s a delight, she’s very pretty,” he says. “I think she’ll be good for you. I’m glad you finally decided to bring her by, especially after all you’ve talked about her.”
I guess I have been waxing on about Ella during my nights here.
“You know,” I say to him slowly, trying to figure out the right way to phrase this. “Even though we’re to be married, sometimes I wonder if she’s really in it for me. Or if she’s doing it for other reasons.”
I watch Harold carefully because he’s old enough to forget about white lies and trying to spare someone’s feelings. Old people wield their bluntness like a sword.
But I can’t read anything negative on his weathered face. “Women like Ella, they don’t pretend. She’s honest and true, that one. I would think that if she wants to marry you, then she really wants to marry you. You can’t fake love.”
My smile feels stiff. This is where Harold is wrong. There is no love between us and if things progress as they’re supposed to, as I hope, then we’re both in for a world of pretending. Whatever he is reading off of her about me is entirely fake.
For the moment, though, I decide to take Harold’s words to heart, and for the rest of the night, I do pretending of my own. I pretend that every time Ella looks across the bar at me and gives me a smile, that it means something. That I mean something to her.
I never knew that something so simple, just having another person want you and genuinely like you, could mean so much. Relationships, marriage…I’m starting to get it. I’m starting to realize that this horrible situation that I’ve been placed in might not be so horrible after all.
As long as it’s Ella.
The thought makes something inside my chest wince.
It has to be her.
This won’t work if it’s anyone else.
We end up staying way past the usual closing hour, Guillermo and Slender Man having left ages ago, Maud falling asleep and snoring on the bar.
Einar checks to make sure the coast is clear and then Ella and I stumble, drunk and warm against each other despite the dreary night, all the way to the car.
“Well that was fun,” Ella says. She moves over so that she’s in the middle seat and her head is resting on my shoulder. “I don’t think I’ve drank that much in a long time. Or talked that much either.”
“I can’t believe you got Slender Man to open up and turn it positive,” I tell her, staring at the top of her head and fighting the urge to kiss it. The sight of her on my shoulder warms me in a million different ways.
“His name is Erik,” she chides me, then yawns. “And that’s a terrible nickname to have. Where did you learn your English from anyway?”
“College. And the Police Academy movies.”
“You didn’t go to college,” she says after a pause.
I smile. “It’s a line from Wayne’s World.”
“So you learned your English from Wayne’s World then.”
“That movie got me through some tough times,” I admit with a sigh.
She tilts her head up at me, her dark eyes soft, her lids heavy. She stares at me for a moment before a slow smile spreads across her face. I wish she knew what that smile does to me. Maybe she does.
“What?” I ask quietly, unnerved by her attention.
“I’ve never met anyone like you,” she says, sounding awed.
I cock my brow. “I assure you there are plenty of people who are still quoting Wayne’s World.”
“That’s not what I meant,” she says.
The space between us seems to grow smaller, my breath heavier, the air ripe with tension. With any other woman in any other situation I would have kissed her a long time ago. Now, I’m paralyzed by the thought. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted something this bad, and it scares me. And what scares me only makes me focus more.
“What do you mean?” I whisper.
“All this time, I’ve never once thought of you as a prince.”
I frown. “Thanks. I guess.”
“It’s a good thing. At least to me. I always assumed that you were just like your persona. Cocky and egotistical and arrogant.”
“Those all mean the same thing. And I think I’m still all those things.”
“I know,” she says. “But that’s not all you are. You’re also smarter than you look. You’re a quick thinker. You’re attentive. You’re curious and, dare I say, quirky. I don’t know anyone who goes to a bar every other night to hang out with a bunch of old people. There are a lot more sides to you than just the playboy prince one that you show to the public. In fact, I think there are more sides to you than you even show to yourself.”
Damn. We’re getting into some pretty deep limo talk back here.
“Which brings me to question tiiiime,” she sings softly, and it brings an automatic grin to my face. “Since I forgot to ask you earlier…”
“Shoot.”
“In the bar, you kept looking at me when I was talking to Erik. What were you thinking?”
I let out a soft laugh. “You want the truth?”
“Yes. Obviously.”
“I thought you were like Galadriel talking Sauron off a ledge.”
“From Lord of the Rings?” she asks, grinning.
I nod. “That’s another side that you don’t know.”
“Interesting. And what were you talking to the bartender about? You both seemed to be nodding at me.”
“Is this an official question?”
“No,” she says after a beat, snuggling in closer to me.
I swallow hard. I should just keep my fat mouth shut since I don’t have to answer it.
But there’s a part of me, the brave and bold part that chases down fear, that dances with it, that wants me to come out and say it anyway.
