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“Yes, Skylar! Remember how Skylar calls you 'Daddy’?”
He doesn’t say more than that, and instead, raises a suggestive eyebrow and reels back in delightful giggles, like a small child.
“She calls me ‘Daddy’ because she has daddy issues, Hakeem. Not because fate has joined her mom and I or whatever you think.” I roll my eyes.
“Eh, daddy issues…whatever. That could be a design of fate.” He shrugs. “It doesn’t make it any less good news.”
"I think you're in love with Rebecca more than I am," I huff.
He, of course, pays no attention to that troll and continues drilling into my head the possible love for Rebecca that I have. It's agonizing torture, and I detest it. I make a mental note to myself to keep things involving Rebecca to myself, even though I know I would flout that rule.
Hakeem is my only friend here, save for Skylar, whom it would be considered an atrocity to share this kind of information with. Keeping it to myself would only let it eat into me deeper. It would leave me with a bigger sense of doubt than I initially had.
I would question too many things rather than having the straight answer a friend would give, be it what I want to hear or not.
The both of us banter back and forth about what the kiss really meant, with me insisting that for the most part, nothing emotional happened on my side. Hakeem disagrees, though,and even crafts a teaser song in Arabic about me and Rebecca, refusing to move on from the topic if I do not sing along at least once.
He's my confidant and a servant to the throne, but at the same time, he's also my best friend. While there are times, I'd give orders and give him no other choice than to abide by them, there are other times where he is completely free with me. These are the times I cherish with Hakeem the most—times where he sees me more as a brother than his ruler.
At the end of the day, there is a much stronger bond between brothers than there is between the ruler and his servant. That is the bond I want to thrive between us, but to do this, I must give him a listening ear when he wants to air his opinion. One of such times is now.
"So, if you eventually begin a new life with Rebecca, do you think you'd care for killing Thomas?" he asks.
Of course, he's trying to find his way to talk me out of my agenda, but it only ends up reminding me much to his disappointment.
"My god!" I freeze and turn to him, staring into his genius eyes, even though he doesn't realize it.
"What?" he asks, confused.
"That's it," I breathe, finally understanding my purpose.
"You're confusing me," he searches my eyes for an answer, but I just tell him instead.
"I can use this newfound friendship…"
"Relationship," he corrects me.
I roll my eyes. "Whatever, relationship. I can use it to get better information from her on Thomas's moves!"
Hakeem stares at me disapprovingly but says nothing. I guess I have some convincing to do.
"Think about it, brother. She hates Thomas with everything in her, so she wouldn't mind telling me about him if I can gether to sort of like… gossip," I explain, tapping his thigh with the excitement of the revelation. "We can finally get our revenge!"
"You can finally get your revenge. It's not really my plan, you know that" he clarifies.
"Your plan, my plan, our plan, it's the same thing. You and I are one in this together," I point out. He's literally my accomplice, even though he doesn't want to. This is where I love this royalty thing. I guess it helps me to convince my best friend to be on my side no matter what.
"Well then, how do you intend on getting any information that would be useful foryourplans?" He makes sure to emphasize the ““your”.
"Oh, that is simple. Give me till the end of the day." I smile deviously.
I makelittle amends for my day and leave my house to get Skylar from school. With any luck, Rebecca would already be home or be home shortly. It takes a full three hours, and I just get casually lucky that Skylar decided to take a nap. Otherwise, it would have been three exhausting hours.
She eventually shows up.
I don't miss the smile on her face when she sees me that immediately disappears, probably upon her realization that she's not supposed to smile. It indicates affection that we're not supposed to have for each other.
"Where's Skylar?" she asks without a greeting, which is back to where we have been before, so it doesn't bother me much.
