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“Shut up, Mum,” Catherine said.)
There’s a certain need for formal portraits now that Alex is officially in “courtship” with Henry. He tries not to think too hard about his face on chocolate bars and thongs in Buckingham gift shops. At least it’ll be next to Henry’s.
Some psychological math always goes into styling photos like these. The White House stylists have Alex in something he’d wear any day—brown leather loafers, slim-fit chinos in a soft tan, a loose-collared Ralph Lauren chambray—but in this context, it reads confident, roguish, decidedly American. Henry’s in a Burberry button-down tucked into dark jeans and a navy cardigan that the royal shoppers squabbled over in Harrods for hours. They want a picture of a perfect, dignified, British intellectual, a loved-up boyfriend with a bright future as an academic and philanthropist. They even staged a little pile of books on the bench next to him.
Alex looks over at Henry, who’s groaning and rolling his eyes under his mother’s preening, and smiles at how much closer this packaging is to the real, messy, complicated Henry. As close as any PR campaign is ever going to get.
They take about a hundred portraits just sitting on the bench next to each other and smiling, and part of Alex keeps stumbling over the disbelief he’s actually here, in the middle of Hyde Park, in front of God and everybody, holding Henry’s hand atop his own knee for the camera.
“If Alex from this time last year could see this,” Alex says, leaning into Henry’s ear.
“He’d say, ‘Oh, I’m in love with Henry? That must be why I’m such a berk to him all the time,’” Henry suggests.
“Hey!” Alex squawks, and Henry’s chuckling at his own joke and Alex’s indignation, one arm coming up aroundAlex’s shoulders. Alex gives into it and laughs too, full and deep, and that’s the last hope for a serious tone for the day gone. The photographer finally calls it, and they’re set loose.
Catherine’s got a busy day, she says—three meetings before afternoon tea to discuss relocating into a royal residence more centrally located in London, since she’s begun taking up more duties than ever. Alex can see the glint in her eye—she’ll be gunning for the throne soon. He’s choosing not to say anything about it to Henry yet, but he’s curious to see how it all plays out. She kisses them both and leaves them with Henry’s PPOs.
It’s a short walk over the Long Water back to Kensington, and they meet Bea at the Orangery, where a dozen members of her event-planning team are scurrying around, setting up a stage. She’s tromping up and down rows of chairs on the lawn in a ponytail and rain boots, speaking very tersely on the phone about something called “cullen skink” and why on earth would she ever request cullen skink and even if she had in fact requested cullen skink in what universe would she ever need twenty bloody liters of cullen skink for anything, ever.
“What in the hell is a ‘cullen skink’?” Alex asks once she’s hung up.
“Smoked haddock chowder,” she says. “Enjoy your first royal dog show, Alex?”
“It wasn’t too bad,” Alex says, smirking.
“Mum isbeyond,” Henry says. “She offered toedit my manuscriptthis morning. It’s like she’s trying to make up for five years of absentee parenting all at once. Which, of course, I love her very much, and I appreciate the effort, but, Christ.”
“She’s trying, H,” Bea says. “She’s been on the bench for a while. Let her warm up a bit.”
“I know,” Henry says with a sigh, but his eyes are fond. “How are things over here?”
“Oh, you know,” she says, waving her phone in the air. “Just the maiden voyage of my very controversial fund upon which all future endeavors will be judged, so, no pressure at all. I’m only slightly cross with you for not making it a Henry Foundation–Beatrice Fund double feature so I could unload half the stress onto you. All this fund-raising for sobriety is going to drive me to drink.” She pats Alex on the arm. “That’s drunk humor for you, Alex.”
Bea and Henry both had an October as busy as their mother’s. There were a lot of decisions to be made in that first week: Would they ignore the revelations about Bea in the emails (no), would Henry be forced to enlist after all (after days of deliberation, no), and, above all, how could all this be made into a positive? The solution had been one Bea and Henry came up with together, twin philanthropic efforts under their own names. Bea’s, a charity fund supporting addiction recovery programs all over the UK, and Henry’s, an LGBT rights foundation.
To their right, the lighting trusses are going up quickly over the stage where Bea will be playing an £8,000-a-ticket concert with a live band and celebrity guests tonight, her first solo fund-raiser.
“Man, I wish I could stay for the show,” Alex says.
Bea beams. “It’s a shame Henry here was too busy signing papers with Auntie Pezza all week to learn some sheet music or we could have fired our pianist.”
“Papers?” Alex says, cocking an eyebrow.
Henry shoots Bea a silencing glare. “Bea—”
“For the youth shelters,” she says.
“Beatrice,” Henry admonishes. “It was going to be asurprise.”
“Oh,” Bea says, busying herself with her phone. “Oops.”
Alex looks at Henry. “What’s going on?”
Henry sighs. “Well. We were going to wait to announce it—and to tell you, obviously—until after the election, so as not to step on your moment. But…” He puts his hands in his pockets, in that way he does when he’s feeling proud of something but trying not to act like it. “Mum and I agreed the foundation shouldn’t just be national, that there was work to be done all over the world, and I specifically wanted to focus on homeless queer youth. So, Pez signed all our Okonjo Foundation youth shelters over.” He bounces on his heels a little, visibly tamping down a broad smile. “You’re looking at the proud father of four worldwide soon-to-be shelters for disenfranchised queer teenagers.”
“Oh my God, youbastard,” Alex practically yells, lunging at Henry and throwing his arms around his neck. “That’s amazing. Istupidlove you.Wow.” He yanks back suddenly, stricken. “Wait, oh my God, this means the one in Brooklyn too? Right?”
“Yes, it does.”
