She dunks one end of her cookie into a glass of milk. “Welcome to life as a Lancaster. I thinklonelyis on the royal crest.”
“Actually, I’m pretty sure it’s a double-headed lion…”
“Shut up.”
I grin into the dark. We’re quiet for a moment, just watching the stars spin by.
“You know,” I murmur. “As crappy as this week has been… I’m happy one good thing came out of it.”
“You’re talking about the giant-ass tiara they’re going to give you at your coronation, right? You could fund a third world country for an entire year, just using the bottom row of diamonds on that thing. Talk about bling, baby.”
I shoot her a look. “Actually, I was talking aboutyou. I’ve never really had many female friends. It’s a nice change of pace.”
“Ew. Don’t get all clingy on me, E. I have commitment issues.”
“Deal with it,C. And don’t for a minute think I missed that line about me being crowned.” My eyes roll. “You do realize there’s a ninety-nine percent chance I’m going to walk away from all this in a few weeks, right?”
“No.” She slams her milk glass onto the table with a bang. “I refuse to accept that. Youcannotabdicate. If you do… the throne will pass to some distant cousin no one even cares about from the far side of the family tree.”
“How far?”
“Far. As in…” She squints, mind churning. “Your grandfather’s younger brother’s daughter’s son. A middle-aged, cross-eyed miscreant, no doubt.”
“Hmm. And how exactly do you know this distant cousin wouldn’t make a better leader than me?”
“I don’t.” She shrugs. “But I can say with at least some degree of confidence that you’re not a complete idiot. God only knows what kind of moron might come crawling out of the woodwork.”
“How sweet.”
Her laughter tinkles out in a melodic burst.
A thought occurs to me. “Will the dreaded cousins be there on Sunday? If so, you’ll have an opportunity to decide —with some degree of confidence— who’d make less of a mess, sitting on the throne.”
“Probably.” She groans at the prospect. “Everyone and their mother will be there to pay their respects in their finest funeral attire. Should be a positively ghastly affair.”
“You make it sound like a bad cocktail party, not a memorial service.”
“Funerals aren’t for the dead, they’re for the living. And, in the case of a royal death, it’s more about the spectacle than anything else. Days of pomp and circumstance, dignitaries flying in from all over the globe… it’s a media circus. Frankly, I’d rather remember my aunt and uncle privately, not on display for the sake of the whole world.”
“I understand that. When my mom died… I didn’t want to share my grief with anyone else. I held it close to my chest for months. I’m not sure why I did it, except that… maybe I thought I’d be giving away a piece of her, somehow, if I talked about her with other people. Does that make any sense?”
Chloe glances over at me. “Maybe it’s the gummy bear talking, but yes. It totally does.”
I smile and begin to reply, but the sudden buzz of my cellphone on the table between us draws my focus. A quick glance at the screen has my mouth pressing into a flat line. I click the side button to send the call to voicemail.
“Who was it?” Chloe asks, curious.
I hesitate.
“Spill, E.”
“It was Owen.”
“Ah.” She smirks. “And how is the leader of my personal fan club?”
“I don’t know. We aren’t speaking, at the moment.”
And, if your mother gets her way, we’ll never speak again.