make it easy | young royals ✓

six

Simon

How can he act like that no time has passed between us? His audacity and drunken confidence when he pressed his lips against mine in the dark, leading me to push him away in protest half-heartedly, knowing I can't trust myself to act rationally in an environment like that. He too, not in his right mind. How can I embrace him when he's too scared to admit his feelings to me in front of everyone else? Will I keep kissing him in the dark? Alone, without anyone seeing? Will he jerk his hand away when we're watching a movie in the common room, and not even look at me? Will he remain silent when August belittles me with his backhanded comments?

Am I actually selfish for wanting him to act a certain way?

It does seem like time has simply frozen and resumed when we reunited, and I'm instantly at ease in his presence, and nothing feels out of place apart from my freshly formed thoughts. I keep telling myself that I don't want to rush this, and let us remain friends before we can decide on anything if it comes to that. Clearly, I'm fucking failing because I can't stop thinking about our intoxicated kiss and how my eyes always wandered towards him when we're sitting with other people.

Sara sits on my bed, folding a piece of origami. Her hair falls into her eyes and she sweeps it away annoyedly. She's been listening to me rant for the past hour, and we're not even close to reaching a conclusion.

"What are you going to do?"

I bury my face in the pillow, and scream hopelessly into it. "I don't know...I don't know?"

"You're thinking about this too deeply," she says casually. Trust Sara to be nonchalant and rational in every situation because I'm not the one who inherited those genes that's obviously not from my dad in our family. "Just take a deep breath-"

"Okay, you've told me to do that five minutes ago."

"That's because you're not calm and you're still freaking out!"

I flip onto my back, and gaze at the ceiling gloomily. "Why does it have to be so complicated?"

"Why did you happen to fall in love with the crown prince?"

"I am not in love with him."

We exchange a glance with each other, and I grab the pillow to stifle another cry of exasperation. "Okay, haha, fine, whatever."

"You need to come to terms with how you feel and tell him exactly that."

"Are you insane? I saw him for the first time in like six months yesterday, I'm not going to start confessing-"

Sara interrupts me, handing me the golden crane she folded. "But all the feelings you've felt a year ago are still there, aren't they?"

"My heart only grew fonder," I recite in a theatrical manner, throwing my arms out in exaggeration, and finally earning a faint smile from her. "You have no idea what it feels like, being kissed by royalty-"

"Who says?"

I freeze, and I'm staring at her with my mouth open. "What?"

"Simon-"

"What do you mean by that?"

She tucks her hair behind her ears, her face is reddening. "I kissed August."

Standing up, I don't know whether to laugh or be annoyed. She's changed enormously ever since we came to Hillerska, and even more when she started hanging out with the boarders. I wonder if this is something she's capable of. "You're joking."

"I don't joke around."

"Why the hell would you do that, Sara? He's a horrible-"

She shrugs offhandedly as if this is just another discussion about classes or the weather. "He helped me get the grants for us to live here."