The Selection (Troyler AU)

♔Part XXVI♔

I'm Sia trash Lord help me.

ALSO THE SELECTION HAS PASSED 50K READS FUCK A MOOSE OKAY (and I've been informed that it's #291 in fanfiction?!?!?!) HOLY FUCK

Also I'm Drarry trash and two days ago I stayed up past 2:30 in the morning reading a Drarry fic that was over 60K words and I spent nine hours reading it and asdfghjkl I'm trash.

Also apparently I'm a Valedictorian so that's a thing.

Tyler POV

"So, how are the preparations for the ball going, Prince Tyler?" Lisa Schwartz asked me, smiling with too much enthusiasm to be truly interested in the topic, her dimples deepening in a doll-like fashion.

She was one of the ones that I'd postponed going on a date with until later (it was between her, Acacia Brinley, Bethany Mota, and Jenna Mourey for the ones I was looking the least forward to, when it came to private time) and out of the ones I had left, she seemed to be the least intimidating. She was bubbly, a bit too much for my taste, and tried to hard to keep a conversation going sometimes, but compared to the others, she wasn't so bad. Ingratiatingly pleasant, sure, but at least she hasn't tried to seduce me so far.

I'd taken her out to dinner, because it was half last seven in the evening when I finally got up the motivation to knock on her door, and I'd seen enough movies over the past few days with the other girls, having had no creativity to put towards potential date ideas yet. I'll have figured something out once more of the girls are eliminated (hopefully) but for now, I suppose that easy, conventional dates will work well enough, when determining which of the Ladies I can stand to be around the most.

I guess that wasn't entirely fair to them; if it were my choice, I'd just have them all go home right now, despite how badly I'm sure the majority of them want to stay.

But have I ever had a choice, really?

"Well enough, I hear," I tell her, even though the last time I've payed much attention to how the set up was going was when I talked to Troye a couple of days ago. I'd had other things on my mind, between worrying about what exactly happened between Hannah and Troye (she refuses to say a word about it, though I know they've definitely talked. I can tell that she has an opinion formed around him as well, though whether it's good or bad, I can't glean from her closed off expressions and vague answers to put off my pestering) and dealing with my father's aggravated state, as Grace continues to test his limits. It's quite amusing, really, and I hope Grace stays for a long time to torment her potential partner that will stop at nothing to form this alliance, but I'm afraid that one day my father will snap, and take his anger out on someone else.

Lisa smiled, tilting her head to the side. Her long, golden curls swung with the movement, the ends just skimming the top of her plate, causing me to cringe at her obliviousness. "That's good to hear. I can't wait to attend."

"I can't either," I told her, unsure if I really meant it or not. On one hand, I'll have to face all of the Selected girls and my father all at once, at some point or another, I'm sure. On the other, however, it'll be nice to see all of the people that I consider friends in the same place, and it'll certainly be intriguing to have all of the Servants and Maids and such come to their first formal event.

I can't imagine what it would feel like, to go to your first ball after spending years of being a part of the force that makes them possible in the first place, but I suppose that that comes hand in hand with being born and raised a Prince. You're thrown into that prestigious life from the second you've come out of your mother's womb, whether you like it or not, and you're hand fed everything without question. It's meant to sound easy, but you have to play your part: you have to smile, act polite and nice, appear to be the ruler your citizens want you to be, but you have to be intimidating, having an aura of sophistication, a heart of stone, and a conscience that has no problems fucking over people who get in your way. You have you public face, and you have your private face, and you have your personal face. Learn the difference between the three early enough, and figure out when to use them, and you'll evade the consequences. If you don't. . .well, I imagine that wouldn't be too pretty for anyone.