Once Upon a Dream

They were the same...

Mal put it into her brain that what happened to her heart when she touched Ben was thanks to her unused magic on the Isle. That was better than lingering in a doubt that wouldn't leave her in peace.

Evie slept quickly. The daughter of the Evil Queen got used easily to the bed she knew from before, as for the daughter of the evil ruler, she dropped her sleeping friend and went outside. At first Mal just wanted to stay awake watching the sky, which in her house was not so clear and full of stars.

What she didn't expect was to find Ben outside as well.

"I thought you had left.

She told him that she was sitting on the hood of the car and was startled to hear it.

Ben had actually stood there for forty-five minutes. To his tremendous luck the car wouldn't start, it must have been a problem with the engine or something. In any case, he wouldn't be out of there until tomorrow.

"Oh, hi, my car kind of broke down."

He said trying not to sound as nervous as he was.

"Get going."

She gave a solution that to her seemed obvious and easy

"Let's say if I walk from here to Auradon Prep. I would only arrive tomorrow morning."

"Auradon Prep.?"

"Where I study."

"Ah, the school for pink princesses."

"Not all of them are pink princesses"

"Of course not, it has the pampered princes too."

"You are making a bad judgment about us, or at least about me."

"You are a prince, aren't you? So yes, I am right."

"You said yourself that you don't know anyone in three days. I am a prince, but it has nothing to do with who I really am."

"And with what does it have to do with?"

Mal didn't even notice when she sat down next to him in front of the door of the house.

"It has to do with the fact that my father is the king and this makes me a prince. Not because I chose it, but because of my father." Mal looked at him fixedly as he listened to him talk about his point of view. When Ben finished speaking, she didn't want to respond, so she gave a slight smile and returned to her observation of the big lights in the sky. "You're not going to reply?"

"No, I think you are right."

"What? You gave me a reason?"

He put his hand on his chest wanting to show how shocked he was.

"It is not that big of a deal, okay? But thinking about it, maybe you're right, who we are has a lot of who our parents are."

"Yeah, I hate that." He lay on the ground and stared up at the sky. Mal watched him and even though she found the attitude strange, she didn't say anything. "My life feels like an extension of my dad's. It's his friends, his kingdom, his opinion and his crown." Mal wasn't going to say; however, she had the same feeling with her mother, "It sucks. But what about you?"

"What?"

"Is your life perfect or did you want to change something?"

She had never thought about it. To change her life. To have other desires than the ones she had always had.

"I don't know, I don't think so. My life is good on the Isle."

She said an easy answer and that as soon as she thought a little more, she would change