Her Royal Highness, Leonor: The Years Later

The Unexpected

"J-josie?"

Leonor couldn't believe her own voice saying that name once again–all the more believe that she was really seeing the familiar face years ago right this morning, at Phillipa's apartment where she bravely traveled for hours–just to have a talk with the writer.

A talk she fears may not happen at all–with the situation she's currently seeing.

She fought against her own will, the walls she had created with herself and the writer, the years that passed, and the emotions she thought had already been forgotten through time. But after Phillipa's visit to the palace yesterday, and with her watching the writer walk away once again, the same haunting gesture that happened in that bus station—she finds herself locking herself up in her room last night, tucking herself to her bed, tired from thinking but is too awake to sleep.

She finds herself at the edge of her bed, holding Phillipa's last letter to her and finding herself immersed in reading them for the first time after so many years, and just by doing so realizing how much has changed. Tears may have fallen, and they were the same tears that her younger self has shed for the same reasons—for the same love she thought she had lost forever.

And fate it may have been, these emotions that the writer can only evoke from within her finally have won—sending her footsteps here in Phillipa's apartment, first thing in the morning, after her family's Sunday church. She was just glad that her father has let her drive herself out, making an excuse about visiting a library somewhere in Seville, at the earliest of the morning.

Her mother did raise an eyebrow about this but didn't ask further, and they both let her go off when she assured them both that Aurelia will be driving in a separate car, along with Gretha, following hers. 

She was just glad that her sister wasn't there–Sofia hasn't come back yet from her little school break from Cambridge to join them in her Sunday Church and witness her bidding their parents goodbye—or else Sofia's knowing stare would instantly make her blush, knowing who she's going to see.

Her mind drifted back to the current moment, and her eyes wandered past the door, and she saw Phillipa sleeping on the couch, the writer's face turned down on the mattress, obviously unconscious. She then returned her gaze to Josie's, who was eyeing her nervously.

Remembering how these two were connected years ago, and how Phillipa told her how Josie had behaved, she knowingly shifted her glances in between the actress and the writer, with her cheeks increasingly warming.

And all at once, she knew.
She was too late.

She mustered all the courage she had in finding her words, though there were rays of sharp crawling pain in her chest in doing so. "I'm sorry, I think I should go..."

"No, no, no, Princessa, por favor." Josie quickly stretches out her arms in front of her to stop her from walking away. "No es lo que parece." (TL: "It's not what it looks like.")

She shakes her head and feigns a small smile. "No, Josie, está bien, entiendo—"

"No, you don't actually, truly understand." The actress kept her arms stretched out, as if doing so would stop her from stepping away.

She stepped away a little moments later. "I'm so sorry to have bothered you both, I—"

"You did not, Princessa, por favor–" To her surprise, the actress swiftly grips both her arms, and on a quick turn, their positions change. She was the one inside the apartment, and Josie's the one blocking the door.

"Lo siento, lo siento, sé que se supone que no puedo tocarte" (TL: I'm sorry, I'm sorry—I know I'm not supposed to touch you.") Josie whispered, her hands curled in a gesture of nervousness and her head down a little in a sense of embarrassment. "But please, don't leave, don't go." Her pleading voice came through clearly. "Por favor, necesito quedarse, por Phillipa–"