casablanca, ˚⊹ trent alexander-arnold

001. ❝souvenirs❞

"And where are you going this time?" They watched in earnest; as Yara attempted to close her brown leather suitcase with great difficulty. 

Yara sighed, knowing it was fuller than she had intended. "I'm going home."

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

001. - SOUVENIRS

"Same time as yesterday?" Faiza, the palace housekeeper and ladies' handmaid, tilted her head to the side as she helped adorn Yara in her own cloak. This dull-coloured cloak would be Yara's disguise, as palace royalty would never be seen in the help's garments. Especially not in public.

"Yes, please." Yara nodded with a smile, referring to how long Faiza would have to cover and lie about her absence to the rest of her family for. "You'll leave the key in the foyer for me?"

She couldn't risk stepping out into the bustling streets of Casablanca with keys that provided entry into the Al Mansouri Palace, if she didn't have security with her. And so Faiza, who was never really a maid to Yara and more so a friend and confidant, would help her relish the few hours of freedom she stole each evening after dinner.

"Of course. Now, eleven o'clock and not a minute later, yes Miss?" Faiza narrowed her eyes at the young royal as she brushed some perhaps imaginary dust from her shoulders.

Yara saluted her. "Not a second later." She grinned, pulling the hood of Faiza's cloak over her head. 

"Don't fall!" Faiza called after her, as she climbed over the marble railings of her bedroom balcony, scaling the walls as she neared the palace grounds. "And text me if you need anything, don't be so proud." 

Yara barely scraped her knee as she landed deftly on the stone, having completed this manoeuvre hundreds of times. She had absentmindedly agreed with Faiza's request, while she wasn't even sure she had remembered to take her phone. 

Patting her pockets under the cloak, Yara sighed with relief. Its familiar rectangular presence resided there, after all.

She trudged through the palace grounds, her grin spreading as she neared closer and closer to civilisation. The streets of Casablanca were growing profoundly busier at this time of night, as the nation prepared for the world cup celebrations. They were ecstatic, that their team had qualified yet again following 2018, where they broke their twenty year absence from the tournament.

It was still a couple of months away, but most knew that there was two things Morocco took very seriously; football and festivities.

Yara approached the beautifully laid-out stalls with a grimace. She knew that the nicer they looked, the more of a tourist trap they were. 

She simply laughed at the fridge magnets, and turned her nose up at the tacky phone cases and baseball caps. But it was a stall full of beautiful, hand sewn scarves and shawls that truly caught her eye. Until her eyes lingered over the price tag, and she shook her head knowing her parents wouldn't be seen dead overspending on street-scamming merchandise. Especially when they would offer her the whole stall free of charge; if they knew who she was.