But I'm Just a Boy // phan

(4)

(AN// Just to clarify, italicized chapters happened in the past, about a year before the corresponding chapter. :) Happy reading!)

"I can't keep doing this." Phil said. I looked up from the ant trail I had been mesmerised by.

"What? Tracking? We can do something else." I said, trying to be casual, my heart in my ears.

"No. This secret stuff. Why we can't let anyone see us. We come out here and 'track', we have picnics, we write stories, you help me with my work. You do everything you did when you were my knave except clean up after me, and you do that sometimes too, and you aren't even paid anymore. So why did you quit?" My mind reeled, searching for a lie I could get away with.

I felt bad taking money from him?

I couldn't stand doing it as a job?

There were better opportunities elsewhere?

His mother threatened to out me if I spent one more second with him?

"I just did." I spat. He narrowed his eyes.

"I knew you were hiding something from the second you quit, and I really wanted to know. But you make it so hard to care anymore, Daniel." He said. He turned and ran back into the darkening woods.

I fumed for a few seconds, but then ran after him, intent on apologizing, of telling him the truth, of saying something about the way he makes me feel, the way I loved him for only a week but also since I first met him.

I found him, near his horse, and I was so relieved he hadn't gone too far that I called out.

But he was too busy kissing some random girl to notice me.

I gasped, and stumbled back. So this was her. The girl he said he loved. Tears blurring my vision, I stumbled away, branches ripping at my skin and clothes, ignoring Phil's shouts.

I didn't know exactly where I was going, but my feet kept moving, taking a familiar path that I couldn't remember.

I ended up at the castle gates. The two guards men who stood there recognized me, and called me by name.

"Daniel! What ails you?" One of them said. I couldn't think of what to say. I had been secretly meeting the prince for nearly year now in the woods and he broke my heart?

"I need a job." I sighed.