𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐮𝐛𝐲 𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬

TEN.

Ruby's mind was absolutely spinning with everything that had happened that day. Even throwing her knife into the wall of her shared dorm room hadn't helped calm her down, so now she was just laying down on her bed, staring at the light pink ceiling. The only thing her staring had helped her figure out was that while she adored red, she had a deep loathing for its lighter shade, pink.

She was in no way closer to figuring out what she thought about her day. If practically forcing Ben to love her with that cookie wasn't enough drama, Audrey had had to confront her about being dumped by Ben that morning. The reason for Audrey being dumped being that Ben had fallen in love with someone else. Her, the Ruby Princess, to be exact. If Ben had dumped Audrey after the cookie, Ruby would've just shrugged it off altogether, but he had dumped her before, which bothered her greatly.

Of course, this was not enough drama for the life of a teenage princess and Ben had started singing her a song after the match, proclaiming his love for her, in front of the entire school. Add to that the drama of Audrey and Chad being a couple now, making Evie jealous and you got a mentally exhausted princess.

Ruby had already wrapped her head around all these events, that wasn't what kept her mind spinning. What kept her mind spinning was that she had no idea whatsoever of what to feel about all of this. Emotions had never been her strong suit—anybody could attest to that—so it was no surprise that her emotions were what she struggled with. Was she upset about it all? Happy? Relieved? Angry? She wasn't entirely sure. She felt conflicted about what to think.

"What are you thinking about?" Evie's voice drew Ruby from her own thoughts.

The redhaired princess lifted her head to glance to the other side of the room, where Evie was sitting on her bed with a few books around her. She let her head fall back down again.

"Nothing."

"It's not nothing. If it was nothing, you wouldn't be lying on your bed motionless. You hate being still." Evie pointed out. Ruby shrugged her shoulders, not answering. Evie sighed and put her books down. She crossed the room and sat down on Ruby's bed. "Come on, Rubes. What's going on?"

Ruby's eyes met Evie's determined ones and she knew right from the bat that this wasn't a fight she would win. Ruby might be extremely stubborn most of the time, but Evie could be worse when she really wanted to be. The look in her blue-haired friend's eyes was enough of an indicator that this was one of those moments. She sighed in defeat.

"I just found something out and I don't know what to think about it."

"And that was?"

"Ben dumped Audrey this morning because he was in love with someone else."

"But we only gave him the cookie in the afternoon," Evie muttered to herself. Ruby raised an eyebrow and gave a pointed look.

"Exactly."

"And you think it's you?"

"I didn't believe so at first, but Audrey told me that Ben had said so himself. He dumped Audrey for me, Evie." Evie's eyes widened in shock before slowly a wide smile started appearing on her face.

"But that's amazing, Rubes. That means he actually really loves you!" Evie squealed. Ruby sat up and glared.

"Is it? Is it amazing? Because I don't even know what to think about that. And if it was amazing, it isn't now because Ben's spelled to love me. I wouldn't know what is real and what is just the spell, now would I? And if that isn't annoying enough, he proclaimed his love for me for the whole school in song, which was overly, nauseatingly sweet and I don't even know how to begin figuring out why I don't completely hate him for that," Ruby ranted.