Once Upon a Prince

TWENTY-THREE



Susanna wore the gold Louboutins out of Parrsons House and into the taxi, through airport security, and down the long thoroughfare to their gate for home.

Brighton to Atlanta. Nine hours. All while wearing the magic, stupid shoes. A reminder never to believe in fairy tales, nor the wild musings of a half-sane homeless woman. Even if she was a millionaire.

“You look ridiculous.” Avery pointed at the shoes, her elbows propped on her knee.

“Do I look like I care?” Susanna crossed her legs, exposing her right shoe in all of its crystal and glitter glory, pumping her leg up and down as she flipped through a magazine.

“What if someone recognizes you?”

Susanna tugged the brim of the wide hat she’d purchased at a souvenir shop in the airport. “They won’t be expecting me under a hat.”

“I can’t believe this.” Avery stood, flapping her hands against her thighs. “Colin said he’d bring us around when the flight actually left. But no, we have to sit here all day like a couple of jack wagons.”

“I’m sorry, but we have to get out of here before it gets worse.” While packing, Susanna had turned on the television to discover she was the topic of a TV show. Madeline & Hyacinth went on and on about “the American,” playing the coronation video where Susanna stood instead of kneeling and popping up pictures of her this morning at St. Stephen’s in Nathaniel’s arms.

“He was going to take me riding.” Avery pouted, kicking at Susanna’s chair.

“You don’t ride.”

“If I can stand on a board and ride an unpredictable wave, I think I can manage a horse.”

“Aves.” Susanna flipped the magazine closed. “We’re going home. Stop complaining.”

With a sigh, Avery flopped back down to her seat and peered at Susanna through a reddish sheen of her chestnut hair. “We were living a fairy tale, weren’t we? Just for a moment.”

“For a moment,” Susanna said, “though I never wanted the fairy tale thing or to be a princess. I just wanted true love. The one.”

“You just happened to find a real prince.”

“But not true love. Not the one.”

Avery sat up and gripped Susanna’s forearm with her hands. “You are such a liar. You do so love him.”

“I don’t, and I told him I’d never marry him.”

“You did not … Susanna, come on, he loves you.”

“What difference does it make, Avery?” Susanna leaned right up to her ear. “He can’t marry me.” The tears she’d been bottling up fizzed and hissed. “I’ve told God I’d go anywhere, do anything, be anyone he wanted. But I’m not staying here to make a mess of things. Make fun of me if you want but not of him.” She dabbed her cheeks with the back of her hand. “He doesn’t deserve it.”

“Oh, Suz.” Avery dropped her arm around Susanna and rested her cheek against her shoulder. “You do love him, don’t you?”

“And not because he’s a prince.”

“King.”

“Whatever.”

A commotion a few gates away interrupted the sisters’ conversation. Susanna peered down the thoroughfare. A cluster of men with cameras scurried toward her gate, elbowing each other for first place, flowing against a stream of travelers heading for alternate gates and baggage claim.

“Paparazzi,” Avery said.

Susanna tugged on her hat. “Get your stuff. Slowly. No quick moves. Put your hood up.”

She’d just settled her backpack on her shoulders when she heard the shout, “There she is!”

A chorus of clomping shoes echoed in the thoroughfare as the troop of photographers charged, the lead man toppling a woman and her carry-ons.

“Aves, go, go, go.” Susanna held onto her hat and sprinted, her body moving twice the speed of her slick-soled Louboutins.

“There’s the elevator.” Avery ran ahead, dashing through a cluster of kids dressed in matching royal-blue T-shirts.

“Suz, come on.” She pinched between the closing elevator doors and pried them open.

Susanna slipped inside and collapsed against the elevator’s handrail, gasping, catching her breath.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the doors … slid … closed.

“Susanna?” A photographer raised his camera, and the shutter whirred just as the doors closed.

“Oh my stars.” Susanna sank down the wall, her quivering legs refusing to hold her up. “I can’t breathe.”

The elevator stopped with a ding, and before she could collect herself, the doors opened to another battalion of photographers.

Avery pressed the Close button, then held her palm toward the photographers, belting out a deep “Leave us alone.” Then she knelt next to Susanna. “Know what? We’re going back to our gate. Forget them. What can they do to you? Besides, you can’t run from everything, Suz.”

“Run? Me? Ha.” She was coming to life now. “When do I run? I’m the one who stays. Remember? Adam? Twelve years?”

“He was all about you running from your past, your fears of growing up with Mama and Daddy fighting.”

Susanna made a face. “Where did you get such a cockamamie idea?”

Avery tapped her temple. “Right here. I’m right and you know it.”

“I’m not running from Nate. I’m just going home. He can’t be with me anyway, and I’m complicating things for him by being here.”

“You’re complicating things by running.” The elevator jerked to a stop, returning Susanna and Avery to the beginning of their escape.

As much as she believed she was a control freak who hated change, Susanna also hated confrontation. She hated pain. She ran. Hid under covers. In dark, small closets that transformed into magical gardens.

Avery grabbed her hand as the elevator stopped. “Ready?”

“Ready.” Susanna squeezed her sister’s fingers. “Thank you.”

“By the time we get home, I’ll be the most popular girl in school, maybe all of south Georgia, thanks to Facebook.”

“Might as well do this right.” Susanna whipped off her hat, fluffed her hair, and stepped off the elevator as the doors opened.

The photographers swarmed.

“Susanna, are you in love with the king?”

“Did you spend the night together, Susanna?”

“Are you having his love child?”

With Avery, Susanna cut a swath toward their abandoned seats. The photographers continued to digitally document the event, shouting questions.

“Will you be back, Susanna?”

“Suz, is that your nickname?”

“What do you think of Lady Genevieve?”

But Susanna sat where she’d left her bags and didn’t answer. She had learned from this morning. Don’t feed the jackals.

“Susanna, how about a smile?”

Enough. Susanna stood in her chair, towering over the photographers. “Please, we just want to wait for our flight in peace.”

“When will you see the king again?”

“Is he coming to say good-bye to you?”

“How did you two meet?”

“Psst.” The woman waiting in the chair next to Susanna tugged on her jeans. “Who are you anyway?”

Yeah, just who was she anyway? Nobody. A small-town south Georgia girl. Loving Jesus. Loving Nate Kenneth.

Her fifteen minutes of fame ended right now.

“Okay, y’all …” The cameras whizzed and clicked, flashing. “First of all, thank you for giving my sister and me a heart attack. Have you ever tried to run in Louboutin spikes?”

The photographers laughed. Passengers slowed and added to the crowd.

“I’m no one of acclaim or interest. I was your king’s landscape architect on his father’s garden on St. Simons Island. We became friends. His mother and brother invited me to the coronation. I came. I saw. I’m going home. End of story.”

Susanna tugged on her hat and dropped down to her seat. Now, if they would shoo, leave her alone. She was tired, drained, and ready to go home.

“One last question, Suz.” A skinny photographer bent toward her with a friendly smile. “What did you think of our great sapphire isle?”

She sighed. That question was easy. “It’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen.” She peered toward the window, lit with the golden edge of the Cathedral City lights. “It felt like home.”