Page 21 of The Winter Princess
I got the Pecan Chicken. Don’t expect me to send flowers if it kills you.*vomit face, headstone, skull*
I exhale a silent, grudging laugh. Who would have guessed she uses emojis? It’s cute. No, I amend, with anyone else I’d think it was cute.
“You didn’t have to do this,” I say, setting aside solvent and heading to the sink. As I lather up my hands, I realize it’s not true. I’m ravenous.
“Fine. More for me,” she answers, ripping the package of a pair of bamboo chopsticks, tapping the paper off, and pulling the ends apart. But she digs into the bag for a couple of bowls and holds them in her open palm. Her brow lifts with an expression that says, “Don’t be silly.”
Fine.
I take one, about to explain that I’ll accept a little to tide me over, but she’s already scooping the contents of the take-out containers into her bowl, filling it generously. I watch her, and she catches me.
“Galas are culinary wastelands. I get very grumpy when I’m starving,” she says, filling the silence.
“What does very grumpy look like?” I ask, inspecting the contents of the remaining boxes.
My question must have been more friendly than I intended, because she gives a small laugh and her cheek tucks in a smile. “There was a non-negligible chance I would bite your head off if I didn’t stop for take-out.”
My hand hovers over a box. Our alliance is one thing, but I don’t want to like her. I don’t want to like anything about her.
“Did they starve you?” I ask, dragging my eyes away by digging into the fried rice, spilling a quantity into my bowl.
“I had a square of chocolate, half a glass of champagne, and a tepid sausage roll.”
We eat in companionable silence. I could tell her my last meal was thinly sliced ham, olives, and crusty bread at mid-morning, consumed in front of the computer while I was preparing a restoration proposal for a modernist still life. I don’t.
There are no forks or spoons, and my ability to use chopsticks is poor. I gobble down a piece of chicken, angling my head under the unsteady utensils like I’m drinking from an outdoor spigot. The chicken falls into my mouth, and I see her trying not to smile as she deftly manages a similar bite.
I shift so I’m not looking right at her and lean back, the legs of my chair tilting with me. “Tell me how it went.”
She swallows and wipes her lips with a paper napkin. It doesn’t smudge her lipstick, a rich shade of cherry red deepening into currant at the center. “Good and bad. I got him to agree to a concession, but what I had to promise to get it is…not great.”
She leans back, skirts draping the utilitarian lines of my office chair, and reminds me of portraits from the late years of Queen Magda’s reign. The style was expensive, designed to flatter the sitters, making them tall goddesses playing lawn tennis or contracting loveless marriages.
Princess Freja already looks like a tall goddess, her gaze direct and disconcerting. Her appearance doesn’t need any flattering touches, and I get a little lost tracing the curve of her neck.
“The prime minister promised to reinstate the funding if we could get two hundred thousand visitors by the end of the year.”
I tip forward, the legs of the chair crashing onto the floor. “Two hundred thousand?” I cough through a mouthful of Pecan Chicken and put a fist to my lips, swallowing. “Or else what?”
She takes a breath and looks away. “Staff cuts. We could expect up to a third.”
“We?” I drop the bowl, rattling a tray of brushes.Stultes es. My mouth hardens. “There’s no ‘we.’ No one fires a princess.”
She shoves her chopsticks deep into the bowl of noodles and rises, leaning across the desk. “Why do you have to be such a—?”
“Should I thank you for making me collateral damage in a war between your family and the prime minister?” I make a frustrated noise at the back of my throat. “Did you think twice about gambling with my career?” I stand, braced against the desk, and lean across, jabbing a finger at the take-out boxes. “Was this a bribe?”
Her eyes almost roll out of her head, and suddenly I have regrets.
“I could think of a better bribe,” she grits out, pounding the desk with each word. “The other option was to make cuts today. At least now we have a chance to restore our funding. I bought us time.”
“You bought us a fairytale.” I release a furious breath and spin away. I look back. “Two hundred thousand, Freja,” I say, her name slipping out along with my frustration.
I look away. My father’s ghost crouches at my side and looks up from his game oftanque, puzzled and amused. Imagine calling this creature by her given name, he thinks. Imagine saying it to her face with the ease of a lover. Imagine your lungs and lips waving it through the gates like a liberator. Imagine fighting when you could be kissing.
I shake my head and his laughing spirit disappears.
“I have enough to do in the next few months without worrying about my job,” I say, trying to cling to my righteous frustration, though the hottest fires have burned themselves out.
