by Alexis Angel
I can't get her back. No matter how hard I push the elevator button, it won't bring her back to me. After I stand there hammering the button like an idiot, I run toward the stairs. I take the stairs two at a time, hurling myself toward the lobby. It's far down, but adrenaline surges through my body, and I won't stop for anything.
When I burst into the lobby, everyone stares at me.
"Is she gone?" I ask no one in particular. They all blink at me. Nicole isn't in the lobby. Of course, she'd be gone.
I pull my phone out of my pocket and dial her number, a number I know by heart now. Her phone rings until it rolls over to voicemail. I hang up and dial again. The ringing rolls over to voice mail a second time. I lean one hand on my knee, trying to catch my breath. When I dial her number a third time, it goes straight to voicemail. She’s switched off her phone.
"Dammit!" I shout. Everyone looks at me again.
"You," I say, pointing at the doorman. "Why did you let Jessica up?"
The guy blinks at me. "I thought she was a friend. She’s been here so many time before."
He's right. She hadn’t come back to my place since I’d told her off. I hadn’t thought to tell the doorman that she wasn’t welcome here. He'd done nothing wrong.
I turn back to the elevator where an older lady just steps in. I step in with her. She glances at me. I refuse to talk to her or even look at her. I'm fuming. I'm so angry, I could break something. Angry and hurt.
The lady gets off at the fifth floor, and I ride the rest of the way alone. When the elevator door opens, Jessica is still standing in front of my door.
"Why the hell are you still here?" I ask.
"Tommy, don’t be like that," she says, reaching for me. I step out of reach.
"Don’t call me that!"
"You’re angry," she says.
"What gave it away?" I asks, my voice dripping with sarcasm. If she knew what was good for her at all, she'd leave me the hell alone.
I unlock my door. Nicole should be here with me, not Jessica. I step into the apartment and turn around, blocking Jessica who has started to follow me in.
"You're not welcome here," I say. "Not in my apartment, not in my life. I never want to see you again. If I do, I’ll have you arrested."
I don't know what my face looks like or how she interprets my voice. For the first time, she looks like she realizes I'm serious. I glare at her. Without another word, she turns around and walks to the elevator. I watch the doors close behind her, and she disappears out of my life. For good I hope.
Inside, I try Nicole’s phone one more time. It's in vain, of course. It's off, and she won't switch it on tonight. I need to talk to her, though. I need to explain everything Jessica said to her. Everything can be explained, except Elanda and the fact that I'm a prince. And my leaving. Fucking Jessica. Why the hell had she opened her stupid mouth? I know the answer to that. Revenge. Malice. Where had she found out? Very few people know that I'm leaving. I guess she was desperate enough to find out something like that.
Nicole’s face flashes before me. She looked so confused. Shocked. Hurt. I had never seen her cry, and I hat that I had been the cause of it. I can't take it anymore. I have to talk to her.
I grab my car keys and lock the apartment again. In no time, I'm back on the road, heading toward her apartment. I don't care if she doesn't want to see me, if she won't let me in. I want to shout out my apologies to her from the road if that’s what it takes.
I park in front of her building and press the buzzer by the door. I look up to where her windows are. They're dark. I press the buzzer again and again, hoping, praying that she'll answer.
She doesn't. When the door opens and someone comes out, I wait until the last moment and slip into the building. I run up the three flights of stairs and hammer on her door.
"Keep it down," a neighbor shouts. "She’s not here."
I had known it all along. The dark windows had been a dead giveaway. Nicole always left a bathroom light on when she was home.
I walk back down the stairs, taking them one by one. It's the slowest I've approached stairs all night. I push my hands into my hair. What the hell am I going to do now? I don't know any of her friends or her parents. I have no idea where she would've gone. I don't know where to start looking.
There's nothing left to do but to get back in my car and go home. I ride the elevator back up, unlock my door again, and lock it behind me. I walk to the living room and sit down on the couch. I drop my head into my hands.
Is this how it's going to end with her? Is this the way it's going to be? I hadn’t wanted this. None of it. Maybe I should've told her what was going on in my life. She deserves to know, after all. But this. I never wanted this.
I wanted to say goodbye, eventually. I wanted to tell her. I’d been dreading it, and I put it off. I hadn’t wanted to lose her until the very last minute.
Maybe this is for the best, though. This is one way to end things. Tying all the loose ends, right? She would've been upset with me, anyway. She wouldn’t have understood. No matter what I did, whether it had all come out like now, or if I’d made up some other reason, it would've ended in heartache for the both of us.
Maybe it's best that I leave it here.
I strip off my clothes, leaving them in a trail to the bedroom and switching off lights as I go along. I crawl under the covers naked and put a pillow over my head. I want it all to go away.
By the end of the weekend, it'll all be over. My life here will be wrapped up as if it never happened, and I'll leave the country, escaping back to a place where the heartache and my past don't exist.
This is it. It's for the best.
It's over.
Nicole
When I flee Thomas’s building, I don't go home. He would've come looking for me there, and I don't have what it takes to face him. Instead, I go straight to Lisa’s place. He tries to phone me twice before I switch off my phone. I want nothing to do with him.
I press the buzzer to Lisa’s apartment until she answers in a sleepy voice.
"It’s me," I say. She buzzes me up right away. I'm crying. I climb the stairs to her door. When she opens, she jolts.
"What happened?" she asks.
I walk into the apartment and collapses on the couch. My cheeks are stained with tears, my makeup is probably leaving streaks down my face, and I shiver with cold even though it's a warm night.
"You were right," I say, talking through my tears. "It's all just a mask."
Lisa sits down next to me and puts her arm around my shoulders. "Tell me what happened," she says.
I do. I tell her everything, from the moment we arrived at his penthouse and Jessica was there, until I left.
"He's the crown prince of a country or something, and he’s leaving. Like, soon. He never told me."
Lisa shakes her head, frowning. "This doesn’t make sense," she says. "I don’t understand."
I shake my head, too. "I know. It’s so confusing. But he lied to me. About everything. And the women. God, he must've had so many. I was such a fool thinking he was different than the rest of them. You were right. I hadn’t known him at all."
Lisa rubs my back and makes shushing sounds, trying to comfort me. There's nothing to be done, though. There's no way to heal a broken heart or to reverse betrayal.
"I came here because I was scared he would come looking for me," I say.
Lisa nods. "You know you’re welcome here, anytime."
I hug her. "This is such a mess."
We sit in silence for a while, and my crying stops. I feel ridiculously worn out. I'm suddenly so tired.
"A crown prince, huh?" Lisa says after a while. "Does that even add up?"
I nod. "His name is Thomas Silber. It adds up. I’d read up on their royal family when I’d gone to Germany."
"That’s crazy," Lisa says. "And he didn’t tell you anything?"
I shake my head. "Nothing," I say.
Lisa nods. "Why don’t you come to bed," she
says. "It’s been rough, and it’s late. Tomorrow, everything might look different."
I nod and get up, even though I don't believe it'll look any better in the light of day. I follow Lisa to her bedroom and get into the other side of her double bed. She switches off the light. In the dark, she says, "You really loved him, didn’t you?"
I nod, even though she can't see me. "I did," I whisper. I’d loved him a little too much.
When I wake up the next morning, I don't feel any better. In fact, I feel worse. I feel like a dark cloud hangs over me. I don't want to get out of bed.
Lisa already left for work. Instead of getting up, getting food, or doing anything at all, I turn around and go back to sleep. It's the best escape there is.
When I wake up again, it's past noon, and I have to go to the bathroom. When I sit down on the couch, my phone lies on the coffee table where I put it before, still off. I switch it on. My stomach knots into a fist of nerves. I'm terrified about what I'll find. Has he sent me a million texts? Has he tried to call me all night?
One missed call flashes on my screen and nothing else. Thomas had only tried once after I had switched off my phone before giving up.
What did that say about how he feels about me? I was nervous about getting a lot of messages from him because I’d been scared about what it would do to me, emotionally. I'm angry now, because he hadn’t sent me anything. He hadn’t even tried. Maybe that Jessica had been right. Maybe he had planned on leaving me to go back to Elanda, after all.
Why wouldn’t he have told me that? I don't understand what he’d been trying to do. I don't want to believe that sex was all he was after. He hadn’t known I was a virgin, and he had carried on spending time with me and sleeping with me after he’d gotten it the first time. He hadn’t left me, then. I don't understand why he’d done that, now.
I switch on the television, desperate for a distraction. The rest of the day, I watch series reruns and stupid movies on Telemundo.
"You’re still here," Lisa says when she comes back after work at five. I nod.
"Is that okay?" I ask.
"Of course," she says, putting down her bag and sitting down on the couch. "I was just hoping you would feel better."
I shake my head. "Nope."
Lisa hesitates, like she's sure how to say what's on her mind.
"Nicole," she starts. I mute the TV and look at her.
"How serious were you about this guy?"
I groan. "Too serious, apparently. I should never have fallen for him."
Lisa shakes her head. "That’s not what I’m getting at. Don’t you think you should ask him what's going on? Hear it from him at least?"
I shake my head. "I don’t think he deserves that," I say.
"According to this Jessica woman you were talking about. But what if she was wrong? What if she was just being a jealous, vindictive bitch?"
"What are you saying?" I ask. "That I should give him another chance?"
Lisa shrugs. "I would give anything to have a shot at talking about things with Graham. He hadn’t given me that luxury, and it hurts like a bitch. You still have the chance to speak to him. Don’t you think you should at least find out what the truth is? If for no other reason than to get closure?"
I shake my head again. I'm not interested. I'm too hurt. I feel like I’d been betrayed, like Thomas had ripped out my heart and stomped all over it.
"Just think about it, okay? Lisa says. "And stay as long as you need."
She's a great friend.
After two days, I need to go home. I have no extra clothes, and I feel bad about wearing Lisa’s stuff all the time and eating her food. When I go back to my own apartment, I feel like I'm a different person than when I left it. I feel ten years older, grimy, and down in the dumps. I go back into bed and switch off the light so my room is perpetually dark. It echoes how I feel inside.
On the fourth day, I have enough. There's only so much moping around I can do before I get sick of it. I get up, shower, and get dressed. I think about what Lisa said. I don't think Thomas deserves anything from me, but Lisa had been right. What if it had all been lies? Jessica hadn’t let him get a word in edgewise, and I had no reason to blindly trust her.
I want to see him one last time. Even if it's just to confirm that he's an asshole and to get closure, at least.
I take a cab to his apartment building and walk in through the front door. When I sign myself in, the doorman shakes his head.
"Mr. Silber doesn’t live here, anymore," he says. "The movers already cleared his apartment."
My stomach sinks. I'm too late. "There’s no way I can reach him?" I ask.
The doorman shakes his head. "He left no forwarding address," he says.
I sigh.
"Are you looking for Thomas?" someone asks behind me. I turn around. A blond man in a polo shirt stands in front of me. He looks well put together, like he’s just stepped out of a magazine.
I nod.
"I’m Luke," he says. "Thomas asked me to oversee the final arrangements. It’s why I’m here. Are you Nicole?"
I nod again. "I just wanted to speak to him."
Luke shakes his head. "I’m sorry. I think he left this morning, early. He’s on his way back to Elanda."
I'm too late, then. I feel like I want to cry. I really messed this one up. If only I’d gotten over myself sooner and come to see him. I might have been able to catch him before it was too late.
"He told me about you," Luke says. "For what it’s worth."
I frown and look up at him.
"You’re the only one that he would've given it all up for, if he could."
I shake my head, confused. "What are you talking about?"
"What he felt for you," Luke says like it's obvious. "You changed him. He stopped chasing random girls and doing stupid things. He settled down. I think you were the one that got away."
He sticks his hand into his pocket and takes out a note. "He wanted me to give this to you if you stopped by."
I unfold the note.
Mon Coeur ne bat que pour toi
"What does it say?" I ask.
Luke shrugs. "I don’t speak French."
I leave the building. In the cab, I type the words into Google Translate.
My heart only beats for you.
I phone Lisa. "He’s gone," I say. "Back to Elanda."
"I’m so sorry, Nicky," she says.
I shake my head. "He left me a note. My heart only beats for you. He loved me."
"What are you waiting for, then?" Lisa asks.
"What?"
"Go after him."
I frown. "He’s already left the country."
"So? You have a passport, don’t you?"
I do have one. And it's still valid. I could pull all my savings. There'd still be time.
"Why are you contradicting everything you’ve told me about being in love and living my life independently?" I ask.
"Nicole, if Graham did that for me, I would have been there in a heartbeat. I wouldn’t have thought twice. This guy loves you. And he’s a prince. A prince. Go to him. What more do you need?"
She's right. I have to go to him. "You’re the best," I say.
"I know." I can hear the smile in her voice. I hang up.
At home, I pack a bag and find my passport. I write a note for my landlady. In less than an hour, I'm at the airport counter, buying a ticket for Elanda. I have no idea how I'm going to find him. The country isn't all that big, though, and there are only so many places the crown prince can hide.
Thomas
One month later …
"I think my father likes you," I say. We're at a café on Market Street, watching cars go by. Nicole sits across from me, sipping a decadent hot chocolate made from real cocoa bean and full cream milk straight from the dairy.
"Why?"
"He hasn’t lectured me about you at all. That’s a feat."
She smiles at me. She's brilliant in the European sunlight. Elanda has the
feel of an old village despite sporting the latest technology, and Nicole seems to fit right into the setting. It's as if she was destined to be here, all along.
When I’d left America, I had been heartbroken. I had headed toward a future that felt dull and suffocating. I would run a country, be expected to take a wife, and produce an heir. The only woman I’d ever wanted had been left behind, and I had been shattered.
Two days had passed in Elanda where my father had lectured me day in and day out about the divine privilege that had been bestowed on me. He had seemed to understand that I had left a part of me behind.
On the third day, a commotion at the gate had drawn my attention. The guards had been fighting with a woman who demanded to see the crown prince. This was impossible, of course. For a brief second, I thought Jessica had come all this way like the psycho stalker she was.
I had gone outside. Nicole had been there, arguing with my guards. I couldn’t believe it. I felt like I was dreaming.
"Your Royal Highness," the waiter says when he brings our baguettes.
Nicole tries to hide a smile. When the waiter leaves she shakes her head.
"It’s still weird, hearing them call you that," she says.
I shrug. "You’ll get used to it."
"I don’t think I will," she says.
She stays with me in the palace. I think my father realized, shortly after her arrival, that her stay wasn’t negotiable. I would do a lot of things for king and country, but I had lost Nicole once already. I wouldn’t risk that again.
"Oh, I got an email from NYU," she says. "They approved the extension."
Nicole has managed to delay her degree for a year. Until then, she'll be here. At some point, she'll have to return to the States to finish her studies. Unless I can organize a transfer here. I'm not going to mention anything just yet, though. I'm just happy to have her back.
"Thank you, for that," I say. She leans over the table and kisses me. Her lips taste like hot chocolate.
"How do you like Elanda, so far?" I ask.
Nicole shrugs. "I think I’m getting the hang of it. It’s a big change, obviously. The languages will take me a while to figure out, too."