White Girl Problems

by Tara Brown

  I nodded. “I’ll come to the party. I could use some eggnog. But I am not letting you kiss me under the mistletoe just for that.”

  He nudged me. “You will, and we both know it. You’re still as flirty as ever.”

  I didn’t think that was true anymore, but it didn’t matter. I was moving on. I’d seen Aiden. I’d told him to eff off. I loved him, but that would go away, eventually.

  Every minute of the day turned into a struggle. My brain worked against me, taking the things he’d said and making them somehow not bad. I thought about him constantly, but I pushed on. I made myself think about other things and I forced myself to be present in my last day.

  At the end of it, Jess met me in the hall. “You want a ride home with me and Aaron?”

  I was beat from not sleeping and the whole Aiden thing, but I needed a walk. I shook my head. “No, that’s cool. You go on.”

  “You coming to Carter’s?”

  “Yeah. I’ll meet you at the house and head over with you guys.”

  She gave me a look. “Did he come here today, for real?”

  “Yeah.”

  “The whole school knows he’s a prince now, huh? No more ‘new guy.’ Now he’s ‘that prince Finley screwed.’”

  I laughed. “I think it was the other way around, but awesome. Everyone is going to be like Linna about it and tell me I should settle for whatever he can give me. I should be grateful he chose me to be in love with and ashamed of in the same breath.”

  She winced. “Screw them. If he doesn’t shout it from the rooftops and tell the world, screw him.” Her cheeks brightened. “I mean, don’t screw him.”

  I laughed. “I’m not going to.”

  I left the school and walked along the sidewalk. The air was cold. Mid-December usually brought us snow. I wasn’t worried about snow. I was worried about never getting past him.

  It didn’t help when I looked up and he was standing in his pea coat and dress pants, looking sexy and conflicted, under a tree in front of me.

  I stopped dead in my tracks. “Come on, seriously? Did you forget to mention another mean thing? Your parents don't approve ‘cause a scamming whore of an American isn’t enough for you?”

  He put out a hand. “I have to say something. Just let me try to get it all out, before you interrupt and think I’m saying something horrid.”

  I took a step back for every one he took forward. I was shivering cold, but I didn’t want to be near him. He sighed. “Okay, I’ll remain here and you there, and I’ll speak and you’ll listen. I won’t move so long as you listen.”

  “Fine, but hurry up. I’m cold.”

  He nodded. “I have always known how my life would be. I imagined it like Cinderella’s prince. A list of eligible girls would be presented and I would pick from that.”

  I scowled, making him laugh. “Let me finish. Having grown up so close to Jack, I knew it didn’t have to be that way. He denied his birthrights and chose a girl no one would have thought suitable. He ran a successful business after the war and made himself a very rich man on his own. The entire time, he was madly in love with the girl he married. It is a rarity in my world, but it happens. Not without great sacrifice and the possibility of being disowned, but it happens. Because Andorra’s monarchy is so young and fragile, I knew I didn’t really have that option. I knew what was expected of me and what I would do to ensure my family’s reign was a success.”

  I wrapped my arms around myself. “I know you like the long way, but can you shorten this up? I’m cold and I don’t give a rat’s ass about your family’s shit.”

  His eyes burned. “I can’t choose you over my country. I don’t have that luxury. I am second in line for the throne and I have to act like it.”

  I took another step back. “I don’t want to know about your troubles, okay? I don’t have room for this in me.” I stepped back again. He walked toward me, quickly.

  He grabbed my arm and pulled me into his embrace. “The thing I’m trying to say, and failing at miserably, is that I want to make it so you are a viable option for me. I want to be with you. I want both, you and my country. I want us to date and for the world to know, and for it to be no different than any other prince dating a beautiful girl.”

  I pushed back. “How could that happen?”

  “You would need to learn how to fit in and be one of us.”

  “So you want to change me, mold me into one of you?”

  He shook his head. “It’s educating you in the mannerisms of my world.”

  I laughed bitterly. “That’s changing who I am but saying it in your fancy Shakespeare way.”

  He smiled down on me, staring at my lips. “I never want to change you. I lo-love you exactly as you are.”

  I sighed. How could I argue with that? He lowered his face and pressed his mouth against mine. It was that held-back kiss again, but I’d missed the feeling of his self-control wavering when he kissed me. His fingers dug into my back, pressing me into him, but his lips lightly roamed mine with a delicate kiss. When I opened my eyes, snow was falling around us.

  He kissed my cheek. “Be my girlfriend.”

  I nodded against his kiss. “Okay.”

  I suddenly noticed the guys standing off to the side. “Who are they?”

  He looked back. “Ignore them. They are something you will have to get used to.”

  I whispered. “Are they your chaperones?”

  He chuckled. “Bodyguards.”

  “Creepy.”

  He kissed again, taking in a deep inhale of me when he did. “You have no idea. It’s going to get a lot creepier, and you’re going to want to do your typical runaway thing, but you have to try and see everything past how it looks.” He pulled back. “Including me. You have to know things between us will look one way and be another.”

  I cocked an eyebrow. “What does that mean?”

  He kissed my nose. “It means that I have to be a certain way in the eyes of the people. I have to maintain my composure. And so do you.”

  I gulped. “What about the video of me fighting and stealing the lip-gloss?”

  He smiled. “I have the lip-gloss one from the security guard and the copy he made of it for their records. But I can’t do anything about the one of you fighting. Fortunately, it is impossible to see who the girl is. We will just have to deny anything that comes out about it.”

  “You mean lie.”

  He tilted my chin. “Don’t tell me you’re above lying to the press who would want to ruin you? Think of them as Sheila. They make more money if you are ruined.”

  “I’m cool with lying. I just need to know who and what I’m allowed to be, I guess.”

  He winced. “My girl, and that’s all that matters.” He encircled me with his arm and led me down the road. The snow was starting to build, making the roads quiet. The first snowfall always silenced our city. I leaned against him and let him walk me home, with the two weird-looking dudes following us like we were important people.

  When we got to my house, I went into my closet and got out the ring. I turned and passed it to him. “I can’t keep this though. It makes me feel weird.”

  He looked at it and me through his inky lashes and nodded. “I am truly sorry for that. I had no idea.”

  I shrugged. “It’s whatever. I just want it gone.”

  He took it and placed it in his pocket and then lifted my hand and kissed it.

  I smiled. “Why do you keep stuttering when you say love?”

  He shook his head. “I used to stutter when I was younger. My mother said it ran in the family. I had to go to speech therapists in secret. I only do it when I’m really nervous. Well, only around you. I haven’t stuttered in ages.”

  A slow smile lifted my lips. “You stuttered when you were little?”

  He looked pained. “I don’t like the way you’re saying that, like I’m an adorable little boy and you might pinch my cheeks.”

  “It’s just cute, and I like that you only do it around me.
”

  “Yes, me as well. I always dreamt that one day I would meet a girl and fall in love with her and then stammer my way through every sonnet I spoke.”

  I laughed. “Oh, I missed your Shakespeare impersonations.”

  His eyes got the look that they got when we were watching Joe Dirt. He reached down and lifted me into his arms and carried me to my bed. He laid me back and kissed my cheek, so close to my lips I could taste the kiss.

  “No matter what I say, don’t let this get too far. You have to be the voice of reason.” He pulled off his coat and got up. He locked the door to the room and switched off the light. It was late afternoon and still snowing, so the room was just light enough to see his beautiful face as he pressed his mouth against my neck. I wrapped around him, getting lost in the embrace.

  His lips ran down my neck to my chest as his fingers slipped up the back of my blouse. I started to undo the buttons, but he grabbed my hands. I kissed him, sucking his bottom lip. “I want you, Aiden.”

  He didn’t wait for anything else to be said. He pulled off his sweater and undershirt. We hadn’t ever swam together or seen each other without anything on. I pulled back, running my hands over his bare chest and muscled stomach. “Impressive.”

  He smiled down on my chest, running his hands over my push-up bra. He kissed at the top of my chest where my heart was. “Do you love me?”

  I looked down at him, sighing. “I do love you. I think I have always loved you.” He climbed on top of me, hovering. “You sure about this, because you were supposed to be the voice of reason here?”

  I nodded. “I’m being the voice of reason.”

  Slowly, he lowered himself on top of me, pressing me down into the bed. His fingers traipsed down my stomach and hips to my butt. He lifted my skirt and ran his hands across to my ass. He gripped firmly, and from there, everything got lost.

  I gripped the bed, moaning into him as he explored me. Our kisses were clumsy and chaotic, sucking each other’s lips and tongues, writhing against one another. He couldn’t get enough of me, and I was desperate to have all of him.

  When it was time to put the condom on, he pulled back and gave me one last heartfelt look. The steam in his eyes vanished for a moment. “Are you sure?”

  I bit my lip, scared yet excited about taking everything to the next step.

  Sometimes I take too many selfies and I don’t know which one I should post, and I want to post them all, but then I don’t want to look narcissistic.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Maiden’s Sheets

  I was no longer a virgin. It was gone. Vanished. Finished. Over. And I couldn’t have been happier. I imagined I might have mourned its passing. I had held out for so long. All my friends had been doing it since we were fourteen. I was the only one who held out, and I still felt young to be making the choice.

  Perhaps, deep down I knew that my mom had been trapped by the choices she had made. When her choices became mine, I got scared.

  But lying there in his arms, curled against each other, I was ecstatic. He was nattering, which was odd. “So then I was thinking we could Christmas with my parents and you could bring Jess, since your family is so awful. The two of you could spend it with my family and we could ski. There are resorts in Andorra like nowhere else in the world. What do you think?”

  I shrugged. “Whatever.”

  He kissed the side of my head. “I think it’s a good idea, and since you’re obviously indifferent to whether you see me or not, I will make the decision for you.”

  I scowled. “What?”

  He laughed and grabbed his phone. He dialed and spoke animatedly into the phone. It was strange, almost like a show. “Hello, Mother. I have wonderful news. Finley has accepted our offer to spend the holidays with our family. She will be bringing her sister, Jessica.” A woman squealed into the phone and I gagged a little bit. I couldn’t catch my breath. Was that what he had been saying? Damn him and that Shakespeare talking. Shit. I was going to meet the king and queen? Oh my God. I backed away and tried really hard to not pass out or vomit.

  Were we at meeting the family? He had met mine, not that it was anything to be excited about. My stomach started to hurt. I got up and went to the bathroom. I needed a shower anyway. The aftermath of losing my virginity was exactly as I feared it would be, and nowhere near what I wanted to share with another human being.

  I turned on the water and climbed inside. I sat on the floor as I had done in the morning of that very day. I curled up and hugged my silky smooth legs and sighed.

  “Shit.”

  The water dumped on me and I fought the urge to barf everywhere.

  The shower door opened and in stepped a completely naked Aiden. I jumped up, scraping my back on a jet and wincing. “Oh shit.”

  He grabbed me. “What are you doing?”

  I held my hand on my back ribs and waited for the initial sting to leave. “Why are you in my shower?”

  He smiled. “I was just in your bed. I figured the shower wasn’t an issue, since I have seen every inch of you na—”

  I slapped my free hand over his lips. “Oh my God. No. I don’t want to talk about it. Ever. Never. Oh my God. That really hurt.”

  “I am so sorry. I tried to be gentle. I know you’d said it was your first time, but you are so confident and strong I assumed—”

  “No, jackass. My back.”

  “Jackass? She calls me jackass after making love to me?” He laughed and spun me around. “Oh, Finley. Darling, you’ve scraped your back open. It’s bleeding.”

  I looked down at the slight hint of blood in the water pooling at my feet. “Awesome. Exactly as I imagined this day going.”

  He hugged me to his chest and I tried really hard not to think about junk resting on my hip. “Did I hurt you or is it just the back?”

  I moaned into his chest. “I don’t want to talk about it. Can it just be something we do and never talk about?”

  He sighed. “Sometimes I forget you’re seventeen. Not that nineteen is so much older, but a lot happens in that two years. And I am twenty shortly.”

  I shook my head. “Well, I turn eighteen in two weeks.”

  He lifted my face. “Close to New Year’s?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, on New Year’s Eve. I was born in ‘95, the last baby born in the State of Washington in ‘95, to be exact. I was born at 11:47 p.m. My parents held me back at school ‘cause my mom thought I would be really behind.”

  “So I’m not even two years older. Maybe you’re just really immature.” He winked and I shoved him back. He laughed harder and hugged me tighter. “I lo-love you, Finley Roze.”

  “Even though I’m immature?”

  “Especially because of that. You make me feel like I am young too.”

  “You are young.”

  “A prince is never young. We have expectations just by being born a prince. In fact, as a fetus, it is expected we will be born a boy.”

  I looked up at him. “I know you’re enjoying this little pity party, but I’m cold and you’re hogging the water.”

  He looked up. “I’m which?”

  “Taking the water. Being tall, it hits you before me and runs down you. I don’t get any. Hogging? How do you not know what hogging is?” I reached over and turned on the steam jets. He moaned as they hit his back. “This is my new favorite shower.”

  I smiled up at him. “I can’t believe you’re in my shower. My dad would murder you.”

  His face dropped. “He might get angry when he notices my men outside the bedroom door.”

  My smile faded fast. “You are kidding me. You left them outside? Why would they come in?” Then it hit me. “You mean they were out there the entire time?”

  His mouth hung open, but he closed it again. I wrinkled my nose. “Did they hear? Do they always do this for you?”

  He didn’t say anything. I shoved him back and climbed out of the shower. “You’re a jerk. That is disgusting. If I wanted to lose it with people listening
in, I would have taken one of the numerous opportunities I had before I met you. And after.”

  He snapped. “It’s the way things are done. They see and hear, but not really. It’s just—”

  “I don’t want hear some bullshit about how this is your world and people have sex while other people listen or watch. Jesus, do you want to save the bloody sheet for your mom? So you can prove you took my virginity?”

  I stomped out to the bedroom with my back stinging and a bad taste in my mouth. He grabbed me, dripping and naked still, and spun me around. Lightly dabbing, he dried my back. “Do you have bandages?”

  “Under the sink. I’ll get them—God knows I don’t want the servants fetching them for me.”

  “This is exactly what I was referring to. You have to get used to the way things are done. I’m not afforded the same freedom as you and I never will be.” He stomped to the bathroom, still very naked, and came back with the box of Band-Aids. He pushed me around again and started to place them on my back, gently. “I love you. The guards know that. I don’t do this sort of thing regularly. They don’t listen. They pay attention to their job.” He kissed my back above the scrape. “There. All patched up.”

  I walked away from him and snatched my robe, pulling it on roughly and going to the door. I ripped it open, not even caring about him being naked, and looked at the two men in the doorway. “Do you listen to people having sex?”

  Both of their faces looked to the prince. I snapped my fingers. “Don’t look at him; look at me.”

  They both looked down on me slowly. Their faces never changed from stone cold.

  “Do you listen to people having sex or watch them?”

  They both nodded once.

  “Do you think it’s hot?”

  “FINLEY! ENOUGH” He grabbed my hand and I regretted it instantly. He pulled me into the room and closed the door. I looked down to see he had his pants on. He let go of me and did them up. “You have to learn to look past it. I will let this one slide, and they won’t say a word of your indiscretion, but that can’t happen again. Do you understand what I’m saying?”