“Is that not a good name for my journal? I think it has a nice ring to it—Jerry Journal.”
“Your journal doesn’t need a name. You’re not writingtoit. You’re just writing your thoughts down.”
“Oh, okay.” I let out a large sigh and tap my pen to my chin before I start writing again. “Today Keller did fifty-two pushups. Ten of them weren’t proper form—”
He tears the journal from my grasp, causing me to laugh.
“Lilly, this is serious.”
“I know,” I groan. “But, Keller, this is slowly killing me. It’s been a week of these mindless lectures in this small stone room. I can’t sit here anymore. It’s boring. It’s monotonous. It’s slowly taking away my will to live. And, sure, you’re nice to look at, and the whole chair kicking and table flipping brought some life to our days, but I can only look at you for so long before I start to lose my mind. And I can’t possibly hurt my friend the table again.” I whisper while stroking the tabletop, “I made a sacred promise to always protect it moving forward.”
“But you need to learn this information, Lilly,” he says, more deflated than anything.
“Well, teach me in a more fun way. This jail-like cell you have me captured in is making this experience unbearable. Can we at least walk around? Study in the living room? Make a cake and talk about history? Drive around? Something, please?”
“We’re not at liberty to drive around just yet.”
“Why not?”
“Because.”
“Because why?” I press.
He paces the space, hands behind his back. “Because I said so.”
“Ah, I see. So because you said so, I should just be okay with that?” I stand as well and approach him. When I’m about a foot away, I poke him in the chest and say, “Well, I’m not okay with it. I’d like to know why we can’t go about visiting the country. Don’t you want me to fall in love with it? I mean, this castle is nice and all,” I lie, because it’s actually dreadful, “but you talked about glaciers and volcanoes. I want to see them.”
“You can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because you need to stay hidden,” he shouts, causing me to step back. He grumbles something and then says, “The royal line of succession has been a joke. Four children born into the monarchy, none of them able to take the throne—granted, your mother is a different story—but still, we’re at the precipice of losing everything, and the last thing this country needs is to consider your reign a joke.”
“A joke?” My forehead crinkles as I fold my arms. “Why would it be a joke?”
“You’re an American. You know nothing about the country. You don’t know any of the traditions. And if I were to present you in front of the country right now, they would laugh at you, rather than welcome you. We don’t need you being spotted. We don’t need the rumors.”
“Wow,” I say, taking a step back. “Well, maybe if you did something more than drone on about the history of needlepoint—”
“Hardanger.”
“Whatever!” I throw my hands up in the air. “If you taught me actual useful things, things of real-life importance, I wouldn’t be such a joke.”
“What I’m teaching youisimportant. You need to know this. You need to know it all so you can make a decision.”
“Well, how’s this for a decision—I’m done for the day,” I say, moving past him and toward the door, but just as I reach it, Keller places his hand on the wood, preventing me from opening it.
“You’re not going anywhere,” he says in a menacing tone.
I look up at him, note that his chest is vibrating.
“I suggest you move unless you want me screaming bloody murder.”
“We need to work.”
“And you need to figure out a better way of teaching me, because I am not sitting in this room with you one more day, droning on about flower crowns and how to properly curtsy.” I move his hand from the door, open it up, and storm out.
* * *
