The Queen

“Are you all right?”
It took all my strength to answer. “You saved my life.” I paused, gasping. “I love you.”

“It’s more than that. You’d take a bullet for him if you had to.”

“Let me make something very clear,” she began quietly, gliding slowly past chairs and couches of girls, looking glorious and terrifying at once. “If one of you little brats thinks you can come into my house and take my crown, think again.”
She stopped in front of a cluster of girls near the wall. “And if you think you can act like trash and still end up on the throne, you have another think coming.” She dug her finger into Piper’s face. “I will not stand for it!”
Piper’s face was flung back by the force of the queen’s finger, but she didn’t react to the pain until after Queen Abby had passed.
“I am queen. And I am beloved. If you want to marry my son and live in my home, you will be everything I tell you to be. Obedient. Tasteful. And silent.”

I nodded, picked up a roll, and bit.
It’s a strange thing to discover how much you matter to people you didn’t really know you mattered to. Or to find that the slow disintegration of yourself causes a smaller version to happen in other people.

You will be the only thing in this world that
is truly mine. And I will put you on a pedes-
tal so high, it will be impossible for anyone
not to adore you.

I’m desperate for peace. I
think you might be the only chance I have at
that.

It’s a strange thing to discover how much you
matter to people you didn’t really know you
mattered to.

You have to be spotless, do you understand? You need to be an exemplary candidate. Up until recently, I didn’t think there’d ever be a need to tell you that, but now it seems I do: don’t give anyone a reason to doubt your competence.”

“I was wondering if you might join me for a late dessert.”
A date? He was here for a date?
And I was in my nightgown, makeup stripped, hair half brushed. “Umm, should I . . . change?”
Martha handed me my robe, and I swooped it on

He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “You will be the only thing in this world that is truly mine. And I will put you on a pedestal so high, it will be impossible for anyone not to adore you.”