How I Knew

chapter two - axel

I stand up from the awfully old and uncomfortable desk chair, frustrated by the papers scattered over the wooden surface. All my father's doing, of course.

The Cabinet and the rest of the royal family are pushing me to marry. If I refuse to do so by their deadline, they will choose a person of their liking and expect us to wed within the week.

This room used to be a safe haven, a healthy escape from the calculated world outside these doors. I found comfort in all the stories shelved around me. As a teenager, I would spend countless hours hiding in here, racing to finish whatever book I was reading before I was hauled back to my pending duties.

Now, these four walls have become the center of my own personal hell. It represents everything I have tried to avoid.

From the moment I was born, every single waking moment of my life has been predetermined by my parents, but most importantly the Regovian institution. As the first in line of succession to the throne, I am a pawn in their end game of continuing the monarchy and extending its governmental power. Play dates at the age of five with princesses, being hosted by royals from neighboring countries during summer vacations, and attending birthday parties of people I had never met were all networking sessions disguised as social activities. I was being groomed to become a better version of my father and achieve all the things he didn't.

I walk to the far right corner of the room, standing in front of the bookshelf and pulling one of the most worn-out books. The Picture of Dorian Gray. It has been my favorite book ever since I read it at the age of fifteen. I always wondered why I intensely gravitated to the book, rereading it countless times to feel understood. I didn't get my answer until years later. I felt connected to the book because my life isn't so different from Dorian's. He and the people around him were victims of the thrills and pleasures of aesthetic life. I have become a prisoner of the same.

Private citizens are fascinated by royal life, constantly looking for an opportunity to get a glimpse of what it is like. However, what they fail to see are the limits and danger of this fate. I will never be allowed to do the mundane activities of a commoner: grocery shopping, strolls around a park, bar hopping. Everything they take for granted. I can't step out of the palace without a caravan of Royal Protection Officers—or RPOs—following me. I would be hounded with protocols and what-if scenarios that take away from the normalcy of the experience.

The hovering has led me to rebel and constantly test my parents' patience throughout the years.

Growing up, I made the nanny's responsibilities worth every single penny they were being paid. It started with nicknames for my younger sister Alexandra during public functions. Alix and muppet are the two that have stuck. As she got older, our mischievousness evolved into food fights and hide-and-go-seek games that often led to broken vases. But once I reached my teenage years and was sent to boarding school, our partnership dwindled. It became a solo man job and Alix felt abandoned by my parting despite my lack of say over the decision.

At boarding school, I dabbled in parties, alcohol, and escaping campus. If the media wanted to follow me and expose my entire life for the world to read, I was going to perform the greatest show for them and my parents. Nothing like waking up to pictures of their precious heir to the throne shirtless and chugging a beer. At twenty-nine years old, I have a harder time provoking Mother and Father's temper but rumors of my involvement with models, actresses, and social climbers have done the job. It has also put me in this current position. Pressured to marry one of the names listed on a piece of paper.

As royals, my family doesn't entirely believe in the system especially when their son isn't getting any younger and the institution needs a new heir to the future throne in the next three years. My parents and grandparents married through the matching. They have made it clear that it was solely because their match had royal ancestry and they were matched during their teenage years, avoiding the need for an arranged marriage. Unluckily, I didn't have the same fate.