𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐨𝐥 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐝 𝐦𝐚𝐧, young royals

Chapter 7: Wilhelm

Orange Juice,  Noah Kahan

7: Wilhelm

I stared at him, so engrossed and absorbed in his work, his eyebrows creasing in concentration, razor blade scraping against my cheek, gathering lather and hair.  I was comforted to have him there with me before my statement.

"Did I ever tell you about my dad?" asked Simon suddenly, drawing the blade away from my face to clean it.

Quietly, I shook my head. He didn't bother looking at me, only proceeded with his work.

"He's a drug addict. And an alcoholic."

I didn't say anything.  I had heard the rumours, of course, but it hadn't mattered to me. I wanted to hear it from him. He came back to my face with a clean razor, pushing two fingers under my chin.

"I can't remember when it started, really. I was very young," he said, narrowed eyes focused on the razor. "3 or 4 years old, maybe. I didn't realize my father had a problem until I was older. When all the other kids' dads were out there cheering in the stadium at soccer games, and mine was out getting wasted in a bar. When I cowered in my room with my sister every time he came home with puffy eyes and smelling of booze. When I heard my mom sob in her room after tucking us into bed."

I listened, considering him, trying to imagine what it'd be like to look into his eyes in such a vulnerable moment.  Would he break?  Let his façade betray him?

"Mom worked hard so he wouldn't live with us anymore.  I wish I could say it gave me back all those years of my life, but it didn't."  He cleaned the blade again, still not looking at me.  "He's trying to get better now, but we're not entirely on speaking terms.  There's sunny days and stormy days, I guess."

For a moment, neither of us spoke, and he put the razor down.  I wished I could draw the sorrow out of him with a needle.  I wished I could hold him and squeeze all the pain out of him.  But I couldn't.

Simon swabbed my face with a towel.  And then he looked at me.  Big, wide, brown eyes, like rain-washed earth.  Vaster than planets, deeper than trenches.  They were broken shards of windows that showed to his soul.  Or stain-glassed windows in a gothic cathedral of some sort, speaking in tales and stories.  Such dark, dark emotions, gushing out of them.

His fingers were still upholding my chin, unmoving, dry towel in his other hand, frozen in motion.  I touched my fingers to my skin, soft and supple, like anew, and I didn't need to glance into a mirror to know his work was faultless.

"I don't know anyone," I said at last, reaching for his hand and taking the towel from him, "who'd go through what you did and come out half as strong as you are."

I hadn't thought about my answer before uttering it.  He grasped at my words, it seemed, breathed the atmosphere around us.  Squeezed my hand.  Stepped closer to me, his index gently tracing my jaw, starting at my earlobe and coasting down to my chin and throat.  But there was more.  I could sense it.

"Wille," he murmured, smiling sadly,  "the police was at my dad's place last night.  With a bottle of his medication in an evidence bag."

✧ ✧ ✧

I've never been very good with words.

I suppose it made sense for me to loathe these stupid speeches and statements so much, then. It's like my head was full of drawers, all slamming open and shut at the same time.  It's like my words were tipsy and disoriented, staggering off my tongue gauchely, always in the wrong places, always at the wrong times.  And I wished I could speak and write the way I thought—abundantly, fiercely, and endlessly.  I wished I could tackle my emotions and drown them in my art, yes. I wished I could immure the monsters creeping hot on my heels, ominous, clawed fingers anxiously lumbering over my neck and set to close in around my throat.

But I spoke and wrote gushingly, chaotically, mussily. Like the way I bled. I expressed myself, I thought, as aptly and skillfully as toddler in ice skates. I always thought it'd be my downfall.

"Many people wonder, was your reveal at the jubilee planned?"

"No, it wasn't," I admitted. "But it felt right in the moment, and I'm glad I took that off my chest. I'm very thankful for the support I received from my friends."

"And your family? Are they as supporting?"

I couldn't see my mother, but I could imagine her holding her breath in that very moment. Luckily, fallacies and deviations were easily considered a mother tongue for my family. "This isn't an easy situation for anyone, but we are working toward a future that's secure for everyone," I said.

"You're the first openly out prince in the history of the country. Do you consider your coming out a step toward a more accepting Sweden?"

"I think so," I replied, pensive. "For some, at least. Those sort of thoughts and opinions are often one's own personal journey," I continued. "My simple being doesn't have to affect them."

"Finally, Crown prince Wilhelm, if you could send out one message to the queer youth in Sweden right now, what would that be?"

"I think I'd say," I spoke, hastily brewing up an answer off the top of my mind, "don't wish to become something you're not."  I inhaled through a pause in my speech, awkward and uncertain, shifting in my seat.  "Because the stuff that's inside you... it's steel," I uttered uneasily.  "Work it, shape it, forge it... it won't change.  You can't wish it gone, can't wait it off or will it away.  And time is precious.  Let your fears take those years away, and you'll be shadowed by regrets.  That isn't a way to live.  So, uh, I guess what I'm trying to say is: don't waste your time trying to be something shinier or tougher or smoother.  Just... be you."

I felt vulnerable.  Naked, almost.  But it was done, and I was somewhat content with my answers, and so seemed the interviewer. Coming out of the interview, my mother looked satisfied with me. Her and my father and some of the court members came to offer me their congratulations. Simon was still there, too, and it was my greatest relief to be coming back to him, like rain returns to the sea.

He grabbed my hand, pushing his forehead against mine. "You'll go down in history," he murmured.

"We will."

idk how much i'll update in the next few weeks because finals are around the corner but i feel kind of committed to this now