Page 20 of A Valiant Prince

I smirk. “Remember, Anna? I don’t always play by the rules,” I inform her. She glares at me but doesn’t go back to her worries.

A few minutes later, a voice comes on an intercom and announces that our flight is boarding. Anna’s face goes pale once more.

I pull her up, and she looks at me. I can tell she’s trying to be brave, but she can’t hide her fear. It makes me ponder how she kept her second life a secret for so long because I can read every emotion on her face like it’s spelled out in neon letters.

I watch Anna scan her boarding pass with a shaky hand. I follow her as we wait in the line that forms down the aisleway of the plane. I keep my hand on her shoulder, and when we reach our seats, I turn her. She scoots toward the window seat, and I take the middle one. As all of us mere mortals do, I internally pray for a not full flight so that the seat next to me remains empty.

And then Hendrick sits down. I sigh. So much for my mile-high club fantasies because I know that Anna will not be going to the stamp-sized airplane bathroom with me if the mere thought of a regular airline seat freaks her out.

I settle myself and am thankful for Anna’s small stature since I’m able to manspread over to her side a bit. She’s curled herself into a small ball and has found a small pillow in her carry-on bag that she’s now leaning against. I put my hand on her leg, and she places her hand over mine while keeping her eyes closed.

The flight is completely uneventful. Anna scoffs at the food and opts to eat the roll from both our trays and a half bottle of wine. She promptly falls asleep somewhere over the Atlantic and doesn’t wake again until breakfast is being served. She again only touches the bread but does manage a few bites of fruit. She has a mimosa with her breakfast, muttering something about it being impossible to screw up champagne and orange juice.

She tugs back down the eye mask that she pulled out from her bag somewhere over the mid-Atlantic and falls back asleep for the remaining hour of our flight.

“She’s not fond of flying, huh?” Hendrick says. I look over at him. He’s kept himself busy during the flight. Never sleeping, but reading, watching videos on his laptop, and chatting amicably with a passenger across from us who put on Rocky IV, a movie that he has seen at least fifty times, according to their dialogue. I get a strong military vibe from Hendrick. He’s stocky, tall but not overly tall. He definitely looks like he could be a boxer.

“So, you’re Pete’s cousin?” I ask him. He looks over at me.

“Affirmative. And Lucas, since they are brothers,” he says. And that military premonition is confirmed. It takes me a minute to realize that I never contemplated that Pete and Lucas are brothers. I funnel that away as something to discuss with Anna.

“Which branch?” I ask him. His accent is all American. He gives me a look and leans in so no one can hear us, which I think is ridiculous because all the other passengers are absorbed in their music and movies, earbuds in and thoughts consumed by mass media.

“Army, special forces. Logan, we can discuss my qualifications later,” he says in a low voice. I nod.

“Rocky, huh?” I say. He grins and shrugs.

“Ever run up the art museum steps?” I ask him. He laughs at that.

“A few times, possibly,” he says nonchalantly.

“That was the first thing I always asked to do when we’d visit Philly,” I admit. He chuckles.

“Well, it’s the best thing to do,” he says. We chat about the movie for a while, and then Anna finally wakes up as the captain comes on and announces our descent into Pittsburgh.

It’s a blur of activity as we make our way through customs. There’s a car waiting for us, driven by Pete of course, who somehow got through customs in record time. We hop in, and he heads out to a rented house near my grandparents’ home. It’s strange being here now. It’s like I’ve crossed through to an alternate universe, and now I’m looking back on the one I can never go to again.

Chapter Six

Istare at the closet door. Inside is a box that contains what may be the only photo of my parents together. My parents. One month ago, I had a different life. Hell, I had a different past.

I listen for any sounds below. I came here with Pete and Hendrick who are waiting in the car. Anna is outside, waiting in the driveway, too afraid to come in. My grandmother is downstairs in the kitchen.

I open the door and pull down one of five boxes of my mother’s things. Things I couldn’t part with but didn’t want to take with me. My grandparents carefully boxed them and placed them here, inside her old room. These boxes contain an illusion. An illusion of who I thought my mother was.

I open the box and reach inside to retrieve a much smaller shoebox. I carefully remove the lid and peek inside. It contains remnants of my mother’s time in Europe. There’s an old journal. I only kept it because she spoke of me, spoke of finding out she was pregnant with me. Otherwise, it only contains old notes, most likely for stories she was working on at the time. There’s a locket. I don’t know why I kept that. That’s a lie. I kept it because of a fuzzy memory from a lifetime ago. It contains no photos. On the outside is a painted eye. It looks like my eye. In all honesty, it creeps me out, but nonetheless, here it is. And lastly, there is a pile of photos. I start searching through them until I find the one that I’m looking for, the only one of my parents.

I stop when I reach it and pull it from the pile. My father stands tall and regal next to my mother. They are speaking about something, not looking at the camera but at each other. I flip it over, it only has E.H. + L.W. and the date which is roughly seven months prior to my birth. For the first time ever, I look at my mother’s belly as though realizing just now that I, too, am in this photo, neatly tucked away inside my mother. I toss the photograph back on the pile and gaze inside the closet.

My mother was a journalist first and my mother second. She was always leaving to go cover a story. Sometimes war, sometimes a murder, sometimes politics. When she came home with me, I was only a few months old. She had told my grandparents she had met a man and had gotten pregnant. They begged her to come home, but she refused, saying they had married, and she would fly them out to meet me once I arrived. But that never happened. Instead, we stood on the doorstep of their small brick, Cape Cod in a suburb of Pittsburgh in the pouring rain, or at least that’s how I’ve been told the story. A story I just learned is largely a farce. I was told my father rejected us. That my mother had to leave and that he never wanted to see me. I think back on my life. It wasn’t bad. My grandparents are loving people. My grandfather did everything a father would have. He relished having a pseudo-son to play ball with and teach chess to and read to at night. My grandmother spoiled me with food. They were my one constant. No matter where I was or where my mother went, they were always there, they are still always here.

I put the lid of the box and walk back downstairs. The smell of my grandmother’s chicken soup permeates the small space of the house. I walk into the kitchen and find her kneading bread.

“Did you find the photos you were looking for?” she asks with a smile.

“Yes,” I say as I lean over and kiss the top of her head. She pats my arm and goes back to kneading the dough.

“Why don’t you use that bread maker I bought you, Nana?” I ask her.

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