Page 97 of Good Losers (Lochkelvin Academy)

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The news becomes a constant in our lives, a bright rectangle of doom in the corner of the room. Danny stares at the TV in wonder while gorging on a fistful of cereal, because apparently cereal is improved by eating it straight from the box and without any liquid whatsoever.

“I still can’t believe I’m here while all this is going down,” he mutters as he crunches, his hand fishing in the cereal box for more.

With Finlay and Rory outside and checking the carnage of last night’s protest for themselves, Danny and I are alone and shielded from the worst of it, having only to witness it secondhand on TV. The reports are dreadful: arson attacks, shops looted, over a hundred arrests and at least a dozen injured.

Around noon, Luke shambles downstairs, wearing an old-fashioned pair of pale pink striped pajamas. It’s one of the oddest sights I’ve ever seen, but I manage to fight my stunned surprise to frantically switch off the TV.

“No,” Luke mutters. “Please keep it on. I want to see.”

His pajamas are a sharp contrast to the glitzy suits he’s been wearing in every single clip of archive footage of him that’s been wheeled out over the last twenty-four hours, and it’s difficult not to stare at this pared-down, tired version of Luke. He’s always been sharply dressed, even in Lochkelvin, where he managed to make the uniform look somehowmoreimpeccable, the height of style as it adorned his photogenic self. Luke in pajamas, pouring himself a bowl of cereal, is like looking at someone who’s given up on life.

“Becca texted me,” he tells me as he hunts for a spoon, breaking the suffocating silence. I quickly switch on the TV and once more, action flares to life in the corner of the room. “She claims to be fine. Somewhere safe, with Mother. Naturally, Mother’s furious about the entire affair.”

I take a moment to simply observe Luke, because yes, this is still the weirdest thing I think I’ve seen. The crown prince casually eating corn flakes in his pajamas at noon, watching the demise of his family play out on the large-screen television.

“I’m glad,” I say delicately. “I hope she’s out of London.”

Luke flicks a shrewd glance over at Danny, who stares back at him with wide eyes, before giving an elegant shrug. “They will not be in the country for long.” With a strange detachment, he reads the headlines scrolling at the bottom of the screen. “One hundred people arrested for sticking up for me. Is that the extent of my army now? One hundred brave souls.”

“You can’t know that.”

A distorted smile twists Luke’s lips. “The whole business is a whitewash. The reports from last night are not a lie. Police are only arresting counter-protesters. Royalists are being hauled into vans and allegedly beaten in detention centers.” He pinches the bridge of his nose, sliding his fingers back and forth as though there’s a meditative quality to it. “My people. My supporters. And no one cares, because the idea of a monarchy is currently notau faitwith the bourgeoisie who make the rules on what is and is not in. They would rather bury their heads in the opposite direction than acknowledge an injustice has occurred.”

I watch as Luke fixes himself tea. He seems uncertain about it, clattering around the kitchen and, eventually, gingerly holding a small metal pot in his hands. I wonder how often Luke’s had to make tea — or really, do anything — by himself.

“They will be back,” Luke adds with a sneer, pouring hot water into a teacup then slamming the metal pot onto the table. “Just wait. Antiro has been disbanded once – they can do so again. In time, they will be begging us to return once they realize the alternative is Oscar Munro with no political oversight. They have chosen calamity over an age-old constant. We are the country’s loss.”

I bite my lip, quickly running through the stages of grief. I know them intimately, but it seems wild to me that Luke’s already reached the delusion and denial stage.

“But you aren’t royal,” Danny points out in confusion, not tiptoeing around the words like me, and I stare at him in shock. You aren’t supposed to tell the emperor that he has no clothes on. “You never were. Isn’t that the whole point?”

Luke lifts his head. In a low tone, he says, “I was to some. To some people, I mattered. It may not have been in my blood, the smallest of biological technicalities, but it was in my upbringing. My teachings. What makes someone royal? Nature or nurture?”

“Nature,” Danny answers in a heartbeat. “Otherwise you’re just another unelected official, and the whole point of royalty is that you’re more than that.”

Luke’s eyes narrow at Danny. “I am starting to regret my choice of bringing you here.”

I’m surprised by these words, and am about to seek clarification when Danny gets there before I do.

“What are you talking about?” he asks skeptically, placing the box of cereal down and no longer cheerfully munching on it. “You had nothing to do with me being here.”

“Think again,” Luke says, and he stares glumly at the TV screen. When Danny’s skepticism fails to lessen from his face, Luke gives another of those sweeping, elegant shrugs. It looks more like he’s massaging his shoulders instead of expressing apathy. “Fine. Cards on the table.”

He mutes the hysterical commentary coming from the TV, the box that whips us into a frenzy and forces us to take sides, because refusing to take sides is to refuse to fight for the future of the country you’re supposed to love. It’s an effortless gesture from Luke, his ability to drown out noise.

“Do not think I have not noticed it,” he tells me, and here Luke speaks directly to me. My insides flip at having his focus on me, at the shrewd, implacable intelligence shining in Luke’s eyes. “You and Rory and also Finlay. I see it plainly, the way I see everything, if anyone bothered to consult my opinion on anything other than politics.”

He sounds so bored, as though the frightening, intense fire I feel whenever I contemplate the powerful connection shared between the three of us is utterly, pathetically trivial.

When I open my mouth to protest, Luke interrupts me. “Do you understand how alone I have felt? How cornered? While the other chiefs cavort around with you, while you dance for them and sneak away at night and do whatever it is you do to them to make them fall more in love with you one by one, I have had nothing. No support. No anything. Nothing apart from fights — fighting with my best friends, fighting with Rory, fighting with Finlay, fighting for a semblance of the recognition I had before. We were meant to be there for each other, the chiefs, but the moment you became one of us is the same moment I started to be pushed out.”

My heart is in my throat, a fluttering thing pounding so hard against the base of my tongue to spill out my words. Whatever I could say would pale in comparison:I never knew, I never realized… that Luke could feel this way, this much, this often, and not once show it apart from minor disagreements. The fact that Luke sees me, notices me, is enough of a constant shock that I feel the need to pinch myself. But the depth of his emotions is even more unexpected, and for some reason, guilt slops thickly inside my stomach.

“What is that Shakespeare line?” Luke muses. “‘Heavy is the head that wears the crown’? Well, I have experienced both wearing a crown and having it snatched from me, and I can attest that the head with the crown is a significantly more comfortable experience.” If he were anyone else, these damning words would be followed by a snooty raise of his chin, his nose in the air and perhaps a harrumph of finality as good as an exclamation mark. But as Luke, his words are calm and measured, a way to make me feel even more like a stupid girl in over her head.

“You have successfully distracted my best friends,” he claims, as though this is the entire reason for my existence, “when they should have been supportingme. No wonder I voted for Danny to stay with us. I know we have not always been cordial, Danny and I, but I would take almost anyone in order not to be the fourth wheel. I didnotwant to be alone.”

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