Justin took a stroll around the palace to try and get acquainted with his surroundings. He passed by the dining hall, where he had had lunch with Ryan’s parents. They were the ones he was most afraid of meeting, because he figured they would be able to tell him apart from their own son. Thankfully, they didn’t notice the difference and only asked him why he was being so agreeable today.
He peeked around the corner to see William speaking with some servants, and assigning tasks to them. “Hey William! What‘s up?”
William looked up, puzzled. “Uh, nothing is…up. I was just giving Molly and Natalie their jobs for the day. Is there something I could help you with, Sir?”
“Actually, yeah,” Justin said. “You said earlier that I could invite Princess Emaria to join me this afternoon? Has she agreed to come?”
William nodded. “She’ll be here at 7:30.”
Justin grinned. Then he frowned. “William?”
“Yes sir?”
“What do you think I should wear?” Justin said, anxiously.
William suddenly laughed. “I’m sure we can find something suitable, Prince Ryan.”
Ryan stood in the hallway and waited for Samantha. He leaned against a locker as he watched her talk to her friends. She was wearing denim Capri’s and a tiny pink t-shirt that said, “No Place Like Homecoming” with ruby slippers and crown.
He smiled at her animated features when she talked. He thought it was cute how her eyes wrinkled at the corners when she laughed. Suddenly she looked his way and caught his eye. He gave her a half smile and looked at the ground.
She gave her friends hugs goodbye and then skipped over to him. “Hey J. Are you ready?”
He answered by taking her hand, and leading her toward the doors. He opened the door for her, “My lady,”
“Good sir,” she giggled. “Thank you, J.”
He winked at her and grabbed her hand. “Come on!”
Samantha twirled her stool around and looked at Ryan beside her. He was twirling his stool too as he looked over the pizza menu. “So what do you usually get here?” Ryan asked, leaning his elbows on the counter.
“Usually at the pizza place, I get….pizza.” She laughed.
“Oh you think that’s funny, do you? Alright then, I’m just going to order the grossest kind of pizza on the menu,” He said seriously. “It says here that they have Peanut Butter and Jelly Pizza. How about that?”
She held her hands up. “Okay, okay. Get half cheese, half pepperoni, breadsticks, and two Dr. Peppers.”
“What if I don’t like Dr. Pepper?” He said, twirling around to face her.
“Justin. You’re forgetting that I’ve known you for twelve years. I know what you like,” Sam said.
Ryan nodded. This was harder than he thought. Sam was going to always see him as Justin, and never as himself. ’I’m just going to have to try harder to make her see that I‘m different.’
“Well today, I’m going to do something different…maybe even spontaneous.” He said, grabbing her hand, and intertwining their fingers.
She tried to hide her surprise with a small laugh, as he signaled the server. “Okay….”
The server approached them, “What can I get for you?”
Ryan handed him the menus with his free hand. “We’ll have a medium, half cheese, half pepperoni pizza. An order of breadsticks. One medium Dr. Pepper, and one medium…Cherry Coke.”
The server scribbled the order down. “Alright, we’ll have that out for you soon.”
“Dr. Pepper? VERY spontaneous, J.” Samantha said, sarcastically.
He squeezed at her hand, and leaned in toward her ear, “I wasn’t talking about the drinks, Sam.”
Then he pulled back and watched from the corner of his eye as a smile crept to her face.
