The worst thing about parties like this is that the music never changes when the mood does.
Inside, the bass still thudded through the walls. Glasses still clinked. Someone laughed too loudly in the next room, the kind of laugh people use when they want everyone to know they are having fun.
Out here on the terrace, however, something had shifted.
I could feel it.
Madison looked at me with that same perfect smile, but now I knew exactly how fragile it was. Charles stood a few feet away, shoulders tense, his expression carefully blank. Aaliyah hovered near the doorway like she was two seconds from dragging me back inside by force.
"Right," Madison said lightly, brushing an invisible piece of dust from her dress. "Well. I should get back to my guests."
Of course.
Her guests.
Her stage.
Her kingdom.
I tilted my chin. "Of course. Wouldn't want your evening to collapse without you."
Aaliyah made a sound somewhere between a cough and a laugh.
Madison's eyes flashed.
Then, because she was Madison, she smiled.
"Try not to get lost on your way back in," she said sweetly.
And just like that, she walked past us and slipped through the doors, all satin and posture and polished control.
The second she disappeared, Aaliyah turned to me.
"What did she say?"
"About seven different things," I replied.
"Helpful," she deadpanned.
Charles was still watching the doors.
"You okay?" he asked without looking at me.
That annoyed me more than if he had looked.
"Yes," I said. "I am standing, breathing, and not throwing anyone off the terrace. That feels like success."
That finally made him glance at me.
A small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"Low bar," he said.
"American standards," I replied.
Aaliyah folded her arms. "Okay, great. You're both alive and still doing the banter thing. But I would really love the summary before Madison decides to publicly sacrifice someone in the living room."
I looked between them.
Then I sighed.
"She thinks I am a threat," I said. "Which, to be fair, she is not entirely wrong about."
Aaliyah muttered, "Understatement of the century."
I ignored her.
"She also thinks Charles looks at me too much."
There was silence.
Sharp, interesting silence.
Aaliyah's eyebrows climbed.
Charles actually choked.
"I'm sorry," he said. "She said what?"
I turned to him. "Do not act surprised. You know perfectly well how she watches us."
His ears had gone slightly red.
A detail I enjoyed far too much.
Aaliyah looked from him to me and back again, then sighed dramatically.
"Oh, this is bad," she said. "This is so much worse than I thought."
"What is?" Charles asked.
She pointed between us. "This. Whatever this weird, flirty, emotionally constipated international incident is."
I stared at her.
Charles stared at her.
Then, somehow, Charles laughed first.
"Emotionally constipated?" he repeated.
"Yes," Aaliyah said. "That is exactly what I said. Anyway, one of you is going to have to admit something eventually, but tonight is not that night, because I can feel a social explosion coming."
She was right.
We heard it before we saw it.
A sudden rise in voices from inside.
A sharp burst of laughter.
Then someone said, much too loudly, "No way—that's actually her?"
Charles swore under his breath.
"Stay here," he said automatically.
I narrowed my eyes. "Absolutely not."
And before either of them could stop me, I pushed past the terrace doors and walked back inside.
The room had changed.
Not visually, at first.
The lights were still soft. The music was still shallow and expensive. The drinks still sparkled under chandelier light.
But the energy had shifted completely.
Everyone was looking at a phone.
Or at me.
Or both.
Wonderful.
I slowed, my heels clicking sharply against the polished floor. Conversations dropped off one by one as people noticed me reentering the room.
At the center of a little circle near the sofa stood one of Madison's friends—the glittery-headband girl from lunch, though tonight she had upgraded to silver eyeliner and the expression of someone thrilled to be near drama.
She looked up as I approached.
"Oh," she said, pretending to be startled. "Monique. We were just—"
"Talking about me?" I finished.
She gave a tiny laugh. "Well… kind of."
Charles appeared at my side. Aaliyah just behind him.
"Move," Charles said flatly.
No one moved.
Of course they didn't.
I held out my hand.
"The phone," I said.
The girl blinked. "Excuse me?"
"The phone," I repeated. "Since you are clearly not using it for anything intelligent."
A few people sucked in breaths.
She flushed, but handed it over.
On the screen was a gossip post.
A photo of me stepping out of the car tonight, Charles beside me, Aaliyah just behind us.
The caption read:
FRENCH PRINCESS + FIRST SON + LINCOLN'S FALL QUEEN BEEF = BEST YEAR EVER.
And below it: Sources say Monique de Beaumont is not just rich-rich, but literal royalty. Also hearing Madison is NOT happy about the Charles situation 👀
I stared at it.
Then I laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because if I did not laugh, I might have actually broken the phone in half.
"How very poetic," I said.
Charles took one look at the screen and muttered, "Oh, for God's sake."
Aaliyah leaned over my shoulder. "Wow. They really made Madison sound like a rejected Disney villain."
At that exact moment, Madison appeared.
Of course she did.
She took in the scene in one sweep—the circle of students, the phone in my hand, Charles too close to me, Aaliyah ready to start a war.
"What happened?" she asked.
No one answered.
Interesting.
I lifted the phone slightly. "Apparently, your party has become journalism."
Her expression changed just enough for me to see it.
Recognition.
Then annoyance.
Then calculation.
"I didn't post that," she said immediately.
"I did not say you did."
"You implied it."
"I merely entered a room full of staring people and found my face on a screen," I replied. "You can understand how that might create an impression."
The room was silent now.
Everyone watching.
Waiting.
Madison crossed her arms. "You think I'd embarrass myself by letting some anonymous gossip account hijack my event?"
Aaliyah snorted. "Honestly? Yes."
"Stay out of this," Madison snapped.
"No," Aaliyah said pleasantly. "I don't think I will."
Charles stepped forward then, voice low and dangerous in a way I had not heard before.
"Who took the picture?"
No one answered.
He scanned the room. "Seriously?"
"It was already online when I saw it," the glittery girl said quickly. "I didn't post it, I swear."
Madison looked furious now—not at me, not at the gossip, but at the fact that she no longer controlled the center of the room.
I understood that feeling better than I wanted to.
So I made a choice.
I handed the phone back.
Then I turned, slowly, so I could look at everyone.
The whole room went still.
"Well," I said clearly, "since everyone seems so deeply interested, let me save you the effort of inventing things."
Charles looked at me sharply.
Aaliyah whispered, "Oh my God."
I lifted my chin.
"Yes," I said. "I am a princess. A real one. No, it is not as exciting as the internet wants it to be. I still have homework. I still get tired. And I still have to stand here in a room full of overdressed American teenagers while strangers write nonsense about me online."
A few people shifted awkwardly.
Good.
I continued.
"I did not come here to become entertainment for people with Wi-Fi and bad manners. I came here to go to school. To study. To live."
My eyes swept across the room.
"If that disappoints any of you, I deeply encourage you to survive it."
There was a beat of stunned silence.
Then, from somewhere near the kitchen, someone laughed.
Not cruelly.
Almost admiringly.
Then another voice: "Okay, that was kind of iconic."
Aaliyah put a hand over her face. "I hate this school."
But she was smiling.
Madison, however, looked like she had bitten into glass.
Because the room had shifted.
Not toward chaos.
Toward me.
I could feel it.
That dangerous little tilt in the social balance.
And Madison could feel it too.
"Monique," she said tightly, "maybe we should all calm down."
I turned to her.
"I am perfectly calm," I said. "Are you?"
That landed exactly where I meant it to.
Her face remained composed.
Barely.
Charles glanced at me like he was seeing me for the first time.
Honestly, I was not entirely sure I blamed him.
Then, because this night clearly had not done enough damage yet, another phone buzzed.
And another.
And another.
The sound spread through the room like a rash.
People looked down.
Expressions changed.
Someone whispered, "Oh my God."
Aaliyah grabbed her own phone and swore.
"What now?" Charles asked.
She held up the screen.
It was another post.
A video this time.
Me and Madison on the terrace, grainy but visible through the glass, standing close, faces sharp with tension.
No audio.
Just enough to let people imagine whatever they wanted.
Caption:
Princess vs. Queen? Looks like Lincoln's biggest party just turned into a war.
I closed my eyes for one second.
One.
Then opened them again.
"Who," I asked very softly, "keeps filming other people instead of developing a personality?"
That got a laugh.
Even from people trying not to.
Madison looked like she might combust.
"This is insane," she snapped. "Everyone needs to put their phones away."
No one listened.
Of course they didn't.
Because once a room smells blood, polish means nothing.
Charles stepped closer to me. "We're leaving."
"I am not running."
"It's not running," he said. "It's choosing not to stay in a house full of future lobbyists with camera roll addictions."
Aaliyah nodded. "I hate to say it, but the idiot is right."
I looked around one last time.
At the staring faces.
At the badly hidden excitement.
At Madison, still standing in the center of the room she had built, except now it no longer belonged entirely to her.
And suddenly, I was tired.
Not weak.
Not defeated.
Just tired.
"Fine," I said.
Charles didn't waste a second.
His hand found the small of my back—not possessive, just steady—and guided me toward the door. Aaliyah walked on my other side like a bodyguard with better earrings.
No one stopped us.
No one dared.
The cold night air hit my skin the second we stepped outside, and I breathed in hard, like I had been underwater longer than I realized.
Behind us, the party kept going.
Of course it did.
America, I was learning, never really stopped performing.
The ride back was quiet at first.
Not empty.
Heavy.
Aaliyah sat across from me in the car, heels kicked off, muttering insults about the entire student body under her breath. Charles sat beside me, one arm stretched along the seat, not touching me now, but close enough that I could feel the heat of him.
Finally, Aaliyah broke the silence.
"Well," she said, "that was deeply horrifying. But your speech? Beautiful. Threatening. Very European."
I leaned my head back against the seat. "Thank you. I was trying not to commit a felony."
Charles laughed softly.
"You were amazing," he said.
I turned to look at him.
He meant it.
The teasing was gone.
No sarcasm. No easy grin.
Just that same careful honesty from earlier in my room, only deeper now.
Something in my chest pulled tight.
"I was angry," I said.
"You were right," he replied.
Aaliyah looked between us and made a face. "I'm happy for both of you, but if either of you starts confessing feelings in this vehicle, I'm opening the door and rolling into traffic."
I stared at her.
Charles choked on another laugh.
"Noted," he said.
She pointed at him. "Especially you. Your face is doing things."
"My face is always doing things."
"Exactly," she said.
By the time we reached the White House, some of the tightness in my chest had eased.
A little.
Only a little.
Security opened the doors. The familiar bright halls swallowed us again.
Aaliyah paused near the entrance.
"My driver's coming," she said. Then she looked at me. "Text me if you spiral."
"I do not spiral," I said.
She gave me a look.
"Fine," I amended. "If I spiral, I will text you."
"Good." She squeezed my hand once, quick and real, then turned to Charles. "And you. Don't make this worse."
He lifted both hands. "That is a very broad accusation."
"It's also a prediction," she said, and left before he could answer.
Silence settled after that.
The kind that feels less awkward than it should.
Charles and I stood there for a second in the enormous hallway, both suddenly without an audience.
Without Madison.
Without school.
Without music.
Just us.
"Well," he said at last, quieter now, "you kind of destroyed that room."
I looked down at my purse. "That sounds bad when you say it like that."
He stepped a little closer.
"It wasn't bad," he said. "It was…"
He stopped.
I looked up. "What?"
His eyes held mine.
"Hot," he said.
I stared at him.
He stared back.
Then, because apparently the universe enjoys humiliating me, I felt my face go warm.
"Charles," I said carefully, "if you are joking right now, I will become violent."
"I'm not joking."
That was the problem.
The whole stupid, dangerous problem.
He took another half-step closer.
Close enough now that I could see the faint crease in his tie, the tiny scar near his jaw, the way his expression had gone serious in a way I had never seen before.
"You walked into that room," he said softly, "and you took control of it without pretending to be someone else. Do you have any idea how rare that is here?"
My throat felt suddenly dry.
"I was angry," I repeated.
"Still hot."
I let out one disbelieving breath that almost became a laugh.
"This country is ridiculous," I muttered.
His mouth curved.
"So stay ridiculous with us."
Us.
Such a small word.
Such a dangerous one.
For one suspended second, neither of us moved.
Then his hand lifted—slowly, carefully—and brushed one loose curl back from my shoulder.
Very light.
Like he was giving me time to pull away.
I didn't.
I should have.
I didn't.
My pulse was suddenly everywhere.
His eyes dropped, just briefly, to my mouth.
And then—
"Monique?"
We sprang apart so fast it would have been embarrassing if it had not also saved my life.
The First Lady stood at the end of the hallway, elegant even at this hour, one hand resting lightly on the banister.
Her gaze moved from me to Charles and back again.
If she noticed anything, she was gracious enough not to show it.
"I heard you were home," she said warmly. "I just wanted to make sure everything went all right tonight."
Everything.
What a generous word for disaster.
I straightened instantly. "The evening was… eventful."
Charles coughed into his fist.
His mother gave him a look. "That usually means something went wrong."
"In this case," I said, "that would be accurate."
She sighed the sigh of a woman who had definitely raised one difficult child and was now temporarily housing another.
"I thought so," she said. "Come sit with me for a minute, both of you. Before the internet invents a version I hate more than the truth."
Charles muttered, "That is disturbingly specific."
"It is also experience," she replied.
And with that, the night changed shape again.
Because apparently in America, even almost-kisses do not get to remain private for long.
By morning, I would discover two things.
First: the terrace video was everywhere.
Second: someone had taken a picture of Charles and me leaving together.
And this time, the caption was worse.
Much worse.
American boy, indeed.