The Non British Princess

Part 16

I sat in the day room with Stella, a girl who despite being on the shorter side of the girls in the selection, had one of the biggest personalities.
"I'm from Manchester, in the Northeast of England." Stella explained, tucking strands of her short brown hair behind her ear.

"That's awesome. I'm from Melbourne, Australia." I say and Stella nods, slipping off her shoes and pulling her legs up onto the couch to be more comfortable.

"I could tell by the accent." Stella says knowingly.

"Of course." I roll my eyes with a smile and Stella giggles to me.
The midday sun shines through the windows across half of the room and most girls are relaxing and chatting with others.

Harriet arrives back from her date after a while and sits down on a couch across the room with Remy and Yasmin.
They start chatting away as I see Harriet starts talking about her date, her arms moving about as she discusses things.
I go back to talking with Stella and she starts to tell me about her family.

"You what?!"

Everyone turned to Yasmin who had bursted out loudly, looking shocked at Harriet.
Harriet looked embarrassed and flushed red.

"I cannot believe you, kissing him already." Indiana said, getting up and leaving the room with a unhappy frown etched on her features.

The room goes silent and all the girls turn their attention to Harriet.

I stand and move over to where she's sitting so I can hear more of what's going on.

"You've kissed him already? Is that true?" I ask, a little surprised. We'd all only just met the guy and after one day he's already locking lips.

Harriet flushes, clearly embarrassed by the attention on her about this.

"Yeah. We kissed."

I'm quite surprised, not knowing how to respond. It's weird to think I had been on a date with him the night before and this morning he's already up and kissing other girls.

Harriet still seems embarrassed and uncomfortable with so many eyes on her so I take her hand, "Come on, let's go somewhere quieter to talk."

She nods, seemingly relieved so we get up.

Yasmin stops us, looking to Harriet apologetically, "Hey, I'm sorry I didn't mean to blurt that out. I was just surprised."

Harriet gives her a smile, "It's fine."

Then we continue out of the room and walk hand in hand.

As soon as we're away from people I start questioning her, "I want to know everything. What did you guys do? How did it happen? Was it Good?"

Harriet laughs, "Well he just took me on a walk around the grounds. It was so lovely. Then we had a private breakfast together in this pretty tea room."

"Sounds romantic." I comment.

Compared to me falling asleep on him during a movie, a quiet breakfast sounds pleasant. I can imagine it's a lovely setting for a kiss.

"I guess it was. And he was being so nice."

I grab onto her arm, pausing our walk down the corridor, "So, did he kiss you or did you kiss him?"

Harriet blushes, "I kissed him."

"Was it good then?"

"Yes I suppose." She says with a nod, "I haven't had many kisses before though to compare it to."

"Well you should be happy. You got his first kiss." I say, wanting to be happy for her, even though I'm a little disappointed.

And she beams, her cheeks still rosy.

And I couldn't do anything but be happy for her.

✿✿✿

"I'm glad you invited me on this ride Isabelle. I used your note as an excuse to get away from Lexi actually. She was blabbering on and on about herself, it's annoying."

I give Hadley a grin as I saddle up the black mare I had chosen to ride.
Hadley chose a brown warmblood, and was taking her time as she stroked its mane.

"I'm glad I could be of help. And from what I've seen so far, Lexi does seem rather obnoxious." I say and Hadley laughs out loud.

"I would agree."

I hook my foot in the stirrup and pulled myself up and into the saddle of the horse.

"You done this before or something? I know a good rider when I see her." Hadley asks, getting up effortlessly onto her own horse.

"Once or twice." I say with a shrug and Hadley gives me an impressed look.

Hadley had her orange hair tied back in a ponytail under her helmet, and the afternoon sun beams shone over her face enhancing the details of her freckles.

We move our horses away from the stable area and out across the oval. I adjust to the saddle and stroke the horses neck softly.

"So what prompted this little rendezvous? I didn't think you liked me much to be honest with you." Hadley said, turning in her saddle to face me.

I give her a half smile, "I may not have made the right impression then." I give her a smirk, "I think we could be friends."

I pull my camera from my satchel that was sling over my shoulder that also had my phone inside.

"You and your photos." Hadley says and smiles as I click a picture of the two of us on our ride.
"It's for my photo wall, I'll invite you over sometime to check it out." I give her a smile and she raises an eyebrow at me.

She nods, seeming intrigued by me. I suppose I had a few tricks up my sleeves. I could ride a horse fairly well, wasn't bad at archery and knew a thing or two about technology.

"I nearly forgot, I brought snacks."

Hadley smiles widely as I pull a stash of food from my bag.

I see she was warming up to the friend idea.