“Finally!” Stella cried when she saw Alix walk in the door. She was lounging on the couch in her bedroom, a disorderly pile of discarded magazines on the floor next to her.

“What do you mean finally?” Alix shot back, hands on her hips. “I’m not the one who’s been busy hooking up with a prince all summer. I’ve been here since May.”

Alix tried to keep her face serious, but broke into a smile seconds later at Stella’s failed attempt at an outraged expression.

“Come on, we’ll be late for the movie,” Alix said, and turned to head right back out the door. “I am sorry that I was late. The traffic getting through the city center was bad.”

They’d been trying for weeks to pick out a day to go out together, and Stella kept canceling because Anton wanted to see her. It had annoyed Alix at first, but Stella was so clearly ecstatic about how things were going with him. It was hard to be mad at your best friend when she was practically glowing. Besides, they’d been texting nonstop since she’d been back in the country. Still, nothing beat a night out to talk in person.

“It’s a shame your parents’ apartment is being renovated,” Stella said, grabbing her bag from her bed and following Alix out into the hall. “We would have been neighbors again! For the first time since we were like, three.”

“That would have been nice,” Alix agreed, as they made their way through the lush, carpeted halls of the Erimere apartment in the quiet Schufalter district of the city. The rooms she had in the palace had everything she needed, and more, but she was always very aware that it wasn’t hers. She hadn’t wanted to bring too much stuff with her and look like she was settling in.

“Is it weird being at the palace full-time?” Stella asked, reading her thoughts.

Alix nodded. They were out in the street now, walking arm in arm towards the small, family-run cinema that she had loved for years. It was always the highlight of her trips to Prynesse, with their special caramel popcorn and frothy hot chocolates. Only those that lived in this district tended to frequent it; it was too far from the city center and too old-fashioned to be of any interest to most of Stella’s typical crowd. She felt a relief at being so far from the busy center and the crowds, and a joy that only comes from being in old jeans and sneakers after a long day in heels and a pencil skirt.

“Still, it must be nice having Duncan down the hall.” Stella waggled her eyebrows suggestively. Alix blushed. “His rooms must be pretty nice.”

“He’s on the complete opposite side of the building, you know that. And besides, I haven’t been to his rooms.”

“Yet,” said Stella, echoing her thoughts once again.

Alix tried to hold back a smile.

“Did Anton invite you to Helena’s birthday party this weekend?” Alix asked.

Stella nodded.

“I’m surprised you said you’d go with him, after how mad you were when we left the gala the other night,” Stella said.

“Well, he did come to apologize in person,” she said. “Which is not something all guys will do. And he said this would be a smaller event, so I’ll be able to talk to him a bit more.”

“I thought you weren’t interested in talking,” Stella waggled her eyebrows again. Alix laughed this time.

“I’m not, but that doesn’t mean I want to waste time this summer with someone boring and awful. He seems like he might be pretty nice.”

“Hmmm.”

“What?” Alix stopped and turned to look at her. “Did Anton tell you something? Is Duncan really as big a jerk as his reputation makes him out to be?” Stella had kept her abreast of the goings on at the palace for years. But she’d never told her much about Duncan beyond what most people said about him – he was never serious about anyone and just wanted to have fun. Her focus had always been Anton, who was much more interesting fodder for the gossip mills.

“Please, I have more important things to do with Anton than talk about his brother,” Stella grinned widely.

Alix laughed again. It was so great to be going out just the two of them.

“Um, when you’re taking a break from ravishing each other,” Alix started. Stella smiled. “Do you usually talk in Prynessian?” Alix blushed. With Stella, she’d always communicated in a mix of French and English, with smatterings of Prynessian thrown in, mostly when their respective grandparents were around.

“Are you seriously still worried about that bitch Christiana?” Stella said. “Who cares if your Prynessian isn’t perfect? Your French is eight thousand times better than hers. She sounds like a backwards hick. You sound like you’re from Paris.”

This is exactly what Alix needed to hear, and squeezed Stella’s arm in gratitude. She really did understand it quite well, she just didn’t speak it that easily. It was coming back, however, the longer she was in the country. And no one had ever made a comment or anything like that. Still, she was hoping her Refugee Medical Alliance internship would be in a French or English speaking country, rather than somewhere where she didn’t know the language. She didn’t like the feeling of not being very good at something everyone expected her to know.

“So, what are you wearing to the party?” Stella asked, drawing her thoughts back to Duncan.

“Something that’ll make him speechless in all three languages,” Alix grinned.

They continued to talk clothes and boys as they walked into the cinema right up until the trailers started rolling. They could have continued the conversation – they were the only ones at the cinema on such a nice summer evening. But as they sat in the darkened room watching the film, Alix thought how nice it was to be with a friend who you didn’t have to say a word to– just being together made everything seem better.