The Prince's Secret Files
[Jay's POV]
If breakfast was a healing sanctuary, lunch was a battlefield of pure, unadulterated embarrassment.
We were gathered in the light-filled dining patio, the scent of grilled seafood and lemon butter hanging in the air. I felt lighter than I had in years. The weight of calling Serina and Keizer "Mamma" and "Pappa" had settled into my heart like a warm anchor.
But apparently, being part of the family meant I was now privy to the "Classified Watson Archives."
"Pappa, please," Keifer groaned, burying his face in his hands as Keizer—no, Pappa—leaned back in his chair with a mischievous glint in his eyes.
"Oh, come now, Keifer," Pappa said, winking at me. "Jay is a scientist. She values data. And the data regarding your sixth birthday party is historically significant."
I leaned forward, propping my chin on my hands, a playful smile dancing on my lips. "Data is very important, Pappa. What happened at the sixth birthday party?"
"Jay, don't encourage him," Keifer muttered, his ears turning a spectacular shade of crimson.
It was a superhero-themed party," Mamma chimed in, practically vibrating with excitement. She pulled out her phone and started scrolling through a cloud drive. "Keifer was obsessed with being the 'Strongest Man in the World.' He insisted on wearing a cape made of one of my silk scarves and—this is the best part—he tried to 'rescue' the family cat from the top of the bookshelf."
"I was a hero in training," Keifer defended, though he looked like he wanted the patio to swallow him whole.
"He got his cape caught in the ceiling fan," Pappa added, laughing so hard he had to set his fork down. "We found him dangling three feet off the ground, spinning slowly in circles, shouting that he was 'patrolling the perimeter.' He didn't even want us to take him down. He said he was 'monitoring the situation' from above."
I burst out laughing, the image of a tiny, caped Keifer spinning like a human ceiling fan playing in my head. "The 'Chill Prince' was a spinning superhero? I need to see the footage."
"I have the video right here!" Mamma chirped, sliding her phone across the table toward me.
"Mamma! Privacy laws!" Keifer reached for the phone, but I was faster. I snatched it up, giggling as I watched a grainy video of a tiny Keifer with messy hair, looking very serious while suspended by a designer scarf.
Wait, there's more," Pappa said, leaning in. "Did he tell you about the time he tried to 'optimize' the pool's pH balance when he was ten? He'd been reading a chemistry textbook and decided the pool guy was doing it wrong."
"I was just trying to help," Keifer sighed, though he was starting to crack a smile.
"He accidentally turned the water neon purple," Mamma whispered loudly. "The entire Watson estate looked like it was hosting a rave for three days. His father had a board meeting that afternoon, and Keifer tried to convince him that 'Purple is the color of royalty, so it's actually a brand upgrade'."
I looked at Keifer, who was now leaning back, watching me laugh with a look of soft resignation. The boy who was the top of his class, the boy who stared down my father without blinking, was once a kid who turned pools purple and got stuck in fans.
It made him real. It made him mine.
"You know," I said, wiping a tear of laughter from my eye. "I think I prefer the 'Purple Pool' Keifer to the 'Perfect Watson' Keifer."
"Careful, Jay," Keifer teased, finally regaining his composure. "If we're sharing embarrassing stories, I'm sure Rory has a few folders on you from the university forums."
"Rory knows nothing," I countered. "But I have a feeling Mamma has enough material on you to last the full two weeks."
"Oh, I have the 'First High School Dance' files," Mamma said, winking. "And the 'Keifer Tries to Bake a Cake' incident of 2021. The kitchen was declared a hazardous waste zone for forty-eight hours."
Lunch continued like that—a chaotic, beautiful mess of stories and laughter. For every story they told, I felt a piece of my own rigid, Mariano-enforced shell falling away. In my house, a mistake was a sin. In this house, a mistake was a story to be told over lunch.
"You're very quiet, Jay," Pappa said gently, noticing the way I was watching them.
"I'm just... I'm just taking notes," I said, my voice softening. "I never realized that being a family meant you got to be a little bit ridiculous together."
Keifer reached under the table, finding my hand and squeezing it. "It's the most important part of the curriculum, Jay. Ridiculousness 101."
As the afternoon sun began to dip, Mamma leaned over and kissed my cheek. "We're so glad you're here to help us tease him, Jay. He's had it too easy for too long."
"I'm happy to be of service," I laughed.
As we walked back toward the library to start our first real study session, Keifer pulled me aside into the shadows of the hallway. He pinned me gently against the wall, his hands resting on either side of my head.
"So," he whispered, his eyes dark with playfulness. "Now that you know my deepest, darkest secrets... do I still have a chance at that kiss, or am I just the 'spinning cape boy' to you now?"
My heart did a triple-flip. I reached up, my fingers brushing the hair away from his forehead. "Well... the spinning was actually quite impressive. Very aerodynamic."
He leaned in, his breath hitching as he closed the gap. "You're a brat, Jasper Jean."
"But I'm your brat," I whispered.
The world went silent. The chaos of lunch was gone, replaced by the electric hum of the two of us. We were so close I could see the gold flecks in his eyes.
But just as he started to tilt his head—
Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.
My phone, tucked in my pocket, went off like a siren.
"I am going to throw that phone into the purple pool," Keifer groaned against my forehead.
I pulled it out, breathless. It was the group chat. All ten of them.
[VIDEO CALL INCOMING: THE SQUAD
"We have to answer," I laughed, pushing him back gently. "If we don't, Rory will think we're dead and call the police."
"Fine," Keifer sighed, grabbing my hand and leading me toward the sofa. "But tell them I'm charging them an 'interruption fee' in the next Game Theory lab."
I swiped the screen, and suddenly, ten faces exploded onto the display, all of them shouting at once. But the moment they saw me—dressed in silk, glowing with laughter, sitting in the Watson mansion—they went silent.
"Wait," Freya whispered. "Jay? You look... happy. Like, 'actually-sleeping-eight-hours' happy."
"I am," I said, leaning my head on Keifer's shoulder as Mamma and Pappa walked by in the background, waving at the camera. "I'm home."