The Rapunzel Dilemma Read online

  Did Ronan see her that way? she wondered. She edged her finger under the dust sheet, tempted to take a quick peek at his painting. Surely it wouldn’t matter, now that their meetings in the tower were a thing of the past. He probably wouldn’t even bother to finish his picture of her – not after the way she’d walked out on him . . .

  She pushed her hand under a corner of the dust sheet.

  ‘Are you sure you want to do that?’ said a voice.

  Lily practically jumped out of her skin and turned to see Ronan coming towards her. ‘Oh, wow!’ she cried, holding her hand to her heart. ‘You scared me half to death!

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘You okay?’

  She nodded, and before he could say another word she blurted out her own apology. ‘About the other night – you – you were right. And I’m sorry.’

  He smiled and she felt most of the tension leave her body.

  ‘I was pretty hard on you,’ he said. ‘But only because I honestly don’t think you have any reason to feel sorry for yourself. These past few nights, listening to you read, you’re good, Lily – really good.’

  ‘Thanks,’ she said, blushing a little. ‘I only wish my teachers agreed with you.’ She looked at him shyly. ‘The fact is, things have always come pretty easily to me and, until I came to the Academy, I don’t think I’d ever really understood what it meant to struggle.’ She met his eyes. ‘You were right when you said I have no call feeling sorry for myself. It’s a struggle for a reason, isn’t it?’

  His face lit up and he nodded. ‘Yeah, but do you get the reason?’

  ‘Because – because if it’s too easy then it’s not worth much, is it?’

  ‘I knew there was a reason why I liked you, Lily D,’ said Ronan.

  Her blush deepened, ‘I like you too, Ron–’

  But she didn’t get any further because Ronan had crossed the room in two strides, grabbed her by the shoulders, and kissed her firmly on the lips.

  It wasn’t a great first kiss, but the second one was better.

  Much, much better.

  They stood locked in each other’s arms, kissing wildly, and it was better than any kiss Lily could ever have imagined.

  Ronan’s mouth was delicious, and she revelled in the feeling of his lips on hers. He tasted like spearmint and chocolate, and when his tongue darted in and out of her mouth she couldn’t suppress a tiny groan of pleasure. Instantly, Ronan pulled her hard against him, his hands tangling in her hair, and kissed her as she’d never been kissed before.

  Lily felt an overwhelming desire to tear off his shirt and feel his skin under her hands, just as another part of her brain screamed, ‘Don’t!’ She ignored the voice and tugged at Ronan’s shirt just as his right hand covered her breast. A vision of the Drake suddenly materialised in her head and she imagined his voice saying, ‘Rules, Lily. I’m offering you a one-term trial . . .’ She closed her mind to it and pulled harder on Ronan’s shirt. It suddenly came free, her elbow hit the easel and she felt it begin to topple.

  ‘Catch it!’ she cried, lunging sideways. But Ronan was faster. He caught the easel and his painting in mid-fall, righted them, and then stood there staring at her, his breath coming in odd, uneven gasps.

  Lily looked at him uncertainly. She suddenly had no idea what to do. Retreat? Launch herself back into his arms? Apologise? Ask him how he felt about her?

  Definitely not that.

  ‘Are you okay?’ asked Ronan.

  ‘I–I’m not sure,’ she replied.

  He came closer and she stepped backwards.

  ‘We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do,’ he said.

  ‘That’s the trouble,’ murmured Lily shyly. ‘I don’t know what I want to do.’

  ‘Then we’ll wait until you do,’ said Ronan, taking her hands in his. ‘Only, I have to warn you that I can’t be responsible for what might happen if we keep kissing like that.’

  ‘So no kissing?’ asked Lily, disappointed.

  ‘Not up here. Not unless you don’t want to stop.’

  Lily felt herself blushing. ‘I – I might want that,’ she whispered. ‘Only – maybe – not yet.’

  ‘So, until then, there’d better be no kissing in the tower.’

  ‘How about downstairs, as we leave?’

  He considered this. ‘Okay,’ he said eventually. ‘I can handle that.’

  CHAPTER 24

  For the next few days, Lily felt as though her life was split into two parts.

  The main part was her Academy life where she went to class, ate, slept and studied as she’d never done before. The Dane had started ramping up their preparations for the play and the rumour was that casting would be finalised the week after their first public critique. That was due on Friday and Lily was determined to be ready for it.

  She spent lunchtimes reading lines with Max and Fatima, who didn’t seem to mind being seen with her, and every other spare minute thinking about character and motive. At the beginning of the week, the Dane had advised each of them to read the play as a whole and then to secretly choose one part on which to focus.

  ‘Naturally, your choice will have no bearing on my casting decision,’ she told them. ‘But I am keen to see how each of you interprets your chosen character on your own.’

  Lily took her words to heart and, taking Ronan’s gift as a good omen, had chosen Puck as her secret role.

  The other part of her life took place in the hours spent in the tower with Ronan. Since they’d kissed, their time together seemed to Lily to have become more magical than ever. It was as if the South Tower was a separate world known only to them and she found herself escaping there a little earlier each day.

  On Thursday she decided to skip dinner and take her script and notebook up to the tower to work on Puck’s ‘Lord, what fools these mortals be’ speech before Ronan arrived. As soon as Mime was over, she practically ran to the locker room to get her things. The corridors were crowded and Lily had to push past people to get to her locker; but the first thing she saw when she got there was another printed note stuck to her locker door.

  With a sinking heart she opened it and read:

  BREAK A LEG.

  BREAK BOTH LEGS.

  Lily grimaced at the unpleasant play on words. Actors were superstitious beings who believed that wishing another actor ‘good luck’ would only ever bring bad luck, which was why they always told each other to ‘break a leg’ before going on stage.

  Lily ripped down the note, shoved it into her pocket and collected her things. She knew the note was just a mean, petty thing, but it made her feel sick.

  As she made her way to the tower she told herself to think of it as a test – a challenge – an opportunity to learn how to internalise emotion. The Dane had talked about that in their last class. She’d explained how a good actor could let an emotion play out in her mind; a great actor felt it in her skin and then made it work for her on stage.

  Lily shook out her hair and marched up the tower stairs. The note was horrible, but she wasn’t going to let it get to her.

  Only, when she got up to the tower room, she found it wasn’t as easy to deal with as she’d hoped.

  The truth was that real life was different from being on stage – in real life she didn’t want to internalise such negative emotion. She tried to forget about the note, but she couldn’t help wondering who might have put it there. She could remember seeing Phoebe and Gemma, Imran, Justin, and Charlotte down one end of the corridor after class, and further along Max and Harry had been discussing the latest Tarantino news with Darcy, Annabel, Mae-Ling and a bunch of other third years.

  Lily couldn’t see why any of them would bother leaving unpleasant notes on her locker. They might not like her, but what did they achieve by being spiteful?

  Unless it was a serious threat. Lily’s heart thudded. Maybe someone really wanted her out of the Academy . . .

  Any hope that she could keep her worries from Ronan proved futile. Within seconds of arrivin
g, he demanded to know what was wrong.

  ‘Nothing,’ she replied, settling herself into position for the painting.

  ‘Tell me,’ said Ronan, lifting her hair forward and turning her head so that the light from the candles fell on her cheek.

  ‘It’s nothing. Really,’ said Lily, pulling her locket free of her hair. ‘Just another stupid note on my locker.’ She pulled it from her pocket and showed him. ‘But anyone could have put it there. There were loads of people milling about.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Ronan, pulling the dust sheet off the easel. ‘So what else is bothering you?’ he asked as he adjusted the canvas and selected a paintbrush.

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Lily.

  ‘I mean that notes and ink stains and stolen jackets are not the whole story. You were unhappy before that.’

  ‘No, I wasn’t!’ she retorted.

  ‘That first day we met, in the lane behind the theatre, you weren’t just upset about this place.’ He waved his hand towards the Academy, but his eyes never left her face. ‘So what’s really going on, Lily?’

  She hunched a shoulder and said, ‘Nothing.’

  His eyebrows snapped together and he slowly shook his head. ‘Lie to yourself if you want to, Lily D,’ he said gravely, ‘or tell me to sod off and mind my own business, but do not ever, ever, lie to me.’

  Lily stared at him, wide-eyed. At last she said, ‘How do I know I can trust you?’

  ‘You don’t,’ he replied. ‘Any more than I know I can trust you.’ He gazed at her, his green eyes unblinking. ‘Anything like this, it’s always a gamble. People let you down more often than not. So it’s a leap of faith for both of us.’

  ‘I would never betray you, Ronan,’ said Lily. ‘I promise.’

  ‘And I know you mean that,’ he replied. ‘But the truth is, you can’t know whether or not you’ll keep that promise until push comes to shove and you’re forced to make a decision you never ever thought you’d have to make.’

  Somehow Lily sensed he was no longer talking about them. She shifted uneasily, feeling like she should make a joke or laugh or do something to lighten the mood. Instead she said slowly, ‘But if I tell you what’s wrong, you’ll probably hate me.’

  ‘I don’t think I could ever hate you, Lily D, but even if I did, so what?’ said Ronan. ‘It’s not the end of the world if someone disagrees or disapproves or even dislikes you. So long as you’re being honest.’

  ‘Do you really believe that?’ demanded Lily.

  ‘I do,’ he replied. ‘So why don’t you try your confession out on me and see what happens? I promise I won’t hate you.’ He put down his brush, repositioned his chair so that he was sitting opposite her, pulled a piece of wood and a penknife from his pocket and began to carve. ‘So tell me,’ he said gently.

  ‘Okay,’ said Lily slowly, ‘I’ve thought a lot about what you said the other night. You know, about me complaining and feeling sorry for myself. And I figured out that one of my main problems is – and this is going to sound really stupid – is that my whole life, I’ve had it easy.’ She curled a strand of hair unconsciously around her index finger and said, ‘I suppose it’s because I’ve always had everything.’

  ‘Really?’ said Ronan, startled. ‘You mean, everything? As in, you’ve never gone without anything?’

  Lily thought for a moment, ‘Well, not any of the obvious things, like food or shelter or clothes or money. And I’ve always had friends and a loving family, although . . .’ Her face grew sombre. ‘Although I did grow up without my mother.’

  ‘That’s hard.’

  ‘I guess. Though I don’t remember her all that well ’cause she died when I was five. My dad and I have always been close, so when Mum died I think he just filled in the empty spaces so I wouldn’t miss her so much.’ She thought for a moment. ‘He did a great job. I guess that’s why I don’t feel like I’ve missed out.’

  ‘So no real adversity, then?’ asked Ronan.

  Lily shook her head. ‘Leaving out the past few months, nothing springs to mind.’

  ‘A good life?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘And so . . . the thing that’s really bothering you and that’s probably going to make me hate you is . . .’

  Lily laughed awkwardly. ‘Okay, I don’t really expect you to hate me, but you might not like me once you know how spoilt and selfish I am.’

  He smiled and blew away a tiny wood chip. ‘So spill.’

  ‘Ever since Mum died it’s always been just Dad and me.’ She drew a deep breath ‘Until last summer.’

  ‘What happened last summer?’

  ‘He got married again. Simone was our housekeeper and she and Angel came to live downstairs, and they –’

  ‘Oh, I get it,’ cut in Ronan, looking up from his carving. ‘It’s an upstairs/downstairs thing. You’re upset that your dad has married the hired help.’

  ‘I am not!’ said Lily, incensed. ‘It’s not like that – it’s never been like that. I love Angel and Simone!’

  ‘Sure, and that’s why you’re so ecstatic that you’re all one big happy family now.’

  ‘That’s right, I am happy.’

  ‘Except you’re not.’

  ‘That’s because . . .’ Lily’s voice trailed away.

  ‘Because?’

  ‘Because . . . Dad is much harder on me than he is on Angel!’ she cried.

  Ronan looked at her sceptically. ‘You sure about that?’

  ‘Yes! And I know I shouldn’t feel that way and that – I–I’m a terrible person!’

  He put down his carving things and came over to the window seat. ‘You’re not a terrible person,’ he said, sitting beside her and taking her hand. ‘Tell me what’s wrong.’

  Lily hesitated and then the words came tumbling out. ‘My dad doesn’t want me to be an actor. He says there’s no future in it. So when I turn twenty-one I have to give up the theatre and follow him into the family business.’

  ‘Ouch,’ said Ronan. ‘That bites.’

  She looked at him in wonder. ‘You get it?’

  ‘Sure I do. You want to pursue your passion, but your dad has other ideas.’

  It was as if his understanding had opened a floodgate.

  ‘But it’s not just that,’ said Lily. ‘You see, my dad was in love with Simone for years before he met my mum, but things went wrong and he lost her. He didn’t know she was pregnant when they broke up, so it was so lucky that he and Simone found each other again and decided to get married. And I’d always wanted Angel for a sister, so I was rapt. We even got to be bridesmaids. But then, at the wedding, the best man got up to toast the bridesmaids and said: “To Philip and Simone’s lovely daughter, Angel.” And that’s when it hit me.’

  ‘What? What hit you?’ asked Ronan, his eyes never leaving her face.

  ‘That Angel is six months older than me, so she’s actually the heir and I’m the spare. And yet after the wedding Dad told me I had to give up the theatre and learn the business instead. And when I asked him, “What about Angel?” he said . . .’ Lily broke off.

  ‘He said . . .’ prompted Ronan gently.

  She wiped away a tear. ‘He said that he couldn’t ask Angel to give up her passion and that it wasn’t fair to make her sacrifice her dream –’ Lily choked.

  ‘But it was okay to ask you to sacrifice yours?’ queried Ronan.

  She nodded.

  ‘Did you ask him about it?’

  ‘That’s the whole problem. When I told him it wasn’t fair, he said I’d have to choose.’

  ‘You mean choose who’ll go into the business?’

  ‘Yes. And I’m not allowed to tell Angel anything, because . . . because . . .’ Lily couldn’t meet his eyes.

  ‘Because if she knew, she’d volunteer to take your place. Is that it?’

  ‘I told you you’d hate me.’

  ‘I don’t hate you. You’re in a tough spot, and I can understand your feelings, but it’s just not a big enough problem to ca
use so much trouble.’

  Lily stared. ‘It’s not?’

  He pulled a face. ‘To be brutally honest, I don’t think you know what real trouble is.’ He reached out and ran his fingers through Lily’s hair. ‘In fact, I reckon you’re like that princess in the tower – Rapunzel. She even had really long hair like yours,’ he added teasingly.

  ‘I’m not like her!’ retorted Lily.

  ‘Well, what about the handsome prince who comes to rescue her?’ asked Ronan, his eyes twinkling.

  ‘And that would be you, I suppose,’ said Lily.

  ‘You said it, not me,’ he replied, laughing.

  ‘So you think I need rescuing?’ she demanded.

  Ronan met her gaze. ‘Put it this way, I think you’ve always had someone to smooth your path, make things easy and take the hardship out of life. So, when you get your first taste of real adversity, it’s a huge struggle for you.’ He curled her hair around his fingers. ‘So, yeah, I think you probably need rescuing.’

  Incensed, Lily pushed his fingers away and got up to face him, her hands on her hips. ‘Okay, so other people would kill for my dad’s ultimatum being their only problem, but in the meantime I got into the Academy and I have to make it here, don’t I? Do it on my own and take whatever people dish out! So I study hard, I work in every class, I listen, I learn and I accept every bit of ruthless criticism that’s thrown at me. Even when I get blamed for things I didn’t do and someone puts horrible notes on my locker, I just ignore all that and keep going. I’ve pushed through everything I –’

  ‘– almost everything,’ finished Ronan. His eyes glinted. ‘And that’s good. After all, there’s nothing wrong with relying on yourself, is there?’

  Lily stared at him in silence for a moment and then she said, ‘What do you mean, “almost everything”? Exactly what haven’t I dealt with?’

  ‘You said that you got into the Academy.’

  ‘That’s right, I did.’

  ‘Okay, but –’ He looked at her sceptically, ‘Tell me, exactly how did you get into the Academy?’

  She stared at him, ‘I – I auditioned.’

  ‘Just like that? You applied and they offered you an audition?’