The Princess and the Pea

The Princess and The Pea

Once upon a time there lived a young man who had very nearly everything in the world.
He wasn’t a Prince but he was extremely rich, courtesy of his family’s large fortune, of which he was the one and only heir.
He was ridiculously handsome; his hair was the colour of spun gold and his eyes a deep forget-me-not blue, his skin a creamy white. He was clever, witty, popular and generally envied by all who saw him.
All in all Yuri Rightman had almost everything, except the only thing he truly wanted; a true love.
Girls threw themselves at him from left, right and centre, that was true, but none were good enough.
His father, Hank Rightman, set him up with eligible maidens from countries far and wide, but though they were rich and beautiful they all ended up having faults.
Some were too vain, spending hours in the bathroom when he really needed to pee.
Some were too loud which meant that their conversations in cafes were often interrupted by elderly gentlemen glaring at them in disapproval.
Some were two-timing, backstabbing and generally just too bitchy.
Some were too shy.
Some were too outgoing.
Some were too talkative and some were just plain boring.
In short, there were simply just too many faults to list.
When he had been only a little boy Yuri’s grandmother had read him the fairy story of ‘The Princess and the Pea’. She had told Yuri, in her crackly parchment voice, that when he grew up he would marry a perfect princess. Just like in the tale. Well he had grown up, and he hadn’t even come close to finding her.
He was tired of asking out girls only to be disappointed and so he decided something drastic was needed.
One winter’s evening, at his father’s country estate; Yuri lit an old gas lamp and ventured up into the attic. The attic was dusty and dirty, a place that not even the mice cared to visit. It was full of useless treasures and old nursery toys. His trusty rocking horse was there, as was his ‘Cowboys and Indians’ costume and his old Sega console.
Yuri rested the lamp on Philippe the rocking horse’s saddle and brushed the dust off of an old antique chest.
The chest was full of old books; Just William, The Famous Five, The Secret Seven and, right at the bottom, a large red and gold book chock full of fairytales. He crawled over to sit closer to the lamp and flipped through until he found the story he wanted.
As he ready, his elegant finger scanning the words quickly, Yuri’s blue eyes opened wide and his mind began to formulate a plan. According to the story, the only way to discover a true princess was to plant a pea under her mattress. If she slept without complaint she was a fake, but if it disturbed her then she was true.
Yuri slammed it shut in joy and ran downstairs to steal a bag of peas from the kitchen.
From then on, whenever he got a girl back to his house and before she nodded off to sleep, he would secretly slip a pea under the mattress. He then proceeded to watch the girl all night, monitoring her breathing, snoring and (if there was any) drooling.
All slept without complaint.
This went on for a good year and a half and by the end of it Yuri was turning twenty-six. His father called him home once more to complain about his only son’s lifestyle and the fact that he had yet to find a wife.
“I was twice divorced and onto the third time lucky by your age boy,” he growled in a fatherly manner.
That night there was a terrible storm. The wind roared, the lightning struck the ground in giant, claw-like flashes and the rain pelted the windows something fierce.
As Yuri sat in front of the fire, a drink of brandy in his tapered fingers, a terrible pounding sounded at the door.
His father looked at him over the top of his newspaper.
“Answer it boy,” he said.
As Yuri rose the pounding began again and he walked through the entrance hallway warily. The butler lingered close by, well aware that answering the door was actually his duty.
As he pulled the great oak door open the sight that greeted him was indeed an unexpected one.
A young girl stood on the porch. Her long brown hair hung in rats tails down her back and she was quite literally soaked to the skin. Big green eyes stared at him pleadingly as she stammered:
“I was out walking and got caught in the storm. I’m from the nearest village but I can’t walk back in this weather. Won’t you please give me shelter for the night?”
Yuri curled his lip at her mention of the village. So she was a poor peasant girl was she? But then he remembered his search for a true princess and the events of the fairytale and a kind of hope flared in his heart.
“Of course,” he said warmly. “Won’t you come in?”
She shivered and followed him into the warmth of the grand house, looking entirely out of place amongst the Baroque carvings and late Renaissance art.
Yuri bid her wait in the upstairs drawing room as he prepared a guest bedroom for her (In fact the only thing he was slip a little green pea under the mattress). When he brought her to the room and gave her an old nightgown to wear and some towels to dry herself with she thanked him profusely in a sweet, lyrical voice. As he looked at her he grew to appreciate her rare, bird-like beauty. She looked dainty and delicate, just the way he had always imagined a princess to look.
That night he could not sleep, he simply sat at the edge of his bed and hoped and prayed. The storm raged until morning and then vanished in the blink of an eye.
In the morning he sat at the breakfast table and did not touch his egg or his bacon.
When she entered the room, looking lovely in the morning sunshine, Yuri almost knocked his chair over in his eagerness to greet her.
“How did you sleep?” he asked.
She smiled and rubbed at the corners of her eyes.
“I did not, the bed was oddly uncomfortable. I swear I am black and blue all over.”
Yuri yelped in delight and swept her up in a tight embrace. Right then and there, without even knowing her name, he asked her to be his wife. Of course she accepted (because who wouldn’t?), and they were married a few months later.
There, that is a real story!