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the-wales-5 · 5 months

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"Scene of the crime" ;)

21st November 2023.

William and Catherine were getting ready to leave for a meeting with the President & First Lady of the Republic of Korea.

The prince of Wales approached his wife and said “You look stunning today, especially in this red coat”, then he proceeded to kiss her on the lips.

"Thank you" Catherine said and smiled a little bit "But please stop with these comments now, we're getting late" she added.

William shook head and hugged her from behind. But Catherine was annoyed. She tried not to show it and sighed, but William could feel that she was frustrated so he asked: "What's going on?"

"I already told you that we're getting late" Catherine replied and rolled her eyes a little.

"No, we're not really late. There's still half an hour left for us to leave",William said and again wanted to kiss her but she rejected it once more and sighed as she looked at her reflection in the mirror.

"We'll get late. Are you ready now?",William asked after a few minutes

"Oh, all of a sudden you are worried about us getting late" she shouted, then scoffed and left the room.

“I just wanted to kiss you but you're acting like a teenager” William said when they were in the car a few minutes later.

“Just one kiss would turn to something more within seconds and I don't like that when we're about to attend an engagement, you know?” Catherine scoffed

“Recently you are annoyed about everything I see” William rolled his eyes

“What do you mean?” Catherine asked louder

“Absolutely nothing” he said and ignored her.

10 minutes later, Catherine left the car and her pictures made the whole royal side of social media blow. Fans were amazed by one of the pictures and by her outfit too.

But the Princess was far from being happy. She quickly curtsied to the king and then stood next to her husband during the horse guard parade.

He quickly understood his mistake and tried to make her smile by talking to her. Kate hardly tried to ignore it and was not paying attention to William nor his words. Yet, she almost smiled at one point.

He leaned close to her and whispered

“You're smiling, Mrs Wales”.

At last, she turned her head to him and smiled once again. Now it was more visible, but after a second, she looked in front of herself again.

Soon, they were at Buckingham Palace to see the exhibition. It was supposed to begin in the next ten minutes. All of a sudden, Catherine's husband took her hand into his and pulled her toward a quiet and dark corner of the room.

“Forgive me” he said then.

"I already did. By the way, what are you doing? I need to fix my hair now because I don't want to wear this hat inside. And the exhibition starts soon. We can talk later, William" she said.

He looked into her eyes and slowly took off her hat, letting her gorgeous brown hair scattered across her back.

Catherine giggled a little "What are you doing?"

"You said you wanted to take this hat off, right? I helped you” William said.

Kate pretended to be annoyed but he pulled her even closer "It's an official apology.. I am really sorry for annoying you earlier. Please, say we're okay now" he whispered.

Catherine was looking into his eyes for a few seconds. Then she whispered "Yes, I think we are okay now”

William smiled and gently pressed his lips on hers "And let me just repeat, you're stunning today. You always are!" he whispered.

Catherine caressed his cheek "Thank you.. I am sorry for shouting at you" she said.

“Don't be sorry, my wife” William whispered and fixed her hair a little.

One of Buckingham Palace aides cleared his throat “Sir, Ma'am. The exhibition starts soon”.

William put his hand on her back and asked “Ready?”. She nodded and put her hand on his lower back.

During the exhibition, they were caught on camera putting hands on one another's back, at one moment they even wanted to hold hands but then remembered they were on duties and quickly took apart and giggled.

“Thank god, we're going back home soon” William murmured

“What is on your mind, Mr Wales?” Catherine smirked but he didn't reply, decided to tease her and 'ignore' her just like she did at the parade earlier.

On the way home in the car, they were caressing one another's hand. Words were unnecessary between them.

As soon as they reached the house, they did not wait even for a second before closing the door. When she noticed that William wanted to say something, Catherine teased him “Don't talk now. You wanted to kiss me, remember?”

William looked at her and smirked a little before passionately pressing his lips on hers and taking off her red coat at the same time.

Catherine was smiling between those kisses.

"How much time we've got until you have to start preparing?" William asked her in a whisper

"A little bit more than 2 hours I think but you know that our children can come here” Catherine said. William locked the door and replied “It's not possible anymore, babe”.

He kissed her under her ear and Kate trembled as she said “It is insane”

“What is insane?” He asked and continued to kiss her

“I'm already not okay after your kisses” she said and tightly closed her eyes.

William chuckled, then lifted her up in his arms and laid her down on the bed.

Catherine smiled at him a little and said “You're wearing too many clothes”

“And you are allowed to take them off” William smirked

His wife took his suit and tie off and then said “Your shirt.. Can I take it off too?”

“Of course, my wife”

“Tear it?” She smirked as she remembered their honeymoon phase in 2011

“You can do everything you want to me now, Catherine Elizabeth. I'm yours” William whispered and kissed her on the lips again.

She smiled lovingly but her facial expression changed to a smirk as she tore his white shirt. Seconds later she pretended to be innocent as she said “I am sorry. I'll have to buy you a new one for Christmas”.

“I don't mind that” William smirked before kissing her on her neck. Catherine gasped and tried to control her breath but it was becoming heavier with each one of the kisses he placed on her skin.

“You are.. insane now” she managed to say and trembled for the thousandth time.

“It is your fault, Mrs Wales. I have been waiting for this moment since I saw you in this” he said and then slowly took off the red dress she was wearing under her coat early in the day “You looked so beautiful and I couldn't resist but wanted to kiss you”.

Catherine was smiling as she tried to focus on listening to his words. She blushed when she heard him say “I barely controlled myself from kissing you earlier at the parade today after noticing your sweet little smile”

“I would reject you. I was angry” Catherine said and winked, then she was finally able to press her lips on his. William cupped her face in his hands and whispered as he looked into her green eyes:

“Don't get angry at me anymore. I can't function properly when you are annoyed toward me, you know?”.

Catherine nodded and kissed him again, this time on his neck too. William deepened another of his lip kisses and then proceeded to kiss both of her flushed cheeks, down her chin, throat and neck again. Within time those kisses turned into little bites.

Catherine's eyes widened and she whispered his name breathlessly.

“Hsshh..” William shushed her with a soft kiss on her forehead and looked into her eyes for a second. He kept kissing her, leaving marks all over her neck and rest of her body. She could not say anything and did not want to.

Both of them were completely lost in one another at that moment and the rest of the two hours they had were spent on making love and telling sweet nothings to each other.

“We should get up now and start to prepare for the banquet” Catherine whispered as she caressed her husband’s back.

“I'd rather stay here and continue what we were doing, you know?” He smirked

“We have a reception to attend, my silly William” she said and laughed a little “We can continue that later tonight”.

Then, she wore one of his shirts and sat down in front of the mirror. Next thing he heard was her sigh full of annoyance and her words:

“Look what you've done to my neck, Mr Wales”

“And who's done this to my neck and chest, Mrs Wales?” William pointed at himself and smirked again.

Catherine closed her eyes and tried not to laugh. “I hope I can cover these marks you left on me with make-up” she said and pretended to feel angry.

William kissed her on the forehead and then went to take a quick shower. Catherine looked at the ceiling and sighed happily. “This is unbelievable that we're still in a honeymoon phase sometimes” she whispered and tried not to blush

“Would you like to join?” William asked from the bathroom

“NOO!” Catherine said and laughed “Hurry up, I have to take a shower too!” .

Within the next 20 minutes, Catherine finished her shower time as well and sighed as she looked at herself in the mirror “My hair's a mess right now”.

“May I help you to fix it somehow?” William asked and caressed her shoulder “You know, I help you with your hair often”

“Yes, but only at home”

“Not only there, remember the time before our wedding reception?”

“It was a simple blow dry”

“Come on, it doesn't mean I can't do anything more” he said and took her comb and hair dryer in his hand “Let us try it”.

Catherine smiled a little and again looked at love bites on her neck.

“I wonder how much make-up will I have to put here” she wondered

“It's not my fault” William said innocently and chuckled a little “I am afraid you won't be able to hide it completely” he teased her

“Don't say that!” Catherine sighed “What if they see it?” She blushed then

“You should not be worried about that” William replied

“You don't know what you are saying because your marks will not be seen in pictures” she blushed again.

William chuckled softly and kissed her on the forehead “I am sure you will cover them perfectly. Don't worry. Are you planning to do an updo tonight?I was thinking about an half up and half down just like you did for our wedding”

"It's a perfect idea. And I think it will fit the tiara I want to wear tonight" Catherine said and looked at her husband

"Your wedding one?" William laughed

"No, my wedding one is too significant to wear again" Catherine smiled

"Cambridge Lover's Knot again?” William asked and rolled his eyes a little “Or else the Lotus, right?” He said

"No, something new for me this time" Catherine smiled a little "The Strathmore tiara”

"The Strathmore?” William was quite shocked “Pa gave you the Strathmore? Is it repaired now? It hasn't seen light for like 100 years!”

"Yes but it's beautiful and I can't wait to wear it" Catherine said

"You will look drop dead gorgeous with it" William said and smiled “Let's try make your hair perfect for it”

"Okay" Catherine smiled and tried not to blush again. She was relaxed now and completely forgot about that pointless fight with William.

The Prince of Wales was not skilled at hairdressing but he did the draft very well and Catherine was impressed.

"Do you like it?" He asked after seeing a little smile on her face

"Yes, it reminds me of my wedding hair a little bit. Thank you" she said.

"You're welcome, but I think Natalie will have to fix it a bit and then you'll be perfect to go" William said and kissed her on hand “I'll wait downstairs” he added. Catherine smiled at his way and called Natalie to help her.

They were in the car a few minutes later on the way to Buckingham Palace. William was looking at his wife almost all the time, feeling mesmerised by her beauty. Catherine knew about looks he was sending her and squeezed his hand a few times throughout the way. Before they arrived in front of the palace, the princess checked herself in the mirror and said quietly “Oh no.. Why didn't I notice it earlier? It is too late now to fix it”

“What?” William asked as he looked at her

Catherine did not reply but pointed at her neck and sighed.

“It is not that dark or visible if one would not look too closely” William said

“I should have noticed it before” Kate closed her eyes, feeling embarrassed and angry too.

“They will not notice it, Catherine”

“How can you be so sure?” she sighed “It is rather easy to see it, especially with the cameras nowadays, you know?” she scoffed

“Stop worrying, please. Everything will be okay”

Catherine rolled her eyes a little and then sighed "Well.. I hope you are right because now I can't fix it anymore”

"I am right. Let's get inside now" William whispered and gently kissed her on cheek before leaving the car.

They were photographed at the door and those photos went viral on social media. Eagle-eyed followers noticed a bite mark on Catherine's neck.

William's wife was smiling, but in the back of her mind, she still had these thoughts full of annoyance at herself. However, she started to feel more relaxed when Princess Anne approached her.

"Someone's left a mark of his crime!" Anne teased Catherine at some point of their conversation. Kate didn't know what to say, she just blushed a little and then looked away.

Anne chuckled and looked at William who mouthed from afar: "Is everything alright?”.

"Yes" Catherine mouthed too and then chuckled. She looked at Anne and said "You should tease him, not me”

"He's tensed enough already" Anne said and laughed a little,"I didn't want to embarrass him even more”

"But you had to embarrass me, yes?" Catherine rolled her eyes a little but then laughed too.

"You are my favourite, you know that” Anne said and winked.

They continued their talk, and Catherine finally could feel relaxed.

When the banquet ended and they were in the car, William asked his wife about her conversation with his aunt.

"Among other things, we talked about a love bite, thanks to you" Catherine replied and rolled her eyes a little.

William sighed and said "I thought nobody would notice"

"Your aunt has an eagle eye, unfortunately," Catherine replied

"I'm sorry, Kate..” William whispered.

Catherine looked at him and smiled a little."Why are you being sorry? It's not anything serious, Wills” she said quietly.

"But she embarrassed you" William said

"She is my family and one of the best people for us at the moment, and she made me laugh anyway, so I don't see a problem" Catherine said quietly and smiled.

“So, you are okay?”

Catherine nodded and caressed his cheek,"I haven't been happier like today for a long time" she whispered and placed her head on his shoulder as hugging his arm "Kiss my forehead now” she whispered again.

William smiled at her lovingly, then gently kissed her on the forehead and told her that he loved her. The night outside the car window was a beautiful one, but for Catherine's husband, she was the most important at that particular moment.

The end ♡

#royal fanfiction #2023 #scene of the crime #:)#state visit #buckingham palace #prince of wales #princess of wales #william and catherine #kate x william #🔥#❤️#stories #text post #tags #christmas gift #christmas 🎄#christmas 2023

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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 year

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Alissa Quart's 'Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream'

Steinbeck never said that Americans see themselves as “temporarily embarrassed millionaires,” but that misquotation is so pervasive because it captures something vital about one version of the American Dream, the idea that anyone can make it in America by pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, which means that if you haven’t made it, it’s because of some defect within you, and not because of a rigged system:

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Steinbeck#Disputed

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/10/declaration-of-interdependence/#solidarity-forever

In Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream, Alissa Quart — director of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project — addresses the meritocratic delusion of the “self-made man,” the story that, in America, the rich are good, and therefore the good are rich, and therefore the dwindling slice of the pie shared among everyone else is no more than they deserve:

https://www.harpercollins.com/products/bootstrapped-alissa-quart?variant=40517189599266

Quart’s book braids together four strands: a factual account of the reality of social mobility in America; a kind of psychoanalysis of what the myth of being self-made does to your mind; a power analysis of how the self-made brainworm benefits the rich and powerful, and a program for breaking free of the stultifying grip of a belief in the self-made.

Start with the factual: America is not a bootstrap-friendly land. If you have money in America, chances very good are you inherited it. Gone is the culture of “shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations,” where “the first generation makes it, the second generation spends it, and the third generation loses it.”

Instead — as Abigail Disney has described, in a rare glimpse behind the scenes of American oligarchs’ “family offices,” American wealth is now dynastic*, perpetuating itself and growing thanks to a whole Versailles’ worth of courtiers: money managers, lawyers, and overpaid babysitters who can keep even the most Habsburg jawed nepobaby in turnip-sized million-dollar watches and performance automobiles and organ replacements for their whole, interminable lives:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/19/dynastic-wealth/#caste

But it’s not just that the America rich stay rich — it’s that the American poor stay poor. America is a world-trailing loser in the international social mobility league-table. If you change classes in America, chances are you’re a middle class person becoming poor, thanks to medical costs or another of the American debt-traps; or you’re a poor person who is becoming a homeless person thanks to America’s world-beating eviction mills:

https://evictionlab.org/

As a factual matter, America just isn’t the land of bootstraps; it’s a land of hereditary aristocrats. Sustaining the American narrative of meritocracy requires a whole culture industry, novels and later movies that constitute a kind of state religion for Americans — and like all religious tales, the American faith tradition is riddled with gaps and contradictions.

Take Horatio Alger, the 19th century American writer whose name is synonymous with rags-to-riches thanks to the enormous volume of stories he wrote about young, male “street urchins” rising to positions of power. There are many problems with Alger’s work and our conception of it. For starters, 19th century American street kids overwhelmingly lived and died in stagnant, grinding poverty. Nineteenth century America was not a country of ex-homeless kids who rose to positions of wealth and prominence.

But even more: Alger didn’t even write self-made man stories. The Alger formula is not a boy who rises above his station through hard work — rather, the Alger stories are universally tales in which young boys befriend powerful, older men who use their power and wealth to lift those boys up. An Alger hero is never self-made.

Even more disturbing: Alger was a pedophile who lost his position as a minister after raping adolescent boys. He was only spared prison when his father — a powerful religious figure — intervened, promising the young Alger’s furious parishoners that Horatio would leave the clergy — which Horatio Alger did, turning instead to writing. Quart notes ominously that Alger went on to adopt two young boys.

That the cult of self-reliance elevated a pedophile who wrote endlessly about how the way for poor boys to get ahead was to move in with older, richer men to legendary status is just…amazing. I mean, I know “every accusation is a confession,” but the fact that the groomer panic set are also giant Alger stans is…wild.

Not all of the self-reliance mythmakers were sexual predators, but they were all liars. Laura Ingalls Wilder’s incredibly popular Little House on the Prairie books recounted her family’s “pioneer” past as a triumph of self-reliance and gumption, glossing easily over the vast state subsidies that the Ingalls family relied on, from the military who stole Indigenous land, to the largesse that donated that stolen land to the Ingallses, to the farm subsidies that kept the Ingalls afloat.

Ingalls Wilder wasn’t just a mythmaker. She was a close literary and political collaborator with her daughter, the far-right ideologue Rose Wilder Lane, who used the Little House royalties to fight the New Deal, and, later, to create a school for oligarchs, the “Freedom School,” whose graduates include Charles and David Koch:

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/little-house-on-the-prairie-conservatism-214237/

Of course, no discussion of American pro-selfishness mythmaking would be complete without a mention of Ayn Rand, whose ideology and apologists Quart dissects with expert precision, including the absurd take that Rand’s reliance on government handouts was “ideologically consistent” because Rand was just taking back the money the government had illegitimately taxed away from her.

For Quart, all this mythmaking serves two purposes: first, it helps convince the vast majority of Americans — who work longer hours, earn less, and owe more for schooling, rent and education than their peers abroad — that any problems they face are their own, representative of an individual failing and not a systemic problem for which they should seek redress through mass political movements and unions. So long as America is a land of the self-made, then anything you can’t do on your own is your own damn fault for not making enough of yourself. Are you worried about climate change? Well, what are you doing about it? Recycle harder!

https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/

The self-made myth serves America’s oligarchs by befuddling people who might otherwise busy themselves building guillotines on the lawns of the nation’s mansions. But the rich depend on the myth for more than safety from others’ wrath — the myth also protects rich people from themselves, from their consciences that might otherwise recoil from the moral injury of having so much when others have to little. The myth lets the richest man on Earth ascend in a penis-shaped rocket, return, thank “every Amazon employee,” adding “you guys paid for all of this,” even as his warehouses maim those workers at twice the rate of his competitors’ facilities:

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/12/study-amazon-workers-suffer-serious-injuries-at-twice-rate-of-rivals.html

Quart makes a case that American progress depends on breaking free of this myth, through co-operative movements, trade unions, mutual aid networks and small acts of person-to-person kindness. For her, the pandemic’s proof of our entwined destiny, at a cellular level, and its demonstration of whose work is truly “essential,” proves that our future is interdependent.

Mutualism produces benefits in the here and now — it’s how we get a larger share of the profit generated by our work; how we secure education, health and housing; how we rescue one another from life’s exigencies and the attacks of our social betters. But the money, power, space and peace that we get from looking after one another has another benefit: freeing us up to demand more change, more equality, more democratic accountability.

Quart’s case-studies of organizers and rank-and-file in different movements are prescriptions for systemic changes, while her urgent case for reframing how we think of ourselves and our society present an individual-scale project for all of us.

I read Boostrapped in the audiobook edition with expert narration by Beth Hicks. I got my DRM-free copy on libro.fm, which I loaded into my waterproof MP3 player for my daily physiotherapy laps in the pool, and, as is the case with the best books, Quart’s words and Hicks’ reading made the time fly by:

https://libro.fm/audiobooks/9780063028043-bootstrapped

There’s only one week left in the Kickstarter campaign for the audiobook of my next novel, a post-cyberpunk anti-finance finance thriller about Silicon Valley scams called Red Team Blues. Amazon’s Audible refuses to carry my audiobooks because they’re DRM free, but crowdfunding makes them possible.

[Image ID: The Harpercollins cover for Alissa Quart's 'Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream]

#pluralistic #books #alissa quart #reviews #gift guide #interdependence #mind palace #mutual aid #meritocratic delusion

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