“Bean, what's on your mind?” Faye asked. “I can tell by your voice that there's something you want to tell me.”
How does she do that every time? Sabrina thought. Is she psychic or something?
“You know me too well, Aunty,” she said. “I called hoping for some advice on a situation.”
“A situation?” she asked. “That doesn't sound good.”
“It's actually a very positive situation,” Sabrina said. “But I'm still a bit unclear as to what I should do.”
“I'll help you if I'm able to,” Faye said. “Tell me everything.”
Sabrina spilled everything to Faye. She told her about Marco and how she'd fallen for him quickly, even though he was technically her boss. She explained the mutual attraction between then and how she could see herself really loving him. Sabrina even told her about the paparazzi chase and the kiss that they had shared in the haunted apartment building.
“He sounds like a really great man, Sabrina,” Faye said. “It's a shame that he's going home early. But you know, sometimes things aren't meant to be. God shows us that through situations that we can't control.”
“I haven't finished telling you everything, though, Faye,” Sabrina said. “Marco invited me to move home with him once the vacation is over.”
“You mean, permanently?” Faye asked, clearly shocked. “Bean, I don't know.”
“Faye, I love this man, or at least I know that I could love him with a little more time,” she said. “I'm falling more in love with him every day.”
“But do you really know him?” Faye asked. “You've only been working with him for a couple of weeks.”
“You're right,” she told her aunty. This was the moment of truth. She checked with Marco, and she could now tell family about his identity. “But I'm learning more about him every day. In fact, there's something I want to tell you about him, but you have to promise to keep it a secret.”
“Who would I even tell a secret to, bean?” Faye replied with a laugh. “I promise I won't tell a soul.”
“Marco is a prince of an island.”
She'd expected Faye to yelp out in excitement or to at least hear a gasp on the other end of the phone line. But there was nothing but silence. Sabrina waited a few seconds, wondering if she had lost the cell phone connection with her aunt.
“Hello? Aunt Faye, are you there?”
Faye cleared her throat. “Yes, honey, I'm here. Sorry, I just wasn't sure if I had heard you correctly. You said Marco is a prince? He's royalty?”
“Yes, he's the Prince of Orsino Island,” she repeated.
“This is not what I was expecting to hear,” Faye said, after a few seconds of pause. “I'm happy for you, Sabrina, and I can hear the excitement in your voice. I want you to be careful, though.”
“What do you mean?” Sabrina asked, standing up from the ground to brush the sand off. “Why do I have to be careful? Marco is a good guy, he wouldn't do anything to hurt me.”
“That's not what I mean,” Faye said, her inflection sounding more motherly than before. “I just know that members of the aristocracy don't tend to mix very well with ordinary people.”
“I understand what you're saying and to be honest, I felt the same way at first,” Sabrina said, as she began walking back toward the boat where Marco was. “But I expressed those concerns to Marco and he assured me that it wouldn't matter. He said he didn't care where I was from or how much money I had, he just wanted to be with me.”
Faye sighed and Sabrina could tell that this news was weighing heavily on her.
“Love, I just don't want you to get hurt emotionally,” Faye said. “Marco sounds lovely. I'm sure he's got good looks, money and charm. On top of that, he's also a prince. On the surface, it would be crazy for me to try to talk you out of it. Who wouldn't want to be with him? But even so, you've only known him for a couple of weeks and you don't really know him.”
“But I do, Aunt Faye,” Sabrina said quietly. “I do know him.”
“He's a noble,” Faye said the word like it tasted bitter. “He comes from an entirely different world. He may say that he doesn't care where you come from, but I don't know that he fully understands how different those two world are.”
Sabrina listened to her words and allowed them to soak in. She trusted Faye with everything and didn't take her opinion on the matter for granted. However, her Aunt wasn't giving her the kind of encouragement that she had been seeking.
“I thought you would be supportive of this,” Sabrina said, kicking the sand.
“I'm supportive of you,” Faye said. “Because of that, I don't know if I can fully get behind this decision to move across the world for him. The decision seems a bit rash. Call me old-fashioned, but I think it would be better to wait for a while.”