Something Different

That one person whose judgment Zina doubts unswervingly. General Julius. If anyone could be a jerk while using some senses simultaneously, he could do it together.

General Julius closed the door loudly, and each sharp noise entered Zina's ear like a machine gun; she sighed the whole second; she felt that her stay was like blasphemy.

The hallway was now quiet in the nearby portion of Port Pampanga, a beautiful place for resting after a battle, one calling the workers did not finish in the process of being revisited by the other rivals interested in buying the area. It had been renovated, the one lonely room that Zina was resting in a month ago, and only those with a permission card could enter the place, and they were allowed to roam around in the mini garden. In the door frame, General Julius leaned because he wanted to see if Zina could stand up on her own. He had forgotten about her, but there was zero percent to disregard. Zina was still the future Crown Princess, and he should show some respect; of course, it does not change his opinion that she does not deserve to be with the Crown Prince.

What were the other things that Julius could list down on his notes about Zina? First, he should loosen up some nerves because, as of the moment, he poked Zina's nerve without actually doing anything to her. A tough place for women to stay.

Yet he would not have decided on being here to keep an eye on her current condition.

"Tell me this, Future Crown Princess," Julius straightens out his back before heading to the fruit bowl placed on the small, wooden table. "Why do women like you have to pretend to sleep when a man comes in?" Julius said and stopped at the table to grab an orange and an apple.

Zina's eyes trailed across the area to where General Julius was standing, enough that she could see his back. However, there was something different about the General, or her eyes played tricks. He somewhat became taller. "I did not pretend to be asleep, and why do a General like you have to be so cocky in asking a question to a Princess? Who are you to me to act like that?"

Smiling on the other side, General Julius peeled the orange and put down its skin on the table already. Zina watched him on the corner of her bed as he gradually glanced at her.

"You are an interesting Princess indeed. He is right," Julius said, making Zina curious about what he had just thought.

He stepped forward while holding the peeled orange in his left hand and the apple in his right hand, "You must be hungry," He reached out his left hand for Zina to take the orange, but she was uneasy moving. "It must hurt a lot, huh?"

Zina felt something different about General Julius, but she ignored it. The silent treatment she gave to the General made him sit down near her thighs, which were covered by a blanket. On the side where she was peeking and bent down his body to let her see his face, and when he was done making himself comfortable on her side, he harshly grabbed her available hand to put the orange on her palm before he unconstrained his hold on it. But then, he was not trying to be hard on her. "Eat it. Your body needs it." And with Zina's egotism in keeping her self-respect, she pushed him because she did not like being touched by a man randomly, and he was harsh in handling her.

Unfortunately for Zina, it was the wrong move. The wounds still bleeding hurt more, and she was now in General Julius' arms; a scene she had never imagined after all those years as she grew up just suddenly happened. Not requiring to be in love, Zina had never tried to find somebody she could rely on arranging each other's lives, but at some point, in her thoughts, she wanted to be beloved by a man who had no connections in the palace. So even if it was just a second ago, both of them had waited to make a move—a move away from each other.

"I am engaged, do not get closer to me." She explained while waiting for action. Until General Julius stepped back and slowly moved away from her, they mutually avoided eye contact, and she even expected that the General would leave soon.

"I only did that because you are injured."

"What?"

"Princess, if I did not hold you back, then your head and wounds will start to hurt again because your head will bang on the headboard. The distance is just an inch away. So, I am just making sure you won't go crazy." Julius also explained, then he bent down and reached for his apple that fell on the ground so that he could still safely eat it along with her. "By the way, the orange you will eat comes from Prince Zhang Wei. So, Princess, you must accept it as gratitude."

One eyebrow from Zina's face rose, but she still said nothing. And General Julius caught her looking at him, picking up his apple.

"The prince exclusively assigned someone to pick a fresh apple and oranges for you, Princess. You are part of his priority too." Julius said he was the prince because he smiled at the apple while talking to her. "And to think that the prince has no available time, he still did try."

"Would that even make any difference? I will still marry him even if I do not love him,"

"It seems you hate talking about the man you will marry soon. Are you one of those princesses that force themselves to enter a troubled stronghold to keep history's reputation intact?" Julius said as he slightly frowned while he cleaned the apple using his field uniform. "You should know the prince cooperated in marrying you because he thinks you can be his form of happiness."