I EMBRACED THE WORLD

Chapter One: The First Honor

Five years old, and already Princess Zimsome had learned how to stand still.

She stood at her father's side in a red dress that made her pale skin glow, her small hand swallowed inside his larger one, waiting for Mrs. Cruz to call her name from the stage. Around her, other children fidgeted and whispered. Princess didn't. She had inherited that from him — the stillness, the sharp nose, the fair skin, the way his lips pressed thin when he was trying not to smile. Everyone always said she looked nothing like her mother. She looked like she belonged to no one else but Parist Zimsome.

Only her hair betrayed her. His was brown. Hers was black as ink, straight down her back. And her eyes — his were warm brown. Hers were black, unreadable even at five years old, as if she'd already decided not to give too much of herself away.

"Let's give our first honor student a round of applause — Princess Zimsome."

Her father's hand tightened around hers, just slightly, like he was the one who needed steadying. She walked up alone, took the medal, and looked for him in the crowd before she'd even reached the last step. He was already on his feet.

When the ceremony ended, he carried her back to her seat himself, past the aunties who cooed over the medal and the fathers who barely looked up from their phones. Four-year-old Prince — her brother, her father's shadow in miniature — abandoned his seat the moment he saw them coming.

"Dad, I'm hungry," he announced, tugging at their father's sleeve as if the entire graduation had been standing between him and lunch.

"Wait a while," their father said, but he was smiling, and Princess knew that meant yes.

They didn't go home that night. Home, lately, had started to mean wherever their father decided to take them, and this time it meant a mansion that belonged to a woman named Sanje.

Sanje was hard to miss — tall, broad, her hair cropped short, skin sun-deep from years abroad. She ran businesses in more countries than Princess could count on both hands, and everyone in three towns seemed to know her real name was Sally, even though she'd long since decided Sanje suited her better. Sally made her sound smaller than she was.

"Congratulations, ha," Sanje said, ruffling Princess's hair with a hand that wore three rings at once. "First honor. Your father must be so proud he can't even sleep tonight."

Princess didn't answer. She was watching her father instead, the way his shoulders had eased the moment they walked through Sanje's gate, like this was one of the only places he didn't have to hold himself together.

That night, over dinner, Sanje set down her fork and said it plainly, the way she said everything.

"I'm flying to Greece tomorrow. Something I need to handle. I'll only be gone a short while — Betrish will look after things here until I'm back."

Princess didn't know yet that a short while was a phrase adults used when they meant something else entirely. She only knew that her father's jaw tightened, just slightly, the way it did whenever a plan changed without warning.

"And after Greece?" he asked.

"America," Sanje said. "Next week. There's a business I need to settle — with Ate Betrish. She's been asking about it for a while now." She said it lightly, the way people talk about weather, not wars. "She'll be down to meet you all, too."

Betrish arrived the next morning with two ten-year-old girls in tow — twins, identical down to their matching scowls, introduced as Migi and Mega.

"Hello, Sanje! It's been forever, haha," Betrish said, already crossing the room before anyone could answer. "These are my girls. Migi, Mega — my two little troublemakers."

"They've gotten so big," Sanje said. "They were still babies last time I saw them."

"Ten years old now. Time really doesn't wait for anyone, does it." Betrish laughed, but her eyes had already moved past Sanje, landing on the two smaller children standing near the door. Her smile thinned. "And who are these two?"

"That's who I told you about," Sanje said.

Something shifted in the way Betrish looked at them then — quick, assessing, gone before it could be called anything. "You didn't mention they'd already be here."

"Stop overthinking, Ate. We agreed — you're in charge while I'm away."

"Fine," Betrish said, though it didn't sound entirely like agreement.

Migi and Mega, for their part, had gone very quiet at the sight of Princess and Prince, edging half-behind their mother's skirt.

"Go on, say hi to your Tita Sanje," Betrish coaxed, but the twins only gripped her hands tighter, refusing to move any closer — as if the two smaller children by the door were something to be careful of, rather than something to greet.

"Ay, my girls, so easily scared," Betrish laughed it off. "Guess they didn't inherit that from me."

Princess said nothing. She had already learned, in five short years, that the adults' laughter didn't always mean something was funny.

Later, passing by the study on her way to find her father, Princess slowed at the sound of Betrish's voice, low and urgent through the half-open door.

"The resort — you already sold it? I thought you said you could still manage it from here."

"It'll be hard to hold on to once I'm in America. Better to let it go now than lose more later."

"You didn't have to sell it. I could have managed it myself."

"Don't push it, Ate. How many more things are you already handling?"

Princess didn't understand what a resort was, or why her father's name had been mentioned in the same breath as Sanje leaving for Greece — but she understood the tone. She'd have to learn, sooner than she wanted to, what tone always meant in that house.

She was still standing there, hand frozen on the doorframe, when the voices inside suddenly stopped.

"Princess?" her father's voice said, right behind her, closer than she'd expected. "What are you doing there?"

She turned around — and found she had no answer at all.