I reached out and adjusted his naturally wavy, reddish brown hair, and while trying to stay professional, I thought, “I’m touching Prince Edgar’s hair and it feels like cashmere and he’s got a few freckles across the bridge of his nose and eyelashes for days and Carter, do not even look at his lips or you’ll be arrested.”

“There. Much better. Media-ready.”

As I said this, Prince Edgar was reaching toward my own hair, and I flinched.

“I’m so sorry. I was just . . . you have very nice hair as well. But I had no right, I don’t know what came over me . . .”

Our eyes locked and I couldn’t breathe and I wanted to die because my life was peaking, but on the other hand I couldn’t wait to see what might happen next.

My phone pinged; I’d meant to silence it and now I was shoving my hand in my pocket to find it, which never looks graceful, but as I yanked the phone free, it rang.

“Please, take it, it might be critical,” Edgar said, with genuine kindness.

It was my sister, Abby, who’s about to get married and calls me thirty-eight times a day for monogrammed water bottle consultations and meltdown management, which I usually love doing, only now I told her, “Abbs? I can’t talk, can I call you in just a bit?”

“But I just texted you,” Abby insisted, “and you didn’t text me back and I’m having an epic gift bag issue—”

“Which we will totally discuss and examine in depth,” I assured her, “but right now—”

Edgar was smiling at me, which almost made me drop my phone as Abby yelled, “WHAT? What are you doing that’s so important you can’t help me choose between miniature foil-wrapped chocolate champagne bottles and Lucite boxes of breath mints in my signature colors—”

“I’m . . . I’m . . .” I sputtered, “I’m at work. I love you and I think you should go with both the bottles and the mints and think about temporary tattoos of the bride’s and groom’s faces but I have to go. I’m sorry!”

I hung up and told Edgar, “My sister.”

“Ah. I know the dilemma. I have a brother.”

Oh my God. Oh my God. He wasn’t politely excusing himself or summoning a security guard. In fact, he kept going, asking, “Is it just the two of you?”

“Yes. And I adore her, but sometimes she’s, you know, a lot.”

“As is my brother.”