Title: Private Conversations

Rating: M

Word Count: 4,424

Prompter: fancyandschmancy

Summary: Rapunzel overhears something that's not meant for her ears.

Rapunzel knew she shouldn't be listening in. Her . . . mother - she should call her that now - had caught her just this morning overhearing an argument between the baker and the sous-chef over a batch of burnt blueberry muffins.

The men's cheeks had been ruddy and their chests puffed out, like the robins she had occasionally gazed upon from the window up in her tower. The men had pointed fingers at each other (fingers her etiquette teacher had said a princess should never ever use) and shouted the most interesting collection of colorful colloquialisms at each other, words Rapunzel had never even heard before.

She had made a mental note to ask Eugene about those words later (He would know what they meant. He knew all sorts of words Rapunzel had never heard anyone else use before like the time he'd stubbed his toe on a raised cobblestone or that other time he made Max so very angry, the steed had picked him up by the collar of his leather vest and flung him into the river). Eugene seemed like the only person in the palace willing to answer her questions, no matter what she asked.

In her relatively short time at the palace, Rapunzel had learned that there were "right" questions and there were "wrong" questions. The problem was, she didn't know if the question was right or wrong until she asked it. Sometimes, if she asked someone (other than Eugene) a "wrong" question, they'd turn a shade of crimson worthy of Pascal and quickly change the subject - or even worse, flee the scene. Eugene never ever did that with her. He never ever made Rapunzel feel stupid or sorry for wanting to know something. And if he didn't know the answer, he'd help her find it. They would figure it out together by scouring the books in the library or walking down to the bookstore.

The whole scene that had unfolded before the princess that morning was fascinating to her. She'd come from a place where this kind of furious exchange of differences of opinion would've been unthinkable; a place where she'd never raised her voice and someone other than her always had the last word, even when they were merely expressing affection (I love you very much, dear. I love you more. I love you most. Ugh, you get the point right?). It made her tummy hurt just thinking about it.

That morning, she had stood there in the kitchen for a good twenty minutes observing the cuisiners trade barbs at each other. Rapunzel was very good at observing things. Each round of insults seemed more creative than the prior and the volume of their shouts increased exponentially at each turn. She began to wonder how loud their voices could get (Rapunzel had once yelled at the top of her lungs just to see if the little birds at the far end of the clearing below her tower could hear her, Moth - someone else had been very displeased with her) before realizing she wasn't the only one watching the exchange.

The queen had heard the shouting and followed the sound into the kitchen, needlepoint in hand. She looked like a person who was in search of a misplaced something or someone. When Rapunzel saw the small, embroidered pillow case in the queen's hand, her eyes widened in realization. It had only been then that the princess had remembered she was supposed to meet her mother by the stone fireplace in the sitting room overlooking the garden where they would practice their stitching.

When the monarch had caught sight of her young daughter in the midst of a verbal firestorm, she had gently pulled her aside, found a quiet alcove away from the culinary racket, and explained to her patiently that it was impolite to listen to other people's conversations, even when they were causing a ruckus and it was nearly impossible to ignore them. Afterwards, the benevolent queen had hugged the beloved princess and told her that she loved her very much. It was so different from the way Moth-, that other person had treated her.

The queen had called it "eavesdropping" which to Rapunzel sounded an awful lot like "leaves dropping." This brought to the forefront of her inventive mind the crisp autumn days. Rapunzel conjured up images of running through a pile of just raked leaves. The gardener, like everyone else in the castle, loved to indulge the whims of the young, energetic princess. He would gladly rake a pile of colorful fall foliage for her to jump on and when she'd done that, gather the scattered leaves back up for her to do it again. It seemed everyone in the kingdom was relieved to have their long lost princess back.

She was on her way to find Eugene and drag him outdoors to play with the crisp leaves. It was just the sort of thing he would enjoy. Although, he didn't seem particularly discriminating about what they did. Where she was concerned, he always seemed game no matter what activity she was proposing. He'd probably agree to a napkin folding race or a staring contest with her if it meant they could spend the day together and she felt the same way about him. Rapunzel was convinced that Eugene was her most favorite person out of all the fascinating people she had met. No one made Rapunzel's breath hitch, her heart flutter, her voice falter the way Eugene did.

He wasn't in the apple orchard with Max and Pascal and he wasn't in his room when she wandered in there. Rapunzel knew she wasn't supposed to be in Eugene's room at night. No one had told her why the time of day when she went in there mattered (and she had asked, repeatedly). But it was day time now. In fact, it wasn't even noon yet so she supposed it was alright if she went in there looking for him.

She was beginning to wonder whether Eugene was playing a secret game of hide-and-seek with her. Rapunzel smiled at the prospect of playing a game. He wasn't the type of person who made up games the way Rapunzel did, but he knew how much she liked them. She was just about to give up her search when she passed the marbled hallway outside her father's study. The mahogany door was slightly ajar and suddenly, she found herself unexpectedly in much the same predicament she'd been in earlier that morning.

The deep, booming voice that commanded the majestic room was unmistakably her father's and the person he was speaking to was Eugene. She knew this because, although she couldn't see either of them, every once in a while, Eugene would pipe up and say, "Yes, Sir," or words to that effect, mostly in response to the question, "Am I making myself clear?"

Rapunzel leaned against the wall beside the door, waiting patiently outside the room for Eugene to finish his chat with her father. From where she was standing, the conversation between the two men carried easily to the hallway outside the large room. Rapunzel was absentmindedly humming a tune she'd just heard from the stable boy in the orchard, when it suddenly occurred to her that she was "eavesdropping" again and that it was something the Queen had told her she mustn't do.

And while this morning in the kitchen when the two chefs were arguing she had been simply biding her time, now that she realized she was eavesdropping, her ears couldn't help but pick up the conversation. It was impossible to do otherwise. It was as if someone had told her not to think of an elephant, naturally her mind would conjure up thoughts of the pachyderm variety.

Rapunzel tried to do the polite thing and walk past the room. Really she did. But now that she could make out what her father was saying, her legs seemed unwilling to move. Her unshod feet felt like they were glued to the cool marble floor beneath them. She tried wiggling her bare toes experimentally. They seemed unmotivated to move. It was just so interesting.

She understood all the words her father was saying, but she got the sneaking suspicion that she didn't quite grasp the meaning behind them. Her father was using words like "innocence" and "purity" and "virtue" and "chastity." She knew what those words meant, of course. Her etiquette teacher used them all the time. She just didn't understand what they had to do with Eugene, or why it was his job to protect those abstract concepts.

She'd never heard her father so shouty, either. She thought that maybe this had to do with him catching them trading smooches in the library the night before because he kept referring to them as "canoodling between the bookcases."

Come to think of it, she'd never seen Eugene grow paler than last night when her father had cleared his throat behind them. And that was saying something, Rapunzel had seen him lose a lot of blood in her tower, and even back then (when he'd been actually dead) he'd looked less deathly.

Eugene had let go of her so quickly, she'd lost her balance, knocking a few heavy tomes off the shelf as she steadied herself using a candelabra. Daddy had been incensed. But to Rapunzel it had seemed like an overreaction. Eugene kissed her all the time, though never in front of the King or Queen or anyone else for that matter. And it wasn't like her father had just caught the former thief red-handed trying to steal the kingdom's most valuable treasure. Although that was exactly what his disapproving scowl had intimated.

Rapunzel just had to know what had her father so worked up and there was only one person she could ask.

###

Eugene had scrambled out of the king's study when he'd finally been dismissed. He couldn't get out of there fast enough. He'd rushed out of the uncomfortable room with the urgency of a ball being shot from a cannon.

And then he'd yelped in surprise when he bumped into Rapunzel; he wasn't expecting to see her outside in the hallway. He looked terrified, a man who'd seen a ghost.

The princess saw her opportunity and immediately began pelting him with questions.

"What did he mean by 'keeping it in your pants'? Keeping what in your pants?" Rapunzel was bursting at the seams with curiosity. "And why until the wedding? What's going to happen then?"

Rapunzel imagined Eugene pulling a rabbit out of his pants after the wedding the way she'd seen that court magician pull one out of a top hat. She smiled eagerly at the thought. Rapunzel loved bunnies. Though even she knew that was a silly thought. If Eugene owned a bunny, surely he'd let her pet him.

Eugene flew past her, trying to put as much distance between himself and the king's study as possible. She followed closely on his heels.

"What about that bit about 'not going all the way'? Are you going somewhere? Where does he think you're going?"

Eugene walked even faster and Rapunzel increased the speed of her steps and of her questions. Maybe Eugene wanted to race her? She beamed happily. Rapunzel loved running and jumping and chasing.

But when he refused to answer any of her questions, Rapunzel's heart fell. What was with him? She'd never seen him so uptight, so jumpy. He was normally so open with her.

"Now's not a good time, Blondie," he hurriedly said without breaking his stride.

He was being unusually tight lipped about his conversation with her father. He'd always answered her questions before, always. No matter how silly and now, now he was treating her like everyone else treated her. Like she was a child and there were right questions and wrong questions and if she asked the wrong question she'd get ignored.

Rapunzel felt the brunt of his cold shoulder. It was as painful and as a sharp reprimand. She no longer wanted to go outside on this crisp autumn day and play in the leaves. She no longer wanted to race him.

It took Eugene a moment to realize he was no longer being followed and when he did, he turned around and saw she was gone.

"Blondie, wait!"

###

Rapunzel made it to her room without shedding a tear, but when she closed the door, when she was all alone, the floodgates opened.

Moments later, she stifled a sniffle, rubbed her reddened nose on the sleeve of her dress, when she heard a knock on her door.

"Blondie, it's me."

Rapunzel was hurt and even more untenable, it was Eugene who had hurt her. But even so, she would never not let him in.

Rapunzel wiped the tears from her eyes, sucked in a breath through her stuffy nose and tried the impossible, tried to look like she hadn't just been crying.

Eugene swallowed hard when she opened the door to him. He looked grief stricken when he took in her crimson, watery eyes, her puffed upper lip and her drippy nose.

"I'm sorry Blondie. I shouldn't have ignored you. It's just -" Eugene looked around the empty hallway, "May I come in?"

The princess stepped aside, opening the door wider to her betrothed.

While Rapunzel was not allowed in Eugene's room at night. It was rare for Eugene to visit her here in her room, regardless of the time of day.

Even more unexpectedly, he closed the door behind him. "You wanted to know what your father and I were talking about," Eugene said.

Rapunzel nodded because even though she was hurt, a part of her really wanted to know.

"Alright," he said. "I'll tell you." He drew a deep breath, as if steeling himself for something painful. "He was talking to me about sex, Rapunzel."

"Oh." The princess could feel her cheeks heat up. She hadn't expected her beloved to say that.

And suddenly it felt like she was standing in front of a hot cauldron instead of her drafty room in mid-autumn. Even so, a very large part of her felt happy that Eugene was being honest with her again even if he was pointedly staring at the pattern on the parquet floor beneath his boots.

Still, something didn't make sense to her. She didn't understand what could've set her father down that path. He'd sounded very upset with Eugene. "But why?" she asked.

Eugene ran a flustered hand down the back of his head. "Last night, your father caught us kissing in the library," he reminded her.

"Yes," Rapunzel agreed. "But what does that have to do with what you and Daddy talked about?"

"Quite a lot actually," Eugene responded. Warm amber eyes peaked up at emerald green ones. "And your father's right," he added. "We probably shouldn't be sneaking off into dark corners and trading kisses," he said though not with a whole lot of conviction.

"But I like kissing you." Rapunzel pouted and Eugene chuckled. "I like kissing you too, Blondie," he admitted. "I like kissing you a little too much and sometimes when we kiss, it gets me all -" Eugene signed in frustration. "I don't even know what words to use," he said.

"Because you don't think I'll understand?" Rapunzel asked, feeling like there was a knowledge gap between her and Eugene that was wide as the sea outside her window.

Eugene shook his head. "No. That's not it," he said. "You're brilliant. Astoundingly brilliant. You've taught yourself math and charted the stars. I don't know anyone who could do that. You're so much smarter than I'll ever be, smarter than anyone I've ever met. It's just that the words that people use to describe these kinds of feelings, these terms, most of them are colloquialisms and it's hard" - he inexplicably snickered at the word - "I mean, it's difficult for someone who didn't grow up with these phrases to understand them."

Rapunzel gazed up at Eugene waiting patiently for him to continue. Because he was selling himself short. He was good at explaining things to her. He was better than most. He was kind and patient and he never made her feel stupid for not knowing things.

Rapunzel did not understand and the confusion must've been written all over her pretty face because Eugene started talking again. "Kissing," he told her. "It's like a prelude to . . . things."

"Things?" Rapunzel repeated the word, but she still couldn't grasp what he meant.

"Yes," he assured her. "When people kiss each other for a long time or when they kiss each other a certain way, they start to feel amorous."

"Amorous," she echoed. Again at a loss for what he was saying.

"Kissing makes people want to do things," Eugene gave her a pleading just-take-my-word-for-it gaze, before continuing with his tortured explanation. "And so naturally when your father caught us kissing last night, he wanted to make sure that I didn't get ahead of our wedding date by doing things with you, that's all." he said.

"And by things," Rapunzel began, starting to stitch together the scraps of information in her head because it was beginning to make sense,"you mean sex?"

Eugene swallowed thickly. "Y-yes," he agreed though his voice sounded strangled. "Sex especially, but he probably means those other things as well."

"Other things?" Rapunzel asked, because he kept using that word. "Things other than sex?"

"Y-yes," Eugene admitted and really it wasn't like him to stutter. Rapunzel started to wonder what had him so tongue tied.

"What other things?" she asked because honestly she had no idea.

The Queen had sat her daughter down and though the regent had been very careful about the words she'd used, she had communicated to Rapunzel what she and Eugene were expected to do on their wedding night. She'd told Rapunzel that it was her "duty" as the Princess of Corona. But the Queen had not said anything about other things. She hadn't even mentioned kissing and so Rapunzel was surprised to learn that kissing was a part of it as Eugene had just informed her.

"Eugene," she stated cautiously. "When you and I kiss," she said looking at him curiously like he was a new type of bug she'd caught in a glass jar. "Do you feel those things?" she asked, using his words.

The handsome rogue quickly redirected his gaze, looking any way but at Rapunzel. "Um," he said, sounding like he'd rather be standing in front of a firing squad at the moment than answer that loaded question.

"When I kiss you for too long," he said quietly. "I get hot and bothered. I get turned on. Do you understand what that means?" He squinted at her as he asked the question. It was a very Eugene thing to do.

Rapunzel shook her head because she understood the words themselves, just not the way Eugene was using them.

"I think about you in that way." He was being painfully honest with her now. Rapunzel could tell he was feeling awkward at having admitted that even if she couldn't quite figure out what he was admitting to doing. "I think about you all the time, actually," he said.

"I think about you too," she assured him, trying to ease some of the discomfort that was etched in his handsome features.

"That's not exactly what I mean," he told her. "I think about you in other ways too."

Eugene was staring at the front of his boots now. "What I mean is that I think about touching you."

Rapunzel had rarely seen Eugene flustered, but he was blushing in earnest now.

She placed a hand on his bicep, tugged on his folded arm to free up his palm, as if to say it's okay, you can touch me. See?

"Not quite like that, Blondie," he chuckled.

She could tell this was difficult for him, he was really making an effort to be honest and open with her, to lay down all the card he kept close to his vest.

Eugene licked his lips and something about that pink flicker of tongue made Rapunzel want to press her own against his.

"I mean, sometimes I really want to touch you. Not through your stiff corset or through layers upon layers of skirts. I want to feel your bare skin against my hand," he said.

Rapunzel scrunched her nose up at him in confusion.

"I've said too much. I'm sorry," he quickly apologized, evidently mistaking her bewilderment for offense. "I'm being disrespectful.

"No," she protested a little too loudly, startling him with her effusiveness. "I mean, not at all. Please continue," she said. She may have been confused about the colloquialism he'd used earlier, but everything he was saying sound very pleasant to her.

"It's difficult," he said. "To not have these wants when we live in such close proximity to each other. When you're so near and I can't have you."

The princess listened intently to her beloved as he spilled what he referred to as less than honorable thoughts.

These inconvenient ideas often came at inopportune times for the prince-consort-in-training, she learned. He told her that at first, he had felt guilty for thinking of her in that way and that her child-like innocence was a constant, painful reminder that despite having turned his life around he was still very much a despicable man.

Rapunzel didn't understand that part, she didn't understand why Eugene felt so conflicted about wanting to touch her.

Despite what he'd said about it not being "in the same way," the thought of Eugene touching her in whatever way he wanted to didn't seem like it was such a horrible thing to Rapunzel. To the contrary, it sounded wonderful. And she didn't think it was possible for there to be a wrong way for Eugene to touch her.

He told her he was being honest with her and that she should know that in his heart of hearts he sometimes courted those unsavory thoughts because they kept him sane and made the wait more bearable and so he'd sometimes indulge in them.

He'd spent many a sleepless nights alone in his bedroom staring at the coffered ceiling and wondering what it would feel like to finally take her and hear her gasp and whimper in a way she'd never done before, in a way he'd never heard before. He'd thought about what it would be like to have her in his bed staring at the ceiling or squeezing her eyes shut.

Rapunzel felt like whimpering just hearing him say that. In fact, she'd only just noticed, but her breaths were coming in short and shallow and that cauldron she'd felt earlier had somehow turned into a blazing inferno.

It took Rapunzel a minute to recover. Then she grabbed both his forearms and pushed herself up on her tipped-toes so she could capture his lips and kiss them with determination and purposeful intent. In that kiss, she had tucked her silent yearnings, her unspoken needs, and her soon-to-be vocalized wants - and they were all directed at him.

She had to force Eugene's mouth open, prying his lips apart with her own and when she finally pushed her tongue through, she kissed him the way he'd only once, in an unguarded moment of supreme weakness, had kissed her. She kissed him the way he'd kissed her that one time on the floor of the tower.

Eugene groaned audibly, using his hands to cup her face.

Rapunzel's kisses had always caught Eugene off-guard and this one was particularly unexpected. As they were both panting for breath, Rapunzel recalled what her father had said about Eugene needing to keep it in his pants.

She knew that Eugene was different, of course. Moth -, the woman she had lived almost her entire life had warned Rapunzel about men with pointy teeth, except that when Rapunzel grew older, the warning about pointy teeth grew into pointy other things as well.

Rapunzel knew she'd been lied about so many things. She'd seen Eugene's actual teeth and they didn't appear pointy at all, except for the ones in the corners when he smiled. And even those weren't excessively pointy. They were normal, like hers and everyone else's.

As for the other "points" Mother, um that woman, had warned her about, that part must have been another lie too. Rapunzel knew Eugene. He was good and kind and she was certain he'd never hurt her. The Queen had talked to her about what to expect, though their talk had been brief and exceedingly light on the details. The monarch hadn't mentioned anything about pointy things and Rapunzel was sure if that had been the case, it wouldn't have slipped the Queen's mind. After all, they had been practicing their needle point at the time.

Rapunzel knew she'd been lied to most of her life about almost everything. But the thing about being lied to, the thing about believing a lie for so long was that it was difficult to let it go, even if so many other things had turned out not to be true.

It was while her beloved's head was still spinning from that heated kiss that she had plucked up her courage. The princess glanced down pointedly at her beloved's trousers, gathering her resolve she reached out to touch him, but Eugene's quick reflexes blocked her intent, he batted her hand away.

He stared at her dumbfounded as if he were seeing her for the first time.

Rapunzel let out a startled cry, retrieving her hand and holding it against her small chest protectively like an injured limb (like it had been that and not her pride that he had wounded).

It hadn't hurt, not physically. He'd barely grazed her, but the shock of rejection stung immensely.

Eugene swallowed thickly. "I'm sorry," he said sounding more surprised at what he'd just done than at what she had tried to do.

"You startled me," Rapunzel told him.

"I know," he said. "It's just that I didn't expect you to do that. And I panicked. I'm sorry, Blondie. Did I hurt you?"

Rapunzel pouted. She was not about to admit that the only thing he'd wounded was her pride.

"I'm not a child," she told him. "I'm eighteen," she reminded him.

"I know that," he answered.

"Then show me," she said.

Prompt: "The king lectures Eugene on the behavior he expects from him as the future husband to the princess, not excluding his behavior towards his innocent daughter until then, getting stereotypically-fatherly about the princess' chastity, which is to remain intact until they are, in fact, married. Except Rapunzel has been eavesdropping to their conversation, and when she corners Eugene later, she can't help but be innocently curious about what her father was saying about purity. . . And it's nearly impossible for Eugene to resist her curiosities."

AN1: I find writing Rapunzel very challenging which is why I usually default to Flynn's POV, but I wanted to do this prompt from her point of view. I also wanted to do a more honest Eugene where he fesses up to having less than pure thoughts about her. I struggled with this prompt mostly because I wasn't sure how much Rapunzel would know about the birds and the bees at this point. I figured she'd know her boyfriend wasn't a Ken doll. I mean she's very observant and she's probably noticed the difference between the sexes, there's obviously a stable in the Kingdom. At the same time, I think the Queen would have broached that delicate topic because she'd probably want her daughter to know what to expect, after all she is getting married. Still, I don't think the Queen would go into too much detail. And then there's Gothel. I really do think that the "men with pointy teeth" line in that song meant men with pointy other things but they couldn't come out and say it because of ratings and all. So to sum it up, I think Rapunzel has some information (and misinformation), but there are clearly large gaps in her knowledge.

AN2: Thank you fancyandschmancy for the prompt. I know I took forever and a day to finish writing it. I hope you liked it, despite it's late arrival. If any of you are still waiting on an update on Disclosure. I'm working on it. Sorry again, for the long delays between updates.

Anyway, love it? hate it? wish I'd continue it? Please, please, please leave a review. They are fuel for fic writers.