Meghan on Harry: ‘We are so in love..
Her incredible interview
MEGHAN Markle has fuelled royal engagement rumours by speaking for the first time about Prince Harry, declaring: “We are in love.”
Discussing their relationship is the clearest indication an announcement can be expected soon, royal sources say.
Such an interview would have to be sanctioned by Kensington Palace, which would not give its approval unless the couple were committed to a long-term future together.
In the interview with US magazine Vanity Fair, 36-year-old Meghan repeatedly refers to Harry, 32, as her “boyfriend”.
She says: “We’re two people who are really happy. We’re a couple. We’re in love.
“I’m sure there will be a time when we will have to come forward and present ourselves and have stories to tell, but I hope what people will understand is that this is our time. This is for us.
“It’s part of what makes it so special, that it’s just ours. But we’re happy. Personally, I love a great love story.”
After the interview emerged yesterday, bookies Ladbrokes stopped taking bets on Harry popping the question.
Spokesman Alex Apati said: “It’s now a matter of when, not if, Harry gets down on one knee this year.”
A royal insider told the Mirror: “These are unusual times for the Palace. Protocol has previously prevented any partner of a royal from discussing their relationship.
“For such a request to be granted, Harry and Meghan will have had to show their commitment to each other and that they are serious about their future together.”
Suits actress Meghan is expected to turn her back on her acting career in America and move to the UK.
Scriptwriters have already made contingency plans to write her character, Rachel Zane, out of the US legal drama.
Meghan’s interview was released a day after it was announced the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are expecting their third child, making Harry an uncle again. It also followed reports yesterday that Meghan was feeling “overwhelmed” at the prospect of becoming a princess. She claims she copes with pressure by avoiding reading about herself in the news. “I don’t read any press,” she says. “I haven’t even read press for Suits. “The people who are close to me anchor me in knowing who I am. The rest is noise.” California native Meghan says she first met Harry through friends in July last year while in London.
Since then they have had a transAtlantic relationship as the Prince fulfils his royal duties in the UK while Meghan films Suits in Toronto, Canada.
After the couple’s relationship emerged in October last year, Meghan became a target of trolls, leading Harry to put out an unprecedented statement through his communications secretary in November.
In it he blasted the “sexism and racism of social-media trolls” who had subjected her to a “wave of abuse and harassment”.
Meghan admits their high-profile relationship has been tough.
She says: “It has its challenges. Right out of the gate it was surprising the way things changed. At the end of the day I think it’s really simple – we’re two people who are really happy and in love.
“We were dating for about six months before it became news, and the only thing that changed was people’s perception.”
Despite being half of one of the world’s most high-profile couples, Meghan says “nothing about me changed”, adding: “I’m still the same person that I am, and I’ve never defined myself by my relationship.”
She tells of her support network, which
includes seven-time Wimbledon champ Serena Williams, who she met seven years ago at the Super Bowl. Serena says of Meghan: “Her personality just shines.” Meghan, who was pictured for the piece by Peter Lindbergh exclusively for Vanity Fair, does not address rumours of an engagement during her recent trip to Botswana with Harry. The country is special to Harry, who first visited 20 years ago shortly after the death of mum Princess Diana. Africa is also where Prince William proposed to Kate in 2010. Meghan speaks about growing up with a black mother, Doria Radlan, and white father, Thomas Markle. She says she first really noticed her ethnicity when she was 11 and had to tick one of four boxes on a form – white, black, Hispanic, or Asian.
She says she felt that to choose either white or black would be a rejection of one of her parents, so she left the boxes unticked.
If she marries Harry she will become the first American to enter into the royal family since Wallis Simpson wed King Edward VIII.
Ancient rules bar Catholics, commoners, and divorcees from marrying royals. Meghan was previously wed to producer Trevor Engelson and, though not Catholic, graduated from a Catholic high school.
The Queen, however, is said to be understanding of modern life – previously allowing William to marry commoner Kate Middleton.