Bless their hearts, they’re trying to make a meal out of the “drama” around Peter Phillips’ June 6 wedding. I’m not mad about it – in fact, I wondered why they hadn’t spent months trying out sad-sack storylines about “Prince Harry is desperate for a wedding invitation” and “Prince William threatened to not attend Peter’s wedding if the Sussexes were invited!” Last week, we finally heard that Peter didn’t even invite Prince Harry, nor did Peter invite Prince Andrew or Sarah Ferguson. I absolutely believe that Peter was “ordered” to snub certain family members, and the quid pro quo was the circulation of rumors that Peter and his new bride could step into some kind of semi-working royal roles. In the meantime, “sources” really want to obsess over why Peter didn’t invite his cousin Harry.

It was the wedding of our now King and Queen, and pictured front and centre, with smiles adorning their youthful faces, were the royal cousins Prince William, Prince Harry, Peter Phillips, Zara Tindall and Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie. The close bond between the giggling and grinning relatives could be clearly captured as they walked alongside one another outside St George’s Chapel, in Windsor, in 2005.

But similar feel-good scenes between the cousins likely won’t be witnessed at the wedding of Princess Anne’s son Peter, 48, to his NHS nurse fiancée Harriet Sperling when they tie the knot at All Saints’ Church in Kemble, Gloucestershire, on June 6. Instead, the nuptials will lay bare the sad state of relations between the royal cousins who were once so close, having all grown up together.

Prince Harry, who stands closest to Peter in the aforementioned snap from Charles and Camilla’s wedding, is not expected to attend his cousin’s big day next month as the pair have ‘lost touch’.

A friend close to The Princess Royal’s son said: ‘Peter and Harry haven’t spoken for several years and have simply lost touch, so he hasn’t been invited.’

‘Peter and Harriet’s wedding is an intimate occasion with their close friends and immediate family around them in the Cotswolds. It’s an area where they grew up and is very special to them both,’ a pal said.

Adding to the sad situation, the groom once discussed how growing up alongside his cousins during family holidays to Sandringham, Balmoral and Windsor, ‘was a lot of fun’.

‘There was a lot of space for kids to run around in, and it wasn’t just us – it was the Waleses, Freddie and Ella Windsor, and the Gloucesters,’ Peter said during an appearance on Good Morning Britain in 2016. ‘So there was quite a gang of us growing up in that age, and it was a lot of fun. We caused quite a bit of mayhem and chaos, but fortunately, I don’t think we broke too much!’

[From The Daily Mail]

Sources went on to try to make an issue over Peter’s relationship with Princess Beatrice and Eugenie, but as far as anyone can tell, B&E are planning on attending the wedding, so it’s not like there will be any kind of visible rift there. Those are the optics the left-behinds want as well – they’re once again pairing up Prince Harry and Prince Andrew as the odd-men-out. Andrew is out because he was part of an espionage-and-trafficking ring which operated with impunity for decades, and Harry is out because he married a Black woman who overshadowed everyone with her beauty, intelligence and grace.

Honestly though, I still say that this story of Peter & Harry losing contact needs to be paired with the story about Prince William’s “band of brothers.” The whole point is that William and the institution believe that they’re publicly mocking Harry by flouting their old friendships and kinships, like “aren’t you jealous, Harry? Don’t you wish you could attend your cousin’s wedding? Don’t you wish you were attending football matches with William’s childhood friends??” For years now, I’ve said that one of the biggest problems for the monarchy is that so much of what they do and say is for an audience of one (Harry), and they have no idea how absolutely bonkers it looks to other people.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.