Royal family

Find out what comment Meghan Markle was heard muttering during her first joint engagement with Prince Harry, Prince William, and Kate Middleton.

Once upon a time, before the public knew about their royal rifts Prince Harry, Meghan Markle, Prince William, and the Princess of Wales (formerly known as Kate Middleton) were dubbed the Fab Four of the royal family. The couples were very popular and great for the monarchy as they could connect with younger generations in a way royals hadn’t in the past. But then it all came crashing down.

That plan was never able to materialize and in the years since Meghan and Harry stepped down, relations between the Sussexes and the Waleses have only gotten worse. Now, those early reports of tension that many thought were just rumors at the time are being brought up again proving that perhaps the signs were always there.

Kate Middleton, Prince William, and Meghan Markle attend events to mark the centenary of the RAF | PAUL GROVER/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

The event where the former Fab Four appeared onstage together

On Feb. 28, 2018, Prince Harry, Meghan Markle, Kate Middleton, and Prince William, appeared onstage together at the Royal Foundation Forum. The event focused on programs and charity work run by The Royal Foundation and a number of delegates who have been involved in key projects. It was also Megan’s first joint royal engagement.

Looking back, the event is one that body language experts and royal commentators often point to as the day it looked like there was a hint that things weren’t as they seemed between the smiling foursome.

During the forum, Prince William and Prince Harry were asked about disagreements, which they played off as a joke at the time.

“Oh yes,” William responded before laughter came from the audience and Harry added: “Healthy disagreements.”

The Duke of Sussex mentioned the event in his memoir Spare and revealed there was some awkwardness backstage between Meghan and Kate after the Suits star asked to borrow the princess’s lip gloss.

The 5-work remark Meghan made that was heard by those ‘within earshot’

Prince Harry, Meghan Markle, Kate Middleton, and Prince William onstage during the Royal Foundation Forum | CHRIS JACKSON/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

Journalist Sarah Sands wrote about another moment that day she found interesting.

The Daily Mail columnist explained that Meghan was overheard making a remark under her breath when she had to wait to speak after the others were done. Meghan didn’t look happy and had one question. According to Sands, the future duchess asked: “Don’t I have a voice?”

“Meghan’s ‘ordeal’ in Britain was, to her mind, the subjugation of her voice,” Sands said. “A colleague who was at a broadcast by the royal family’s short-lived Fab Four how poignant it is to recall the two couples looking so happy together remembers the microphone moving down the line: William … Kate … Harry… Meghan, at the end of the line, was disinclined to wait. ‘Don’t I have a voice? ‘ she asked icily.”

The Royal Foundation Forum was supposed to be an annual event but the first one of the foursome together was also their last.