Princess in the Spotlight Read online

  As if. This is so much more serious. Not that it isn’t totally scary when Louie eats a sock. I mean, we have to rush him to the animal hospital and all, and right away, or he could die. A thousand bucks later, we get an old half-digested sock as a souvenir.

  But at least the cat is back to normal.

  But this? A thousand bucks won’t cure this. And nothing will ever be back to normal again.

  It is so incredibly embarrassing. I mean, that my mom and Mr. Gianini—you know, DID IT.

  Worse, that they DID IT without using anything. I mean, please. Who DOES that anymore?

  I told Lilly there wasn’t anything wrong, that it was just PMS. It was totally embarrassing to admit this in front of my bodyguard, Lars, who was sitting there eating a gyro that Tina Hakim Baba’s bodyguard Wahim—Tina has a bodyguard because her father is a sheik who fears that she will be kidnapped by executives from a rival oil company; I have one because . . . well, just because I’m a princess, I guess—had bought from the vendor in front of Ho’s Deli across the street from the school.

  The thing is, who announces the vagaries of her menstrual cycle in front of her bodyguard?

  But what else was I supposed to say?

  I noticed Lars totally didn’t finish his gyro, though. I think I completely grossed him out.

  Could this day get any worse?

  Anyway, even then, Lilly didn’t drop it. Sometimes she really does remind me of one of those little pug dogs you always see old ladies walking in the park. I mean, not only is her face kind of small and squashed in (in a nice way), but sometimes when she gets hold of something she simply will not let it go.

  Like this thing at lunch, for instance. She was all, “If the only thing bothering you is PMS, then why are you writing in your journal so much? I thought you were mad at your mom for giving that to you. I thought you weren’t even going to use it.”

  Which reminds me that I was mad at my mom for giving it to me. She gave me this journal because she says I have a lot of pent-up anger and hostility, and I have to get it out somehow, since I’m not in touch with my inner child and have an inherent inability to verbalize my feelings.

  I think my mom must have been talking to Lilly’s parents, who are both psychoanalysts, at the time.

  But then I found out I was the princess of Genovia, and I started using this journal to record my feelings about that, which, looking back at what I wrote, really were pretty hostile.

  But that’s nothing compared with how I feel now.

  Not that I feel hostile toward Mr. Gianini and my mother. I mean, they’re adults, and all. They can make their own decisions. But don’t they see that this is one decision that is going to affect not just them, but everyone around them? I mean, Grandmère is NOT going to like it when she finds out my mother is having ANOTHER child out of wedlock.

  And what about my father? He’s already had testicular cancer this year. Finding out that the mother of his only child is giving birth to another man’s baby just might kill him. Not that he’s still in love with my mom, or anything like that. I don’t think.

  And what about Fat Louie? How is he going to react to having a baby in the house? He is starved enough for affection as it is, considering I’m the only person who remembers to feed him. He might try to run away, or maybe move up from eating just socks to eating the remote control or something.

  I guess I wouldn’t mind, though, having a little sister or brother. It might be cool, actually. If it’s a girl, I’d share my room with her. I could give her bubble baths and dress her up the way Tina Hakim Baba and I dressed up her little sisters—and her little brother, too, now that I think of it.

  I don’t think I want a little brother. Tina Hakim Baba told me that baby boys pee in your face when you try to change them. That is so disgusting I don’t even want to think about it.

  You would think my mother might have considered things like this before deciding to have sex with Mr. Gianini.

  Monday, October 20, G & T

  And what about that, anyway? How many dates has my mom even been on with Mr. G, anyway? Not many. I mean, like eight, maybe. Eight dates, and it turns out she’s already slept with him? And probably a couple of times, because thirty-six-year-old women do not get pregnant just like that. I know, because I can’t pick up a copy of New York magazine without seeing about a gazillion ads from victims of early menopause who are looking for egg donations from younger women.

  But not my mom. Oh, no. Ripe as a mango, that’s my mom.

  I should have known, of course. I mean, what about that morning I walked out into the kitchen and Mr. Gianini was standing there in his boxer shorts?

  I was trying to repress that memory, but I guess it didn’t work.

  Also, has she even thought about her folic acid intake? I know for a fact she has not. And may I just point out that alfalfa sprouts can be deadly for a newly developing fetus? We have alfalfa sprouts in our refrigerator. Our refrigerator is a deathtrap for a gestating child. There is BEER in the vegetable crisper.

  My mother may think she is a fit parent, but she has a lot to learn. When I get home, I fully intend to show her all this information I’ve printed out off the Web. If she thinks she can put the health of my future baby sister at risk by eating alfalfa sprouts in her sandwiches and drinking coffee and stuff, she is in for a big surprise.

  Still Monday, October 20, Still G & T

  Lilly caught me looking up stuff about pregnancy on the Internet.

  She said, “Oh, my God! Is there something about your date with Josh Richter that you didn’t tell me?”

  Which I really didn’t appreciate, since she said it right in front of her brother Michael—not to mention Lars, Boris Pelkowski, and the rest of the class. She said it really loud, too.

  You know, these kinds of things wouldn’t happen if the teachers at this school would do their jobs and actually teach once in a while. I mean, except for Mr. Gianini, every teacher in this school seems to think it is perfectly acceptable to toss out an assignment and then leave the room to go have a smoke in the teachers’ lounge.

  Which is probably a health violation, you know.

  And Mrs. Hill is the worst of all. I mean, I know Gifted and Talented isn’t a real class at all. It’s more like study hall for the socially impaired. But if Mrs. Hill would be in here once in a while to supervise, people like me who are neither gifted nor talented and only ended up in this class because they happen to be flunking Algebra and need the extra study time might not get picked on all the time by the resident geniuses.

  Because the truth is, Lilly knows perfectly well that the only thing that went on during my date with Josh Richter was that I found out that Josh Richter was totally using me, just because I happen to be a princess and he thought he could get his picture on the cover of Teen Beat. I mean, it wasn’t like we were ever even alone with each other, unless you count when we were in the car, which I don’t, since Lars was there, too, looking out for Euro-trash terrorists who might feel compelled to kidnap me.

  Anyway, I exited really fast from the You and Your Pregnancy site I had been looking at, but not fast enough for Lilly. She kept going, “Oh, my God, Mia, why didn’t you tell me?”

  It was getting kind of embarrassing, even though I explained that I was doing an extra-credit report for Biology, which isn’t really a lie, since my lab partner, Kenny Showalter, and I are ethically opposed to dissecting frogs—which the class would be doing next—and Mrs. Sing said we could do a term paper instead.

  Only the term paper is supposed to be on the life cycle of the mealworm. But Lilly doesn’t know that.

  I tried to change the subject by asking Lilly if she knew the truth about alfalfa sprouts, but she just kept blabbing on and on about me and Josh Richter. I really wouldn’t have minded so much if it hadn’t been for her brother Michael sitting right there, listening instead of working on his webzine, Crackhead, like he was supposed to be doing. I mean, it’s not like I haven’t had a crush on him sin
ce forever.

  Not that he’s noticed, of course. To him, I’m just his kid sister’s best friend, that’s all. He has to be nice to me, or Lilly will tell everyone in school how she once caught him getting teary-eyed over an old 7th Heaven rerun.

  Besides which, I’m just a lowly freshman. Michael Moscovitz is a senior and has the best grade point average in the whole school (after Lilly) and is covaledictorian of his class. And he didn’t inherit the squashed-in-face gene, like his sister. Michael could go out with any girl at Albert Einstein High School that he wanted to.

  Well, except for the cheerleaders. They only date jocks.

  Not that Michael isn’t athletic. I mean, he doesn’t believe in organized sports, but he has excellent quadriceps. All his ceps are nice, actually. I noticed last time he came into Lilly’s room to yell at us for screaming obscenities too loudly during a Christina Aguilera video, and he didn’t happen to be wearing a shirt.

  So I really didn’t appreciate Lilly standing there talking about how I might be pregnant, right in front of her brother.

  TOP FIVE REASONS WHY IT’S HARD BEING BEST FRIENDS WITH A CERTIFIED GENIUS

  1. She uses a lot of words I don’t understand.

  2. She is often incapable of admitting that I might make a meaningful contribution to any conversation or activity.

  3. In group situations, she has trouble relinquishing control.

  4. Unlike normal people, when solving a problem, she does not go from A to B, but from A to D, making it difficult for us lower human life forms to follow along.

  5. You can’t tell her anything without her analyzing it half to death.

  HOMEWORK

  Algebra: problems on pg. 133

  English: write a brief family history

  World Civ: find an example of negative stereotyping of Arabs (film, television, literature) and submit with explanatory essay

  G&T: N/A

  French: ecrivez une vignette parisiene

  Biology: reproductive system (get answers from Kenny)

  ENGLISH JOURNAL

  My Family History

  The ancestry of my family on my father’s side can be traced back to A.D. 568. That is the year when a Visigothic warlord named Albion, who appeared to be suffering from what today would be called an authoritarian personality disorder, killed the king of Italy and all these other people, then made himself king. And after he made himself king, he decided to marry Rosagunde, the daughter of one of the old king’s generals.

  Only Rosagunde didn’t much like Albion after he made her drink wine out of her dead dad’s skull, and so she got back at him the night of their wedding by strangling him with her braids while he slept.

  With Albion dead, the old king of Italy’s son took over. He was so grateful to Rosagunde that he made her princess of an area that is today known as the country of Genovia. According to the only existing records of that time, Rosagunde was a kind and thoughtful ruler. She is my great-grandmother times about sixty. She is one of the primary reasons why today Genovia has some of the best literacy, infant mortality, and employment rates in all of Europe: Rosagunde implemented a highly sophisticated (for its time) system of governmental checks and balances, and did away entirely with the death penalty.

  On my mom’s side of the family, the Thermopolises were goat herders on the island of Crete until the year 1904, when Dionysius Thermopolis, my mom’s great-grandfather, couldn’t take it anymore, and ran away to America. He eventually settled in Versailles, Indiana, where he opened an appliance store. His offspring have been running the Handy Dandy Hardware store on the Versailles, Indiana, courthouse square ever since. My mom says her upbringing would have been much less oppressive, not to mention more liberal, back in Crete.

  A Suggested Daily Diet for Pregnancy

  • Two to four protein servings of meat, fish, poultry, cheese, tofu, eggs, or nut-grain-bean-dairy combinations

  • One quart of milk (whole, skim, buttermilk) or milk equivalents (cheese, yogurt, cottage cheese)

  • One or two vitamin C–rich foods: whole potato, grapefruit, orange, melon, green pepper, cabbage, strawberries, fruit, orange juice

  • A yellow or orange fruit or vegetable

  • Four to five slices of whole-grain bread, pancakes, tortillas, cornbread, or a serving of whole-grain cereal or pasta. Use wheat germ and brewers’ yeast to fortify other foods.

  • Butter, fortified margarine, vegetable oil

  • Six to eight glasses of liquid: fruit and vegetable juices, water, and herb teas. Avoid sugar-sweetened juices and colas, alcohol, and caffeine.

  • For snacks: dried fruits, nuts, pumpkin and sunflower seeds, popcorn

  My mom is so not going to go for this. Unless she can smother it in hoisin sauce from Number One Noodle Son, she is just not interested.

  TO DO BEFORE MOM GETS HOME

  Throw out:

  Buy:

  Heineken

  multivitamins

  cooking sherry

  fresh fruit

  alfalfa sprouts

  wheat germ

  Colombian roast

  yogurt

  chocolate chips

  salami

  Don’t forget the

  bottle of Absolut

  in the freezer!

  Monday, October 20, After school

  Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, suddenly, they did.

  Grandmère called.

  This is so unfair. I thought she was supposed to have gone to Baden-Baden for a little R and R. I was fully looking forward to a respite from her torture sessions—also known as princess lessons, which I am forced by my father, the despot, to attend. I mean, I could use a little vacation myself. Do they really think anyone in Genovia cares whether I know how to use a fish fork? Or if I can sit down without getting wrinkles in the back of my skirt? Or if I know how to say thank you in Swahili? Shouldn’t my future countrymen and women be more concerned with my views on the environment? And gun control? And overpopulation?

  But according to Grandmère, the people of Genovia don’t care about any of that. They just want to know that I won’t embarrass them at any state dinners.

  As if. Grandmère’s the one they should be worried about. I mean, I didn’t have eyeliner permanently tatooed onto my eyelids. I don’t dress up my pet in chinchilla bolero jackets. I was never a close personal friend of Richard Nixon.

  But oh, no, it’s me everyone is supposedly so worried about. Like I might commit some huge social gaffe at my introduction to the Genovian people in December.

  Right.

  But whatever. It turns out she didn’t go after all, on account of the Baden-Baden baggage handlers being on strike.

  I wish I knew the head of the baggage handlers’ union in Baden-Baden. If I did, I would totally offer him the one hundred dollars per day my dad has been donating in my name to Greenpeace for performing my duties as princess of Genovia, just so he and the other baggage handlers would go back to work, and get Grandmère out of my hair for a while.

  Anyway, Grandmère left a very scary message on the answering machine. She says she has a “surprise” for me. I’m supposed to call her right away.

  I wonder what her surprise is. Knowing Grandmère, it’s probably something totally horrible, like a coat made out of the skin of baby poodles.

  Hey, I wouldn’t put it past her.

  I’m going to pretend I didn’t get the message.

  Later on Monday

  Just got off the phone with Grandmère. She wanted to know why I hadn’t returned her call. I told her I didn’t get the message.

  Why am I such a liar? I mean, I can’t even tell the truth about the simplest things. And I’m supposed to be a princess, for crying out loud. What kind of princess goes around lying all the time?

  Anyway, Grandmère says she is sending a limo to pick me up. She and my dad and I are going to have dinner in her suite at the Plaza. Grandmère says she is going to tell me all about my surprise the
n.

  Tell me all about it. Not show me. Which hopefully rules out the puppy-skin coat.

  I guess it’s just as well I’m having dinner with Grandmère tonight. My mom invited Mr. Gianini over to the loft tonight so they can “talk.” She’s not very happy with me for throwing out the coffee and beer (I didn’t actually throw it away. I gave it to our neighbor Ronnie). Now my mom is stomping around complaining that she has nothing to offer Mr. G when he comes over.

  I pointed out that it’s for her own good, and that if Mr. Gianini is any sort of gentleman he’ll give up beer and coffee anyway, to support her in her time of need. I know I would expect the father of my unborn child to pay me that courtesy.

  That is, in the unlikely event that I were ever actually to have sex.

  Monday, October 20, 11 p.m.

  Some surprise that was.

  Somebody really needs to tell Grandmère that surprises are supposed to be pleasant. There is nothing pleasant about the fact that she has managed to wrangle a prime-time interview for me with Beverly Bellerieve on TwentyFour/Seven.

  I don’t care if it is the most highly rated television news show in America. I told Grandmère a million times I don’t want to have my picture taken, let alone be on TV. I mean, it’s bad enough that everyone I know is aware that I look like a walking Q-tip, what with my lack of breasts and my Yield-sign–shaped hair. I don’t need all of America finding it out.

  But now Grandmère says it’s my duty as a member of the Genovian royal family. And this time she got my dad into the act. He was all, “Your grandmother’s right, Mia.”

  So I get to spend next Saturday afternoon being interviewed by Beverly Bellerieve.

  I told Grandmère I thought this interview thing was a really bad idea. I told her I wasn’t ready for anything this big yet. I said maybe we could start small, and have Carson Daly or somebody like that interview me.