A Kiss in Time (6 page)

The princess lunges toward me. You cannot go. You have broken the spell. Do you know what
that means? When I dont answer, she says, It means you are my true love. Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Travis whispers.

I ignore him. True love? But I dont even know your name.

My name? She looks surprised. Oh, well, that is easy enough. Everyone knows that.

Except me. Once you tell me, can I leave?

Very well. It is probably best to have a proper introduc- tion. She looks at Pudding Face
and says, Lady Brooke. Lady Brooke nods, although she doesnt look happy about it, and
gestures toward me. Jack ONeill, of Florida,

you are presented to Her Royal Highness, Princess Talia.

Talia.

It is customary to bow at this time, Talia says. Your name is Talia? I didnt know . . .
And yet, that is what you called me when you . . . I know. I shake my head. I mean, I
didnt know your name, but somehow I guessed or something. It was weird, like someone told it to me.

She nods. True love. It was meant to be.

Look, I say, I might want to go out sometime, but as far as true love But you woke me! And I can only be awakened by true loves kiss. And besides, I am a
beautiful princess. How could you not love me?

Easy.

Travis looks at Talia, then at the hands of the guards who are holding him, and then back
at Talia. So, um, Your Royalness, do you think you could maybe let us go? Yeah, itsahgetting late. Its actually only twelve thirty, but who knows if these people
can even tell time. Our tour groups waiting for us.

Highness, this one is a thief! the guard behind Travis says. And if this person was with
him, he must be an accomplice.

Im no thief, I say, and neither is Travis. The crown was in his hands! says the guard. He
didnt take anything, and Im the one who broke the curse and saved you all. Doesnt that count for anything? What curse? Lady Brooke says.
What is he talking about? Talia ignores her. Yes. Guards, you must unhand this gentleman at once. He is an honored guest and a friend of my future husband. You must both
stay for supper.

Future husband? Does she mean me? Excuse me, but Im not Talia . . . Lady Brooke says. You cannot mean to invite this . . . this . . . commoner to
supper. It is the eve of your birthday ball.

Talia starts to cry again. No, Lady Brooke. Do you not understand? I have touched a
spindle! A spindle! We have all been asleep for a great while, and this . . . She gestures
toward me. This commoner has awakened me.

You have touched a spindle, you say? Lady Brookes puddingy jaw is hanging.

Talia nods. A spindle, you say? Yes!

Lady Brooke cradles her forehead in her hands. I have left you alone for ten minutes, and
you touched a spindle and slept for . . . for . . .

Three hundred years.

Ah! Lady Brooke looks like shes been stabbed. Oh, not again, not again . . . She recovers.
And you have been awakened by a . . . a . . .

Really great guy? I volunteer.

Talia nods. He will stay for supper. She looks at me. You will stay for supper?

I nod. I can handle it if thats what it takes for them to let me goeven though theyll
probably serve squirrel or something. Thats fine. Just let me call the hotel and tell them
where we are. I take out my cell phone.

What is that? Princess Talia says.

A phone. She keeps staring at it. In fact, everyone stops what theyre doing, gathers
around, and stares. You can, um, talk to people on it.

Except I cant get a signal. Duh. Theres no tower here. Suddenly, it dawns on me what Talia
said: I have been asleep nearly three hundred years! If thats true, this place is like a
time warp. Princess Talia really did screw things up.

And all Im thinking is, How did they go so long without eating or peeing?

Everyones still staring at the phone, which lights up and makes beeping noises. Think how
jacked theyd get if it actually worked. We have to go there, I say. Theyll be waiting for us.

But surely your friends must have known of your jour- ney, Talia says.

We sort of sneaked off.

Then we must send a messenger, Talia says. Simply tell me the name of the inn in which you
are staying, and it shall be done.

Problem one: I have no idea where the hotel is. Problem two: Theres a huge hedge around
the whole country. Problem three: I am notand I mean notmarrying this princess.

Does this help? Travis pulls a postcard out of his pocket. It has a photo of our hotel on
the front. This causes another spasm of activity as everyone has to gather around to look
at the photo. Finally, Travis says, The address is on the back, I think.

Talia hands it to Pudding Face, who looks dangerously close to fainting. She examines it a
moment, then says, That is two days journey.

It seemed pretty far but not two days.

Nah, Travis says. It was about two hours on the bus.

Pudding Face looks puzzled. Bus?

Yah. Its sort of like a car only . . . you got the wheel here? Has that been invented yet?

Talia straightens her shoulders, and even Lady Brooke seems to have recovered enough to
glare at Travis.

I guess it has, Travis says. Well, a bus is sort of a wheel thing with a motor, and fast. He looks at them. Okay, I can see you dont get the bus
thing. Maybe I could, like, take your guards out and show it to them if, um, theyd let go
of me and get their swords out of my butt.

Talia nods. Do as he says.

The guards look disappointed, but they let go of Travis, and he gestures to them to follow
him. Hey, do you guys have a chain saw? Travis is saying as they leave.

When he is gone, Talia turns to me. Well, then, we must find you some proper clothing. If
we are to marry, you must meet my father. Then, in case I dont get it, she adds, The king.
So we can arrange the wedding.

Lady Brooke finally topples to the ground. Im pretty close to joining her.

I should have stayed with the tour!

M
y life is ruined. I dispatch Lady Brooke to find Jack a room and some clothing. Then I go
back to the task I began, I thought, this morning, but apparently almost three hundred
years agochoosing dresses for the ball. There is no reason not to have a ball. Yes, I am
three hundred sixteen years old (give or take a year) rather than sixteen years old, but
since I have neither starved to death, nor died of thirst while asleep, it seems as though
my body has been somehow suspended in time all these years. Besides, Jack would not have
kissed me had I been a crone. Therefore, tomorrow will still be my sixteenth birthday, and
I am still entitled to my party, so I still need dresses.

The bad news is that the most beautiful dresses were supplied by someone whom I now know was an evil witch bent upon destroying me because she
was annoyed at not being invited to a previous party (I will say, Father and Mother were
rather shortsighted in not simply inviting herwhat would it have cost, an extra pheasant
and perhaps some turnips?), so I will need to continue my search.

I venture into the first, then the second room. I know I should go looking for Mother and
Father, but I simply can- not face them yet. I do not want to tell them what I have done.
They will never forgive me.

It is in the third room that I see Father. He looks distraught.

Talia, I am so glad to have found you. Although, truthfully, he does not look glad in the
least. I have terrible news, he continues. The ball must be canceled. But why? Although I have some idea why. He has dis-

covered my folly with the spindle, and he means to punish me. I prepare to bawl, possibly
to wail. I am an excellent wailer.

But Father says something even more surprising. I do not know, my pet. It seems there are
no guests. No guests? Whatever do you mean? It is the queerest thing. The lookouts saw the
first ships off in the distance at nine oclock. By ten thirty, some were on the verge of entering the
harbor. But then they simply disappeared. Disappeared? I repeat what he has said to give me time to think.

Father nods. I fear, daughter, that there is something afoot here, that we might be on the
verge of war, or worse, that I may have been victimized by black magic, the dark art of
the witch Malvolia.

Malvolia. Oh, no. In an instant, I understand what hap- pened to the ships. They did not
turn around, nor were they bewitched, not really. They may have tried to enter our harbor.
But when they did, it was not there. The king- dom was obscured from sight by a giant
wood, as Flavia said in her idiotic spell. They thought they had gone to the wrong place.
The guests, the visiting royalty, even the special prince who might have been my husband,
they have been dust for centuries, and I am merely a three-hundred- sixteen-or-so-year-old
princess with absolutely no prospects whatsoever.

It will take a great deal of tact to explain this to Father. I am sorry, my dear daughter.
He is sorry. Would it be possible simply to feign igno-

rance of the whole situation? Pretend I have no idea what happened to the ships, no
comprehension of what causedI am certainnumerous additional changes to the kingdom?

But I remember Jacks clothing and the strange flashing object he carried with him, Traviss
talk of buses. Certainly the world changed during our three-hundred-year hiberna- tion, as
surely as it changed during the three hundred years before that, and as soon as Father remarks the changes, he will understand their cause. If
he does not, Lady Brooke will be certain to tell him.

Father? I touch his shoulder. Yes, my princess? I believe . . . I take his arm, sweet as I
can, and guide him toward a chair. I believe you should sit down. He does, and when he does, I begin to
tell my story.

I touched the spindle, and then at the next moment, a commoner named Jack was waking me
up, I conclude.

Father is silent. Father? Are you . . . is everything quite all right? You say you touched
a spindle, Talia? A spindle? It was no fault of mine. No fault of yours? It was every
fault of yours. He looks, suddenly, like Gods revenge against murder. Have we taught you nothing? How many
times have we told youcautioned youabout spindles? It was the first word you learned, the
last thing you heard before bed at night, the one lesson of any import: Do not touch
spindles. And you forgot itignored it?

I said I was sorry. Sorry? Do you not understand that we are ruined? Ruined? Father is
making quite a fuss. Certainly it is inconvenient, but Inconvenient! Talia, do you not understand? Could you be so stupid? I feel tears springing to my eyes yet again. He has never spoken to me in this manner.
Father, your voice. Everyone will hear you.

What does it matter? If, as you say, we have all slept these three hundred years, we are
ruined, destroyedyou, I, the entire kingdom. We have no kingdom. We have no trade. We have
no allies to defend us. Mark my words, it will not be long before everyone realizes that
my daughter is the stupidest girl on earth.

But . . . but . . . I can hold back my tears no longer, and when I look at my father, I
see something horrible. He is struggling to hold back his own. My father, the king, the
most powerful man in all Euphrasia, is weeping, and it is my fault, all my fault.

It was a mistake!

You cared for no one but yourself, Talia, and we are paying the price. It would have been
better had you engaged in any other youthful indiscretionrunning away, even elopingrather
than this one. This has affected everyone, and it is unforgivable.

My fathers words strike like daggers. He would rather see me gone than have me do what I
did. He hates me.

I am sorry, Father.

He looks at the floor. Perhaps, Talia, you ought to go to your room.

Yes. Perhaps I should go and never come outwhich is probably what is planned for me,
anyway. I nod and start for the door. Then I remember something I must tell him, although at this point, I would much rather not. Still, if Father despises me, I have
nothing to lose. I have already ruined everything.

Father? What is it now, Talia? The boy, the one who woke me from my sleep . . . I have invited him to stay at the castle and to have supper with us.

Father stares at me. Supper? Yes. It seemed the proper thing to do. He makes an attempt to
straighten his shoulders but fails. Yes. The word comes out as a sigh. Yes, I suppose it is.

And then, before I can say anything else, Father turns on his heel and leaves. I wait a
minute to make sure he is gone before leaving the room myself.

I am passing through the guest chambers on the way to my own room when I hear a voice.

Excuse me? Talia? Um, Your Highness. I stop. Jack! They must have placed him in this room.
I approach the door. Yes? Indeed, it is him. This commoner, this boy I am sup-

posed to marry, this nobody who has ruined everything. And yet . . . he is wearing more
appropriate clothing, in which he looks handsome, yet quite uncomfortable at the same
time, as befits a member of the nobility. Um, sorry to bother you, Princess. No bother. Although, in truth, I would much rather be alone with my grief. My face burns.
Soon, everyone will know of my stupidity and humiliation, that I have ruined the kingdom,
and soon I will be the most ruined of all.

Your dad seemed upset. I nod, unable to speak. So he had heard. But what he said, Mr. Jack
ONeill continues, about the hundred years sleep? Three hundred. Right. Sorry. Three hundred! We have slept three
hundred years,

and we are ruined, and it is all my fault. I try not to sob again. Were I a few years (or
a few hundred years) younger, I could throw myself on the floor with impunity, but as it
is, I simply stand there, gasping for breath.

Jack stands there, too, looking down. I wonder if he heard Father call me the stupidest
girl on earth. Probably the whole castle did. Finally, he says, Can I get you some- thing,
like a Kleenex? I have no idea what a Kleenex is, but he reaches into his pocket and
procures a bit of paper, sort of a paper handkerchief.