The Princess Diaries (18 page)

Anyway, after a while I couldn’t stand it anymore. I put down a forkful of rice and beans and said, "Look, Tina. If you don’t want to sit with me anymore, I understand."

Tina’s big eyes filled up with tears. I mean it. She shook her head, and her long black braid swayed. "What do you mean?" she asked. "You don’t like me anymore, Mia?"

It was my turn to be shocked. "What? Of course I like you. I thought maybe you might not like
me.
I mean, every-one is staring at us. I could see why you might not want to sit with me."

Tina smiled sadly. "Everyone always stares at me," she said. "Because of Wahim, you see."

Wahim is her bodyguard. Wahim and Lars were sitting next to us, arguing over whose gun had the most firepower, Wahim’s 357 Magnum or Lars’s 9mm Glock. It was kind of a disturbing topic, but they both seemed happy as could be. In a minute or two, I expected they’d start to arm wrestle.

"So you see," Tina said, "
I’m
used to people thinking I’m weird. It’s
you
I feel sorry for, Mia. You could be sitting with anyone—anyone in this whole cafeteria—and yet you’re stuck with me. I don’t want you to feel you have to be nice to me just because no one else is."

I got really mad then. Not at Tina. But at everybody else at Albert Einstein. I mean, Tina Hakim Baba is really, really nice, and no one knows it because no one ever talks to her, because she isn’t very thin and she’s kind of quiet and she’s stuck with a stupid bodyguard. While people are worrying about things like the fact that a deli is overcharging some people by five cents for gingko biloba rings, there are human beings walking around our school in abject misery because no one will even say Good morning to them, or How was your weekend?

And then I felt guilty, because a week ago
I
had been one of those people. I had always thought Tina Hakim Baba was a freak. The whole reason I hadn’t wanted anyone to find out I was a princess was that I was afraid they’d treat
me
the way they treated Tina Hakim Baba. And now that I know Tina, I know just how wrong I’d been to think badly of her.

So I told Tina I didn’t want to sit with anybody but her. I told her I thought we needed to stick together, and not just for the obvious reason (Wahim and Lars). I told her we needed to stick together because everyone else at this stupid school is completely NUTS.

Tina looked a lot happier then, and started filling me in on the new book she’s reading. This one is called
Love Only Once,
and it’s about a girl who falls in love with a boy who has terminal cancer. I told Tina it seemed like kind of a bummer thing to read, but she told me she’d already read the end, and that the boy’s terminal cancer goes away. So I guess that’s okay then.

As we cleared our trays, I saw Lilly staring in my direction. It wasn’t the kind of stare someone who was about to apologize would use. So I wasn’t too surprised when later, after I got to G & T, Lilly sat there and stared at me some more. Boris kept on trying to talk to her, but she obviously wasn’t listening. Finally he gave up and picked up his violin and went back into the supply closet, where he belongs.

Meanwhile, this is how my tutoring session with Lilly’s brother went:

Me:
Hi, Michael. I did all those problems you gave me. But I still don’t see why you couldn’t just look at the train schedule to find out what time a train traveling at 67 miles per hour will arrive in Fargo, North Dakota, if it leaves Salt Lake City at 7
A.M.

Michael:
So. Princess of Genovia, huh? Were you ever going to share that little piece of info with the group, or were we all supposed to guess?

Me:
I was kind of hoping no one would ever find out.

Michael:
Well, that’s obvious. I don’t see why, though. It’s not like it’s a bad thing.

Me:
Are you kidding me? Of course it’s bad!

Michael:
Did you
read
the article in today’s
Post,
Thermopolis?

Me:
No way. I’m not going to read that trash. I don’t know who this Carol Fernandez thinks she is, but—

Then Lilly got into the act. It was like she couldn’t stand not to get involved.

Lilly:
So you’re not aware that the crown prince of Genovia—namely, your father—has a total personal worth which, including real estate property and the palace’s art collection, is estimated at over three hundred million dollars?

Well, I guess it’s pretty obvious that
Lilly
read the article in today’s
Post.

Me:
Um . . . 

Hello? Three hundred million dollars?? And I get a lousy $100 a day???

Lilly:
I wonder how much of that fortune was amassed by taking advantage of the sweat of the common laborer.

Michael:
Considering that the people of Genovia have traditionally never paid income or property taxes, I would say none of it. What is
with
you, anyway, Lil?

Lilly:
Well, if
you
want to tolerate the excesses of the monarchy, you can be my guest, Michael. But I happen to think that it’s disgusting, with the world economy in the state it’s in today, for anyone to have a total worth of three hundred million dollars . . .  especially someone who never did a day’s work for it!

Michael:
Pardon me, Lilly, but it’s my understanding that Mia’s father works extremely hard for his country. His father’s historic pledge, after Mussolini’s forces invaded in 1939, to exercise the rights of sovereignty in accordance with the political and economic interests of neighboring France in exchange for military and naval protection in the event of war might have tied the hands of a lesser politician, but Mia’s father has managed to work around that agreement. His efforts have resulted in a nation that has the highest literacy rate in Europe, some of the best educational attainment rates, and the lowest infant mortality, inflation, and unemployment rates in the Western Hemisphere.

I could only stare at Michael after that.
Wow.
Why doesn’t Grandmère teach me stuff like
that
at our princess lessons? I mean, this is information I could actually use. I don’t exactly need to know which direction to tip my soup bowl. I need to know how to defend myself from virulent antiroyalists like my ex–best friend Lilly.

Lilly:
(to Michael) Shut up. (to me) I see they already have you spouting off their populist propaganda like a good little girl.

Me: Me?
Michael’s the one who—

Michael:
Aw, Lilly, you’re just jealous.

Lilly:
I am not!

Michael:
Yes, you are. You’re jealous because she got her hair cut without consulting you. You’re jealous because you stopped talking to her and she went out and got a new friend. And you’re jealous because all this time Mia’s had this secret she didn’t tell you.

Lilly:
Michael, SHUT UP!

Boris:
(leaning out of the supply closet door) Lilly? Did you say something?

Lilly:
I WASN’T TALKING TO YOU, BORIS!

Boris:
Sorry. (goes back into closet)

Lilly:
(really mad now) Gosh, Michael, you sure are quick to come to Mia’s defense all of a sudden. I wonder if maybe it ever occurred to you that your argument, while ostensibly based on logic, might have less intellectual than libidinous roots.

Michael:
(turning red for some reason) Well, what about your persecution of the Hos? Is that rooted in intellectual reasoning? Or is it more an example of vanity run amok?

Lilly:
That’s a circular argument.

Michael:
It isn’t. It’s empirical.

Wow. Michael and Lilly are so smart. Grandmère’s right: I need to improve my vocabulary.

Michael:
(to me) So does this guy (he pointed at Lars) have to follow you around everywhere from now on?

Me:
Yes.

Michael:
Really?
Everywhere?

Me:
Everywhere except the ladies’ room. Then he waits outside.

Michael:
What if you were to go on a date? Like to the Cultural Diversity Dance this weekend?

Me:
That hasn’t exactly been an issue, considering that no one’s asked me.

Boris:
(leaning out of the supply closet) Excuse me. I accidentally knocked over a bottle of rubber cement with my bow, and it’s getting hard to breathe. Can I come out now?

Everyone in the G & T room:
NO!!!

Mrs. Hill:
(poking her head in from the hallway) What’s all this noise in here? We can hardly hear ourselves think in the teachers’ lounge. Boris, why are you in the supply closet? Come out now. Everybody else, get back to work!

I need to take a closer look at that article in today’s
Post.
Three hundred million dollars?? That’s as much as Oprah made last year!

So if we’re so rich, how come the TV in my room is only black and white?

Note to self: Look up the words
empirical
and
libidinous

Wednesday Night

No wonder my dad was so mad about Carol Fernandez’s article! When Lars and I walked out of Albert Einstein after my review session there were reporters all over the place. I am not even kidding. It was just like I was a murderer, or a celebrity, or something.

According to Mr. Gianini, who walked out with us, reporters have been arriving all day. There were vans there from New York One, Fox News, CNN,
Entertainment Tonight
—you name it. They’ve been trying to interview all the kids who go to Albert Einstein, asking them if they know me (for once, being unpopular pays off; I can’t imagine they were able to find anybody who could actually remember who I was—at least, not with my new nontriangular hair). Mr. G says Principal Gupta finally had to call the police, because Albert Einstein High is private property and the reporters were trespassing all over, dropping cigarette butts on the steps and blocking the sidewalk and leaning on Joe and stuff.

Which, if you think about it, is exactly what all the popular kids do when they hang around the school grounds after the last bell rings, and Principal Gupta never calls the cops on
them
 . . .  but then again, I guess their parents are paying tuition.

I have to say, I sort of know now how Princess Diana must have felt. I mean, when Lars and Mr. G and I came out, the reporters started trying to swarm all over, waving microphones at us and yelling stuff like, "Amelia, how about a smile?" and "Amelia, what’s it like to wake up one morning the product of a single-parent family and go to bed the next night a royal princess worth over three hundred million dollars?"

I was kind of scared. Even if I’d wanted to, I couldn’t have answered their questions, because I didn’t know which microphone to talk into. Plus I was practically rendered blind by all the flashbulbs going off in front of my face.

Then Lars went into action. You should have seen it. First, he told me not to say anything. Then he put his arm around me. He told Mr. G to put his arm around my other side. Then, I don’t know how, but we ducked our heads and barreled through all the cameras and microphones and the people attached to them, until the next thing I knew, Lars was pushing me into the backseat of my dad’s car and jumping in after me.

Hello! I guess all that training in the Israeli army paid off. (I overheard Lars telling Wahim that’s where he’d learned how to work an Uzi. Wahim and Lars actually have some mutual friends, it turns out. I guess all bodyguards go to the same training school out in the Gobi Desert.)

Anyway, as soon as Lars slammed the back door shut, he said "Drive," and the guy behind the wheel hit the gas. I didn’t recognize him, but sitting in the passenger seat beside him was my dad. And while we’re pulling away, brakes squealing, flashbulbs going off, reporters jumping onto the windshield to get a better shot, my dad goes, all casual, "So. How was your day, Mia?"

Geez!

I decided to ignore my dad. Instead, I turned around in my seat to wave good-bye to Mr. G. Only Mr. G had been swallowed up in a sea of microphones! He wouldn’t talk to them, though. He just kept waving his hands at them and trying to head for the subway, so he could take the E train home.

I felt sorry for poor Mr. Gianini then. True, he had probably stuck his tongue in my mom’s mouth, but he’s a really nice guy and doesn’t deserve to be harassed by the media.

I said so to my dad, also that we should have given Mr. G a ride home, and he just got huffy and tugged on his seat belt. He said, "Damn these things. They always choke me."

So then I asked my dad where I was going to go to school now.

My dad looked at me like I was nuts. "You said you wanted to stay at Albert Einstein!" he kind of yelled.

I said, well, yes, but that was before Carol Fernandez outed me.

Then my dad wanted to know what outing was, so I explained to him that outing is when somebody reveals your sexual orientation on national TV, or in the newspaper, or in some other large public forum. Only in this case, I explained, instead of my sexual orientation, my royal status had been revealed.

So then my dad said I couldn’t go to a new school just because I’d been outed as being a princess. He said I have to stay at Albert Einstein, and Lars will go to class with me and protect me from reporters.

So then I asked him who’ll drive him around, and he pointed to the new guy, Hans.

The new guy nodded to me in the rearview mirror and said, "Hi."

So then I said, "Lars is going to go with me everywhere I go?" Like how about if I just wanted to walk over to Lilly’s? I mean, if Lilly and I were still friends. Which is certainly never going to happen now.

And my dad said, "Lars would go with you."

So basically, I am never going anywhere alone again.

This made me kind of mad. I sat in the backseat with red from a traffic light flashing down on my face, and I said, "Okay, well, that’s it. I don’t want to be a princess anymore. You can take back your one hundred dollars a day and send Grandmère back to France. I quit."