Princess on the Brink

by Meg Cabot

  God, I wish that were all true.

  Michael! My cherished preserver!

  Friday, September 10, 3 a.m., the loft

  Dear Michael,

  I just wanted to say—

  Dear Michael,

  Why did you have to—

  Dear Michael,

  WHY????

  Friday, September 10, 4 a.m., the loft

  Michael! My hope! My love! My life!

  Friday, September 10, the limo on the way to school

  I can’t believe Mom made me go to school today.

  I told her my heart was broken. I told her I hadn’t slept A WINK ALL NIGHT LONG. I told her I can’t stop crying. I haven’t stopped crying since last night, practically. I had no idea human beings were even CAPABLE of producing so many tears.

  It was like talking to a stone wall. Mom was all, “You broke up with Michael, Mia, not the other way around. No way are you going to wallow around in bed all day.”

  It’s weird but…it’s almost like she’s on MICHAEL’S side, or something.

  But that can’t be possible, right? I mean, she’s MY mom, not HIS.

  Still. She even made ME call Lilly and tell her to find alternative transportation to school this morning. She refused to do it for me, even though I begged, because I was afraid Michael might see it was me on the caller ID, and pick up instead.

  I feel bad leaving Lilly in the lurch without a ride, but NO WAY can I face Michael this morning. And I know he will TOTALLY be waiting in front of their building for me, because he left me an e-mail to that effect this morning, which said:

  SKINNERBX: I still don’t understand what I did wrong. How is my having slept with someone before I even knew you liked me a crime? I don’t get it.

  I guess I can see why you’re upset about the Japan thing, but I don’t know how many times I have to explain that one of the reasons I’m doing this is for US before it sinks in. Lilly said Boris said something about clarinetists at lunch the other day, so I guess that’s where that came from, but I still don’t understand it. But if you want to see other people while I’m gone, I guess I’m fine with that. Maybe it would even be a good thing.

  Look, we have to talk, okay? I’ll be waiting with Lilly out front before school. Maybe we could grab a coffee?

  I HAD to call Lilly (on her cell, so there was no chance of getting Michael by mistake) and was all, “Lilly? I can’t come pick you up today.”

  “POG?” Lilly sounded suspicious. “Is that you?”

  “Y-yes,” I said.

  “Wait—are you CRYING?”

  “Y-yes,” I said. Because I was.

  “WHAT is going on?” Lilly wanted to know. “What did you do to my brother? I’ve never seen him like this. Did you really dump him? Because he says you did.”

  “He—he—”

  But it was hopeless. I couldn’t speak. I was crying too hard.

  “Jesus, Mia,” Lilly said, actually seeming concerned about me for once in her life. “You sound even worse than he does. WHAT IS GOING ON?”

  “I c-can’t talk right now,” I said. Because I literally couldn’t talk, I was crying so hard.

  “Fine,” Lilly said. “But, Mia…seriously, I don’t know what this is about, but you’re breaking his heart. The only reason I’m not coming over there and kicking your ass for it is because I can tell your heart isn’t doing so well, either. But seriously, you have to talk to him. Just talk to him. I’m sure whatever it is, you two can work it out, if you just TALK. Okay?”

  I couldn’t reply, though. I was crying too hard.

  If I could have said something, though, I’d have said, “It’s too late, Lilly. There’s nothing left to say.”

  Because there isn’t.

  I miss him so much. And he hasn’t even left yet.

  Friday, September 10, Intro to Creative Writing

  ME, A PRINCESS???? YEAH, RIGHT.

  A Screenplay by Mia Thermopolis

  (second draft)

  Scene 12

  INT/DAY—The Palm Court at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. A flat-chested girl with upside-down-yield-sign-shaped hair (14-year-old MIA THERMOPOLIS) is sitting at an ornately set table across from a bald man (her father, PRINCE PHILLIPE). We can tell by MIA’s expression that her father is telling her something upsetting.

  PRINCE PHILLIPE

  You’re not Mia Thermopolis anymore, honey.

  MIA

  (blinking with astonishment)

  I’m not? Then who am I?

  PRINCE PHILLIPE

  You’re Amelia Mignonette Grimaldi Thermopolis Renaldo, Princess of Genovia.

  MIA

  (getting up from the table, pulling an Uzi from her backpack)

  Dad, look out!

  NINJAS descend from the ceiling on ropes. MIA kicks over the table, sending the tea things flying. Then she strafes the room with bullets from her Uzi. TOURISTS and WAITERS dive for cover. Her dad, terrified, ducks behind a potted plant. MIA throws down the Uzi, which has jammed, and kickboxes the NINJAS, dispatching them one by one, à la River in the movie SERENITY.

  Finally, the room is still, all NINJAS unconscious. One by one, the TOURISTS and WAITERS climb to their feet. One of them begins to clap, slowly. He is joined by everyone else. Soon, MIA is receiving a standing ovation for her bravery.

  MIA walks up to PHILLIPE and sticks out her right hand to help him to his feet. He hesitantly takes it. She pulls him up.

  PRINCE PHILLIPE

  (gratefully)

  Mia—where did you learn to—

  MIA

  (matter-of-factly)

  I’ve been working as a highly trained demon-killer for the Vatican for years, Dad. Didn’t you know?

  PRINCE PHILLIPE

  I didn’t know. I was wrong about you, Mia. You’re not just a princess.

  MIA

  No, Dad. No, I’m not.

  F

  Mia, while this is highly imaginative, in no way does it satisfy the assignment, which was to describe a beloved pet.

  —C. Martinez

  Friday, September 10, English

  Are you okay?

  I guess so, Tina. Thanks.

  You look kind of…pale. And your eyes are red.

  Yeah. Well. I didn’t get much sleep last night.

  Have you spoken to him yet? Michael, I mean?

  No. Not in person.

  Hasn’t he called? Or texted?

  Well, yes. But I haven’t written back. How can I, Tina? What is there to SAY?

  True. But if he apologized, wouldn’t you forgive him?

  He’s not going to apologize, Tina. He doesn’t think he did anything wrong!!!

  But this can’t be IT. I mean, it can’t be OVER between you two. You love each other too much!!!!!

  Michael himself said—in one of the e-mails he sent—that maybe it’s better this way. You know, that we see other people while he’s gone.

  HE SAID THAT????

  Well, he didn’t say HE was going to see other people, but that it was okay with him if I wanted to.

  Wait—he really SAID that?

  Yes. He did. Well, he said he guessed it HAD to be okay.

  Oh, Mia! I don’t know how to say this but—do you think maybe Your Precious Gift is wrong? Because in my favorite romance novels—The Sheik and the Virgin Secretary and The Sheik and the Princess Bride—none of the sheiks were virgins, and it all turned out okay for them and THEIR girlfriends.

  I didn’t want to write what I wrote next. Really. It HURT me to say it. But someone HAD to. Because Tina just can’t live in Tinaland for the rest of her life. She just can’t.

  Tina. Those are BOOKS.

  But Tina wasn’t backing down.

  Your Precious Gift is a BOOK. How come it’s right, and not the sheik books?

  Tina. None of the sheiks in those books Did It with Judith Gershner and then LIED about it, okay? None of the sheiks in those books invented a robotic surgical arm and are leaving for Japan for a year. Or mo
re. And if they were, they’d take their virgin secretary princess bride WITH THEM.

  I know. I just think maybe you should give Michael another chance.

  How can I do that? Every time I think about him now, all I can picture in my head is Judith Gershner with her tongue in his mouth. And that is the LEAST disgusting thing I picture the two of them doing.

  Yes. I felt that way when I found out about Lilly and Boris. But it goes away after a while, Mia. Really. In a few days you won’t see Judith Gershner in your head anymore when you think about Michael.

  Thanks, Tina. I see what you’re saying. I really do. But the problem is, in a few days—no, in a few HOURS—Michael will be gone. Possibly forever!

  Mia! Oh my gosh, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to make you cry!

  It’s not you, Tina. It’s me. I just—I just—

  Mia, it’s okay. You don’t have to write another word. I’ll shut up now.

  God. How can it have come to this—me sitting in English class, CRYING???

  In a way I wish Michael WAS a sheik, and I was his virgin secretary or princess bride. I know it’s not very feminist of me to think that.

  But if he whisked me off to his tent in the desert instead of moving to Japan, at least I’d know he really cared.

  Friday, September 10, French

  Mia! Is it true?

  Yes, Perin. It’s true that Michael admitted he had sex with Judith Gershner and he’s moving to Japan and he and I are broken up. I feel really terrible about it and I don’t want to start crying in French, so can we not talk about it?

  Um, no. I meant is it true that you would know what to do if a tsunami hit New York City?

  Oh. Yes, that’s true, too.

  I’m sorry about you and Michael. I didn’t know. So I guess you’re single now?

  I never thought of it before. But, yeah, I guess I am.

  Want to sleep over tonight?

  Oh, thanks for the invitation, Perin, but I think I’m just going to go home and go to bed. I’m not really doing all that great, to tell you the truth.

  Okay. Well, feel better!

  Thanks!

  Qu’est-ce que c’est que le mérite incroyable d’une femme, vous demandez? Selon la chaine douze, le mérite incroyable d’une femme est sa capacité de nourrir ses enfants. Une femme avec une carrière? Ça, c’est une femme qui n’adore pas ses enfants, ou son mari. Elle n’est pas une chrétienne! Elle est une serveuse du diable!

  Mes camarades et moi nous nous sommes regardés les unes les autres. Nous avons changés le chaine. Et juste a l’heure!

  117+76=only 193!!!!!! I need 7 more words!

  Oh, wait…the title. AND MY NAME:

  Une Emission Pleine d’Action par

  Amelia Mignonette Grimaldi Renaldo Thermopolis

  YES!!!!

  At least SOMETHING is going my way today.

  Friday, September 10, between French and Lunch

  My cell phone just buzzed. Michael left the following text message:

  MICHAELM: At least let me come by and try to explain. Even though that won’t be easy because I’m still not clear on what, exactly, I did that was so wrong.

  What is he talking about, come by and try to explain? How can he come by and try to explain? I’m in SCHOOL.

  And how can he still not know what he did wrong?????

  Friday, September 10, Lunch

  You know what? I don’t care. LET them stare at me. This is the most delicious thing I’ve ever eaten in this cafeteria. If I’d known the cheeseburgers were this good, as a matter of fact, I’d have started eating them a long time ago.

  And you know what? I don’t even care. I mean, I still feel bad for the animals, and stuff.

  But in a way it’s like…well, tough luck for them. The world is an unfair place. Sometimes you’re the windshield. Sometimes you’re the bug.

  That’s from a song my mom likes.

  If there is such a thing as reincarnation, I’ll probably come back as a cow, and I’ll spend my whole life in a tiny stall I can barely move around in, and eventually someone will come around and bonk me on the head and then skin me and make my skin into a leather miniskirt and the rest of me into hamburger and a girl whose boyfriend gave his Precious Gift to Judith Gershner will eat me, and that will just be too bad for me. It’s the circle of life, baby.

  Wow. I guess I’m a total nihilist now.

  Lilly seems to think so. And she can’t seem to believe it.

  “A burger?” She just kept staring at my tray. “You’re eating a CHEESEBURGER?”

  “I don’t care anymore,” I said. Because it’s true. I don’t. About anything. Being a nihilist, and all.

  “You and my brother,” she said, “get into one fight, and you break up with him and start eating meat? He’s right. You HAVE lost your mind.”

  I put my burger down at that one.

  “He SAID that?” I demanded. I didn’t care that we were having this discussion in front of the whole lunch crowd—J.P., Boris, Ling Su, Tina, Perin. Why should I? I don’t care about anything anymore. “Michael said I’ve lost my mind?”

  “Basically,” Lilly said. “And the fact that you’re sitting there eating a cheeseburger proves it. You haven’t eaten meat since you were six years old!”

  “Well, maybe it’s time I started,” I said. “Maybe if I’d been getting more protein this whole time, I wouldn’t have made so many boneheaded decisions.”

  “Which one of your many are you referring to?” Lilly asked acidly.

  “Hey, Lilly,” J.P. said, quietly but firmly. “Cut it out.”

  Lilly looked startled. She isn’t used to J.P. butting in on her conversations with me. Because he’s never done it before.

  But it was too late. Because my eyes were already filling up with tears. Again.

  I guess I’m not a nihilist after all.

  “If he thinks I’ve lost my mind,” I said to Lilly, barely able to contain a sob, “then he doesn’t get it AT ALL. I HAVEN’T lost my mind. I just can’t DEAL with it anymore.”

  “Deal with what?” Lilly wanted to know. “Having a guy who loves you so much that while you were off in Genovia this summer, he invented this fantastic thing that could change the face of medical history as we know it, just so he could prove he was good enough to be with you, only to have you slap him in the face when he explained that in order to get the thing off the ground he has to go away for a while?”

  I just glared at her, even though it was kind of hard to see her through my tears.

  “That’s not it,” I said, “and you know it.”

  “Oh, wait, I know. Is it because all these months he didn’t tell you about something he KNEW you wouldn’t understand and would go bananas over, because it is in your nature to go bananas over the littlest things, and he wanted to spare you?”

  “What he did,” I said, a catch in my voice, “wasn’t LITTLE—”

  “Oh, spare me,” Lilly spat. “Tina told me about that stupid book her aunt gave her. Are you really so ignorant that you don’t know that this whole ‘Precious Gift’ crap started off as men’s way of controlling females so that they could limit their number of sexual partners, and therefore ensure the legitimacy of their own offspring?”

  “Hold on,” I said, glaring at her. Which was hard to do, considering the tears that were causing my nose to feel prickly. “There is NOTHING wrong with waiting to have sex until you can do it with someone you love.”

  “Of course there’s not,” Lilly said. “You’re totally entitled to that belief. But CONDEMNING someone who doesn’t necessarily SHARE that belief? That’s no better than those fundamentalist judges in Iran who condemn women to be buried up to their necks in sand and have rocks thrown at their heads. Because any way you look at it, that’s YOU punishing someone for not sharing YOUR morals.”

  The tears totally came with that one. I mean, seriously. Comparing ME to one of those evil fundamentalist judges?

  But Lilly wouldn’t let up.

/>   “Why don’t you just admit what this whole fight with Michael is REALLY about, Mia?” she snarled. “You’re mad because Michael won’t do what you want and stay in New York to be your little lapdog. Because he has a mind of his own and he wants to use it to make a LIFE of his own. THAT’s what this is all about. And DON’T try to deny it.”

  That’s when J.P. got up, grabbed Lilly by the arm, and said, “Come on. We’re going for a walk,” and dragged her out of the cafeteria.

  And that’s also when I started to cry in earnest. Not sobbing or anything. Just quietly weeping, over the remains of my burger.

  Yes. I am a pathetic crying meat-eater now.

  Boris patted me on the shoulder and said, “Don’t cry, Mia. I think you’re doing the right thing. Long-distance relationships never work. Better to make a clean break of it, like this.”

  “Boris,” Tina said, sounding exasperated.

  “No,” I said. “He’s right.”

  Because he is.

  I just wish he wasn’t.

  Also that I was dead.

  I just went and got some bacon to put on my cheeseburger.