Princess on the Brink

by Meg Cabot

  Oh my gosh! That is so sweet!

  Thanks, J.P.! I think of you that way, as well. I can’t tell you how much it means to me that you’re on my side in all of this, and not Michael’s. So many boys WOULD take his side, I think. They just don’t seem to understand that your virginity is the most precious gift you have to give to your one true love. If you waste it on someone you don’t even care about, then you have nothing to give the person you DO care about when the time comes.

  Exactly. That’s why I’ve hung on to mine.

  !!!! J.P. is a virgin!!!!!

  Wow. He and I really DO have a lot in common.

  Also…this means that Tina is wrong: He and Lilly never Did It!!!!!!!!!!

  I’m not going to tell Lilly I know the truth, though. She’s had enough disappointments for one day. I’ll let her have the fun of stringing me along for a bit longer. It’s the least I can do, considering it’s MY fault she and J.P. broke up.

  I just really hope she never realizes this.

  Friday, September 10, Precalc

  Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. Did what just happened really happen? Or did I just imagine it?

  It CAN’T have happened. Because it’s too weird to actually have taken place.

  Except…except I think it really did!

  I’m going to throw up. I really am. Why did I eat that bacon cheeseburger for lunch?

  My fingers are trembling so much I can barely write this…but I have to get it down somehow…okay, here goes:

  Now I know what Michael meant when he said he was going to come by and try to explain. He meant he was going to come to ALBERT EINSTEIN HIGH SCHOOL.

  And walk up to the door to seventh period Chemistry just as I was coming out with J.P. Only at first I didn’t notice him. Michael, I mean.

  At least, not until after J.P.—who I’m sure hadn’t noticed Michael either—went, “Friends?” to me, and I said, “Of course!” and then he said, “Hug?”

  And I was like, “Why not?” And gave him one.

  And I was so—I don’t know. MOVED by how sad J.P. was, on account of breaking up with Lilly, and all—that the next thing I knew, I was KISSING J.P.

  I only meant to kiss him on the cheek. But he moved his head. And so I ended up kissing him on the lips.

  Not like French, or anything. And only for a second.

  Still. I kissed him. On the lips.

  It wouldn’t have been any big deal—I’m sure it wouldn’t—if it hadn’t been for the fact that when I took my arms down from around his neck and turned around—all embarrassed, because I HADN’T meant to kiss him. Or at least, not exactly—there was Michael.

  Just standing there in the middle of the crowded hallway, looking stunned.

  So many things went through my head when I turned around and saw Michael standing there, staring at me. Happiness, at first, because I’m always happy when I see Michael. Then pain, when I remembered what he did to me, and how we’re broken up now. Then bewilderment, over what on earth he was doing at a school he already graduated from.

  Then I realized he was there to try to explain, like he’d texted.

  And then I saw his expression, and saw his gaze dart from my face to J.P.’s—poor J.P., who was standing there still as a statue, the hand he’d put around my waist when I’d stood on my tiptoes to kiss him still up in the air, like he’d forgotten how to move, or something!—and back again.

  And I knew EXACTLY what he was thinking.

  Then all I felt was confused. Because Michael had to think—well, that there was something going on between me and J.P.

  But it wasn’t true, of course.

  “Michael,” I said.

  But it was too late. Because he was already turning around and walking away.

  Walking away, like he’d suddenly realized he’d made a huge, colossal mistake in coming to see me at all!

  I couldn’t believe it! Apparently, I don’t even mean enough to him to stay to try to hash it out with me! He didn’t even stay to punch J.P. in the face for scamming on his girl!

  I guess because I’m not actually his girl anymore.

  Also, I guess I shouldn’t have been too surprised. I mean, when Michael saw me sexy dancing with J.P. at that party he had last year, he never said anything about it.

  But he hadn’t completely ignored me altogether afterward, either, like he’s doing now.

  Oh, God. I can’t even think about it. I thought writing about it would help, but it hasn’t. My fingers are STILL shaking as I write this. What’s happening to me? My stomach is really upset, too. It can’t be the cheeseburger; that was hours ago…plus the nurse gave me those antacids…

  WHY didn’t he SAY ANYTHING? I WAS KISSING ANOTHER MAN. You’d have thought he’d at least have said SOMETHING, even if it was only, “Good-bye, forever.”

  Good-bye, forever. Oh, God. He’s leaving tonight. Forever.

  And he looked so GOOD standing there, so tall and strong, with his neck all freshly shaved (I think. I didn’t exactly get an opportunity to go up to it and check. Or take a sniff. Oh, God! How I miss the smell of Michael’s neck! If I smelled it right now, I bet I’d stop shaking, and my stomach would stop rolling around).

  He looked so shocked—so hurt—

  Oh, God. I think I really am going to be sick….

  Friday, September 10, the limo on the way to the Four Seasons

  I was sick in the nurse’s office. Lars got me there just in time.

  I don’t know what came over me. I was just sitting there in Precalc, writing in my journal, and all of a sudden, I pictured the shocked expression on Michael’s face when I turned around from kissing J.P., and I started feeling sweaty all over, and Lars, who was sitting next to me, went, “Princess? Are you all right?” in alarm, and I said, “No,” and the next thing I knew, Lars had me by the arm and out the door and over the sink in the nurse’s office, where I threw up what looked like the entire bacon cheeseburger I scarfed down at lunch.

  Nurse Lloyd took my temperature and said it was normal but that there’s a stomach flu that is going around, and that I probably have it. She said I couldn’t stay at school, or I’d infect everyone.

  So she called the loft, but no one was there. I could have told her that. Fridays this semester Mr. G only has a half day, so he went home early. He and Mom probably headed out to New Jersey to catch whatever was showing at the five-dollar matinee, and then stop at Sam’s Club to stock up on diapers for Rocky, their half-day tradition.

  So Lars decided to take me to Grandmère’s, since he didn’t think I should be alone in the loft in my current state.

  Apparently, being ill in the company of Grandmère is preferable to being ill in my own comfy bed. I fail to see the logic in this, but I was too weak to protest.

  I didn’t have the heart to tell Nurse Lloyd that what I have isn’t the flu. What I have is too-much-meat-after-a-lifetime-of-abstaining-from-it-because-my-boyfriend-gavehis-Precious-Gift-to-someone-else-and-is-moving-to-Japan-tonight syndrome.

  But, just like with the flu, there’s no pill you can take to make that go away.

  Especially when it’s accompanied by I-just-kissed-my-best-friend’s-ex-boyfriend-and-my-ex-boyfriend-saw-me-do-it-ism.

  The saddest part of all is that the first person I wanted to call when I realized I was being booted out of school on account of being sick was…Michael. Because even just talking to Michael has always made me feel better.

  But I can’t call him. I can never call him again. Because what would I even SAY to him, after what just happened?

  It’s a really good thing this limo comes with its own barf bags.

  Friday, September 10, 3 p.m., the Four Seasons

  Grandmère is the worst person to hang around with when you aren’t feeling well. Being a cylon, she, of course, never feels sick—or at least, never remembers what it was like when she DID feel sick—and is completely lacking in compassion for anyone feeling out of sorts.

  Worse, she is WAY excited
that Michael and I broke up.

  “I always knew That Boy was trouble,” she said, all happily, when I explained what I was doing, showing up at her suite in the midafternoon, supposedly infected with a highly contagious disease. I’m not sick, Grandmère, I’d said. I’m just sad.

  Because, the problem is, I haven’t stopped loving Michael. So instead of agreeing with her that he was trouble, I was just like, “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” and went and sat on her couch, pulling Rommel onto my lap for comfort.

  Yes. That’s how far gone I was. I was looking to ROMMEL, a toy poodle, for comfort.

  “Oh, there’s nothing inherently WRONG with Michael,” Grandmère went on. “Except that he’s a commoner. Well, tell me. What did he do? It must have been something particularly heinous for you to have taken off That Necklace.”

  My hand went to the empty spot at my throat. My necklace! I hadn’t even realized how much I’d been missing it—how strange it felt not to have it on—until just then. Michael’s necklace had been a bit of a bone of contention between Grandmère and me. She always wanted me to put on the Genovian royal jewels for balls and functions I attended, but I would never take Michael’s necklace off, and let’s just say Grandmère isn’t a fan of the layered necklace look.

  Well, I guess a silver snowflake on a chain doesn’t exactly go with a diamond-and-sapphire choker.

  I figured there was no point in hiding the truth from Grandmère, since she’d weasel it out of me somehow. So I went, “He slept with Judith Gershner.”

  Grandmère looked delighted. Well, she WOULD.

  “Cheated on you! Well, never mind. Plenty of fish in the sea. What about that nice boy who was in my play, the Reynolds-Abernathy boy? He’d make a lovely consort for you. Such a nice young man. So tall and blond and handsome!”

  I just ignored that. What could I have said in reply? Sometimes I wonder if lunacy runs in the family.

  Actually, I KNOW it does.

  Instead, I said, “Michael didn’t cheat on me. He slept with Judith Gershner before we started going out.”

  “Is she that horse fly girl?” Grandmère wanted to know. “I can see why you’d be upset about that. Those horrible black tennis shoes!”

  “Grandmère.” Seriously. What is WRONG with her? “It’s not about how she LOOKS. It’s that Michael LIED to me about it. I asked him if they were going out, and he said no. Plus, he didn’t even LOVE her. What kind of person gives his Precious Gift to someone he doesn’t even LOVE?”

  Grandmère just looked at me. She seemed confused. “His precious what?”

  “GIFT.” God, she can be so dense. “HIS PRECIOUS GIFT. You only have ONE. And he gave his to JUDITH GERSHNER, a girl he didn’t even CARE about. He should have waited. He should have given it to ME.”

  I didn’t mention the part about how he’d just caught me kissing another boy. Because it didn’t really seem to pertain to the matter at hand.

  Grandmère just looked more confused. “Was this gift some kind of family heirloom? Because the rules of etiquette dictate that when a young man gives you a family heirloom, it is only yours to keep for the duration of the relationship, and must be returned in the event of the dissolution of the engagement.”

  “His Precious Gift isn’t a RING, Grandmère,” I said, fighting for patience. “His Precious Gift is his VIRGINITY.”

  Grandmère blinked at me. “His virginity? Virginity is no GIFT. You can’t even WEAR it!”

  “Grandmère,” I said. I can’t believe she is so behind the times. Well, it’s not surprising she has no idea what I’m talking about. I was listening to “Dance, Dance” on my iPod the other day and she overheard it and said it was “catchy” and asked who sang it and when I said Fall Out Boy, she accused me of lying and said no one would name a band something that stupid. I tried to explain that the name came from Bart on the show The Simpsons, and she was just like, “BART WHO? Do you mean WALLIS SIMPSON? She didn’t have a relative named Bart. That I know of.”

  See? She’s hopeless.

  “Your virginity is a Precious Gift you are supposed to give only to a person whom you love,” I explained slowly, so she’d understand. “Only Michael gave his to Judith Gershner, a girl he didn’t love and with whom, in fact, he says he was only ‘messing around.’ So now he has no gift to give me, the girl he professes to love, because he SQUANDERED his gift on someone he didn’t even care about.”

  Grandmère shook her head. “That Miss Gershner did you a FAVOR, young lady. You should be kissing her feet. No woman wants an inexperienced lover. Well, except apparently all these young blond female teachers I keep seeing on the news, who are sleeping with their fourteen-year-old male students. But I must say, they all appear to be mentally unhinged to me. What on earth do they TALK to these young boys about? Because it certainly isn’t why their trousers are falling down. Tell me, Amelia, why IS that considered so fashionable? What is so appealing about a young man whose pants are halfway down to his knees?”

  I could think of no reply to this. Because what can you even SAY to that?

  “In any case,” Grandmère went on, not even noticing I hadn’t said anything, “isn’t That Boy moving to Japan anyway?”

  “Yes,” I said. And as usual, my heart twisted at the sound of the word Japan. Just proving that:

  a) I still have a heart, and

  b) I still love Michael, despite all my efforts not to. I mean, how could I not?

  “Well, what does it matter, then?” Grandmère asked cheerfully. “You’ll probably never see him again.”

  That’s when I burst into tears.

  Grandmère was pretty alarmed at this development. I mean, I was just sitting there, wailing. Even Rommel put his ears back and started whining. I don’t know what would have happened if my dad hadn’t walked in just then.

  “Mia!” he said when he saw me. “What are you doing here so early? And what’s the matter? Why on earth are you crying?”

  But I just shook my head. On account of how I couldn’t stop crying.

  “She broke up with That Boy,” Grandmère had to shout, in order to be heard over my sobs. “I don’t know what she’s carrying on that way for. I told her it’s all for the best. She’d be much better off with the Abernathy-Reynolds boy. Such a tall, handsome young man! And his father’s so rich!”

  This just made me cry harder, remembering how I’d kissed J.P. in the hallway, right in front of Michael. I hadn’t meant to, of course—but what did that matter? The damage was done. Michael was never going to speak to me again. I just knew it.

  The fact that I so desperately wanted him to, in spite of everything that had happened between us, was what was making me cry hardest of all.

  “I think I know what she needs,” Grandmère went on, as I continued to wail.

  “Her mother?” Dad asked hopefully.

  Grandmère shook her head. “Bourbon. Does the trick every time.”

  Dad frowned. “I think not. But you might have your maid ring for some hot tea. Maybe that will help.”

  Grandmère didn’t look very hopeful, but she went off to get Jeanne to ring for tea, while Dad stood there, looking down at me. My dad’s not really used to seeing me cry like that. I mean, I’ve cried in front of him plenty of times—most recently over the summer when we were at a state function at the palace and I walked into a low-hanging roof beam while wearing my tiara and the combs dug into my head like tiny knives.

  But he is not used to me having dramatic emotional outbursts, because for the most part over the past few years, with a few notable exceptions, things have been going fairly well, and I have been able to keep it together.

  Until now.

  I just kept on bawling, and reaching for tissues from the box on the end table by the couch. In between wails, it all kind of poured out, about the Precious Gift and Judith Gershner and the snowflake necklace and how Michael had come to school to see me and instead saw me kissing J.P.

  I have to admit, Dad loo
ked pretty stunned. I don’t really talk about, you know, sex with my dad, because, um, ew.

  And I could tell the Precious Gift thing was freaking him out, because he sank down onto the end of the couch like he had kind of lost the ability to stand up. And he just sat there listening to me until I finally wound down and couldn’t talk anymore and was just sitting there, blowing my nose, the worst of the tears over.

  Only when I’d cleaned up most of the snot from my face did Dad think of something to say. And when he did, it was NOT what I was expecting.

  “Mia,” Dad said somberly. “I think you’re making a mistake.”

  I couldn’t believe it! I’d basically just told him that Michael is a man-slut! You would think my own father would want me to stay far away from a man-slut! What was he TALKING about, a mistake?

  “True romantic love really doesn’t come around that often,” he went on. “When it does, it’s foolish to throw it away because of some silly thing the object of your affections did before the two of you were even dating.”

  I just stared at him. I don’t think it was my imagination that he looked so much like the elf king in The Lord of the Rings.

  If the elf king had been totally bald, I mean.

  “It’s even more foolish to let someone you feel that strongly about go—at least, not without a fight. That’s something I did once,” Dad went on, after clearing his throat. “And I’ve always regretted it, because the truth is, I never met anyone I felt that way about ever again. I don’t want to see you make my same mistake, Mia. So think—really think—about what you’re doing. I wish I had.”

  Then he got up to leave for his meeting at the UN.

  I just sat there, completely stunned. Was that speech supposed to have HELPED me? Because it so didn’t.

  Dad should have just gotten Lars to shoot me. That’s the only way I’ll ever be put out of this misery.

  Friday, September 10, the Four Seasons