Who Made You a Princess?

by Shelley Adina

  “Um, isn’t that the point of Second Life? To not be alive?”

  “You should see it. It’s called Due.” She pronounced it the Italian way, “doo-ay.” “Every table has a flat screen embedded in it, and it makes an avatar of you when you sign in and sit down. Then if you want to ask someone to dance, you send your avatar over. If they turn you down, no harm, no foul. You can order and send drinks and food that way and everything.”

  “Huh.” It did sound cool. “Do you have to be a member?”

  “You swipe a card so they can activate your avatar, but it’s not like Cream. I mean, stuffy much?”

  I laughed. “Good point.”

  “It’s just fun, you know? And I can use some fun right now.”

  “Why, what’s going on?” She looked just the same. She’d pulled her hair straight back in a cute retro hair band, so her curls fell down her back, but that was about it.

  “If you’d stick around for more than two seconds, you’d know. Mac and I got our subpoenas on Saturday.”

  “Oh, my gosh.”

  Carly began to walk down the corridor. In between smiles and people saying hey, she gave me the scoop. “David Nelson had his preliminary hearing in the summer, right? So we knew this was coming because he pleaded not guilty, if you can believe it. Mac and I have to testify next week.”

  “Are you scared?”

  “Not really. Well, yeah, sort of. I never met the guy, just saw him from a distance. It’s Mac I’m worried about.”

  “I can’t see her being scared of anything.”

  “She is, though. Underneath. Her mom’s coming, but I don’t know how much that’ll help.”

  “Wow. Good thing she has us.”

  Carly nodded as we went into our classroom. “And it’s a good thing we have God.”

  Okay. Some of us had God, at least.

  Did she have to bring that up?

  VTalbot Can’t wait for Saturday. How’s the guest list coming?

  EOverton Still working on it.

  VTalbot It’s Tuesday. You should have it nailed down by now.

  EOverton Maybe you’d like to take care of it yourself?

  VTalbot At this rate I’ll have to. How many solid? I want to make sure Cream has enough tables and their event planner is briefed.

  EOverton 20.

  VTalbot You have to be kidding. What have you been doing all this time? Eating?

  EOverton We’ll have 100 by Friday. Promise.

  RASHID INCLINED HIS HEAD toward the table by the window, and Farrouk carried our plates over and set them down.

  “Rashid,” I said, “there’s something you should know about this table.”

  “I have sat here many times.” He pulled out a chair for me and waited.

  “Yeah, when Vanessa invited you. No one sits here except her and her friends.”

  “No one tells the Prince of Yasir that he cannot sit here or there.” He raised an eyebrow at the chair and then at me.

  I sat. When Vanessa showed up, he could deal with her. Meanwhile…I waved as Brett and Carly put their plates down at a place across the room. And picked them up again. And walked over to us.

  “Hey.” Brett pulled out a chair for Carly and waited. Wow. Had Rashid been giving him lessons?

  Carly hesitated and glanced at me. “You know we’re not going to get away with this. I totally don’t feel like a scene right now.”

  Mac joined us. “Tsk-tsk. Aren’t we brave?”

  “What are you two talking about?” Brett wanted to know.

  “Vanessa and Emily and that crowd are going to kill us,” Carly said. “You know it, I know it, and everyone in this room knows it.”

  Rashid frowned at her. “I think you overrate their importance.”

  ”They aren’t that bad,” Brett said. “I’ll protect you.”

  “I don’t need protecting,” I told him. “But you have to admit these tables are divided up by cliques. And Vanessa’s has the most clout.”

  “Some of us don’t care,” Mac observed, picking up her hot prosciutto and Gruyère panini sandwich. “I say we give them a challenge.”

  “I say we’re about to,” Carly murmured. “Look who just walked in.”

  It had probably never occurred to Vanessa and her friends to pick a backup table in case theirs was full. In the nearly four years I’ve been going here, that has never happened, not even once. The A-list had their table by the window, and that was that—an immutable law of the universe, like gravity or photosynthesis.

  So when they turned with their plates and saw us sitting there, chatting and laughing and pretending we hadn’t seen them, the identical OMG faces were almost laughworthy.

  “Rashid, Brett, how cool that you’re joining us,” Vanessa said, without wasting a single flick of an eyelash on any of us girls. Until she got to me. “Excuse me, you’re sitting in my chair.”

  I straightened, ready to leap up and get in her face if I had to. Vive la révolution.

  Rashid put his hand on my forearm. “I have invited Shani to sit here.”

  Vanessa’s long-lashed brown eyes rested on me just long enough to convey the message that life as I knew it was over. Still, she couldn’t argue with the fact that the prince was on the A-list by her invitation, and I was there by his. Her gaze tracked to Rashid’s other side, where Carly took another bite of her panini and turned to Brett.

  “These are really good. I got the cranberry and Brie one. What did you get?”

  Carrying her plate, Vanessa walked around to Carly’s chair while Emily and Dani Lavigne looked torn between eating their lunches standing up or pre-empting Vanessa’s victory by pulling out the empty chairs in front of them. In any case, their sandwiches could only be getting cold.

  Not that I was wasting any sympathy.

  “Excuse me, Carolyn,” Vanessa said. “I’d like to talk to Rashid. Privately.” Carly took another bite and didn’t answer. “Carolyn. Did you hear me?”

  Carly swallowed and looked over her shoulder, surprised. “There’s no one named Carolyn here. Who were you talking to?”

  “You, obviously. I hate when people play stupid for effect.”

  “It’s better than actually being stupid,” Carly said, as though she and Vanessa were having a real conversation. “I know you know my name. It’s cheap to pretend you don’t.”

  I had a hard time keeping my jaw from hitting the glossy hardwood tabletop. Mac and I were one thing. I kinda had a rep for not mincing words, and Mac had no filters at all. But since when did Carly take on Spencer’s social queen? And check out the ’tude. As in, none. She was as calm and cool as if they were discussing the insides of their sandwiches. More. At least with the sandwich, she sounded interested in the answer.

  “It’s cheap to pretend you didn’t hear what I asked you,” Vanessa retorted. “I want to sit there.”

  “That will make your situation at present more pitiable, but it will have no effect on me.”

  It took me a second to realize she was channeling Elizabeth Bennet. I bit my lip to keep from laughing and glanced across the table at Lissa, who had just done a hip swivel around Emily and taken the chair opposite Carly. Her face stayed expressionless, but I could clearly see Go, girl! in her dancing eyes.

  “Give it a rest, Van,” Brett said. “Pull up a chair if you want, but don’t go kicking people out. That’s subzero.”

  “Easy for you to say,” she snapped. “I kicked you out months ago.”

  “Best thing that ever happened to me.” He gave Carly the kind of smile that a girl can only dream about, and squeezed her shoulders.

  “Hey Gillian, Jeremy,” Carly said as they pulled up the chairs right in front of Emily and Dani and put their plates down. “Feel free to join us, Vanessa. There’s a seat on the end, there. But it looks like Emily and Dani might have to go somewhere else.”

  “You snooze, you lose,” Gillian said cheerfully, and bit into her sandwich. “Everyone ready for their thirdterms?”

  Li
ssa and I jumped in with groans of dismay. Hey, I was prepped. I had a nasty paper to write for World Lit, but Lissa would help me with that. And calculus was never a picnic, but then, when is it ever for anyone?

  “Dani, Emily, there’s the rowing team,” Vanessa said just loud enough to override us. “I’m ready for a change. Let’s sit with people who are interesting, at least.”

  Emily looked from Rashid to Brett to the table where the rowing team was joshing and pushing and it looked like a food fight would break out any minute. Only the really brave sat with the jocks—when they weren’t diluted by girls—because the risk was real. Then again, I’d bet on Vanessa against a whole boatload of jocks any day.

  Emily reached for the chair on the end. “I—I think I’m going to stay here. I want to talk to Gillian about something.”

  “I already told you, I’m too busy to tutor,” Gillian told her.

  Emily looked crushed and kind of pale. “N-not about that.”

  “Whatever it is, you don’t really need to know now,” Vanessa said. “Come on.”

  Emily’s spine wilted. “Okay.”

  The two of them trailed Vanessa over to the jocks’ table, where they were greeted by a cheer. Someone affectionately stole Emily’s sandwich and pretended to eat it. Since the poor kid is, um, spatially challenged, hinting that she didn’t need it wasn’t the most tactful thing to do. But no one’s ever accused Tate and his jock buddies of being that evolved.

  Lissa looked across the table at us. “What just happened?”

  “They have found another place to eat.” Maybe it was the language thing, or maybe Rashid took things literally all the time.

  “Something’s going on,” I said. “Changes.”

  “We’re sitting at the A-listers’ table.” Lissa repeated the obvious as though she couldn’t quite believe it. I half expected her to knock on it to make sure it was real. “Vanessa just gave up her table to us.”

  “I think she gave it up to Rashid and Brett,” Gillian said. “Temporarily. Supper will be a different story. You watch.”

  “I fully intend to sit here at supper,” Rashid put in. “Vanessa was kind enough to invite me to join her and her friends the first evening, so I will invite her to join me and mine.”

  “Not to backtalk you or anything,” I said, “but she’ll probably send someone to stake it out long before you get here. Like the rowing team.”

  “Not,” Brett put in laconically. “I’m the captain. If I say don’t, they won’t. And we have crew down at Foster City this afternoon. If we get back before the doors close, that’ll be a stretch.”

  Jeremy stood with his empty plate. “I’ve gotta go look up some stuff for my World Lit paper in the library. Hey, speaking of, Lissa, what’s this about the Hearst medal?”

  Her pale skin warmed to a flush. “Curzon called me into her office before core class today.”

  I looked from one to the other. “Curzon had news about the Hearst medal? And you didn’t tell us, why?”

  “I was going to as soon as I came in, but got sidetracked by drama.”

  Gillian hugged her from behind. “She’s a finalist, guys! Ten people in the whole state and she’s one of them!”

  “What is this medal?” Rashid wanted to know, amid shrieks from Carly and me.

  “It’s only open to the Honors English classes,” I explained breathlessly. “You have to write an essay on some horrific topic—ten thousand words. You might as well write a book.”

  “It felt like a book,” Lissa admitted. “But it wasn’t horrific. I did it on the literary tradi-tion of courtship in dance and dialogue, starting with Jane Austen and ending with Helen Fielding.”

  “Like I said. Horrific.” I could feel my face stretching into a grimace even as I joined the rest to hug her in congratulations. “So, where are we going to celebrate?”

  “Due, of course,” Lissa said. “Saturday night, eight o’clock. All of you must come. No exceptions. Dress code: Glam To The Max.”

  I looked at Rashid. Cream? Tier-one pass? Hello?

  He was smiling at her. “I will have a limousine for all of us at the door at seven thirty.” He glanced at Bashir, standing next to the window. “See to it.”

  Bashir nodded. Once.

  “I already invited everyone in my English class,” Lissa said. “Feel free to invite whoever you want. It’s opening night—it’ll be crazy and fun.”

  It was opening night at Cream, too, and I’d overheard DeLayne Geary raving about how they were going all out for Vanessa’s party. Total media coverage. Maybe a Hollywood celebrity or two.

  Two places. Two opening nights.

  Would the real A-list party please stand up?

  Chapter 12

  AT SUPPER, AS PROMISED, the rowing team did not show up until about 6:45. Fortunately, the doors hadn’t been closed yet, so at least they got fed. But it meant Brett wasn’t there to anchor our little group of social rebels, and Mac and I couldn’t talk the others into making a point of it.

  So Vanessa won Round 2.

  She also won dinner with Rashid, who refused to take his plate over to where we were sitting. Well, I refused to stay there with him. I’m no dummy. I was going to have to endure an entire school year with Vanessa, whereas he’d be flitting off to the desert at the end of term, where none of us would ever see him again.

  It’s not like I’m afraid of her or anything, but you do the math.

  “I insist you sit with me,” he told me, putting a hand on my arm to stop me. “I command it.”

  Okay, I’m not a computer. I don’t do commands well. I shook off his hand. “Just because you kissed me doesn’t give you the right to command me. We’re in America now.”

  “But I—”

  “I’ll see you later, Rashid.”

  “When later? In the common room after dinner?”

  “No, I’ma go to prayer circle. I don’t know when. Probably tomorrow in class.”

  “But Shani—”

  I don’t think it’s proper protocol to turn your back on a prince and walk away. But I was so steamed that I did it anyway.

  Command. Hmph.

  And then all I got was a stomachache from stress—or maybe the faux Szechuan food Dining Services dished up did it. Gillian spent the dinner hour happily dissing their cooking skills while I watched Rashid practically cheek-to-cheek with Vanessa, no doubt discussing the finer properties of kinetic energy.

  Snarl.

  At prayer circle, Lissa came armed with her laptop, which made me perk up a little. Sure enough, Danyel had made another video of his prayer. For some reason, this calmed me down and I could focus on finding some peace instead of feeling all mad and jangly inside, like a band playing together for the first time who can’t quite find the beat.

  When my turn came, I hesitated. Now, normally I’d just smile and say, “Pass.” everyone’s used to it, but they still pause for a second and wait, just because.

  Next to me, Lissa waited the usual couple of seconds and then I heard her inhale.

  “God?” I blurted, as much to my own surprise as everyone else’s. “God, I have no idea if you’re out there listening to me, but these guys say you are. They say that if I just talk to You, You’ll answer. Okay. I’m talking. I’m dealing with a lot of stress and a lot of things are bugging me. If You can give me a hand with that, I’ll be glad. Thanks.” I paused. What did they say to wrap it up? Oh, yeah. “Amen.”

  It took Lissa a second to speak. I guess she was recovering from the surprise. Anyway, she swallowed and began to pray, and then Gillian and Carly followed her. When we were done, Carly came over and hugged me, hard.

  “Kinda surprised, huh,” I mumbled.

  “Does this mean you want to give your life to God?” she asked.

  “No!” I made “go away” motions with my hands. “Nein. Non. Nada. It doesn’t mean anything. I need a little extra help, that’s all, and you guys say this is the way to get it. I’m just giving it a try. Don’t read anyt
hing into it.”

  “God might read something into it.” Gillian was smiling like she knew something I didn’t. Which, on every other subject, is probably true. “You might start something He’s going to finish.”

  “I’ll leave that up to Him.” Time to change the subject. “Who’s up for Starbucks?”

  Gillian, Jeremy, and Lissa waved their hands. Carly shook her head. “I’m going to walk over to Brett’s with him. His mom made zabaglione and wants us to eat most of it so she won’t.”

  The four of us wandered down the hill in the twilight. It was still warm, but on the edges of the air, you could feel that fall was going to arrive any second. We were still two blocks from Starbucks when my phone rang.

  “You guys go ahead. It’s Danyel.”

  I flipped it open and leaned against a convenient garden wall cleverly designed to look as if it had been hand-chipped in Italy. “Hey. Didn’t I just see you?”

  His smile overflowed into his voice. “Lissa let me join you, huh? I never know if that girl is going to keep the lid on me or not.”

  “She’d never do that. It’s kind of neat. You should get Kaz to do it, too.”

  “He’s too shy.”

  “Why? Doesn’t he pray in church?”

  “Not that kind of shy. Whenever Lissa is in the room, shy takes on a whole new meaning.”

  “Uh-huh. When are you gonna sit that boy down and tell him that if he doesn’t make his move, she’s going to do something extreme—like date a jock. This guy named Tate is hanging around us way too much, and since Jeremy warned him off Gillian, and I know it’s not for my benefit, and Mac won’t give him the time of day, that leaves her.”

  “Ugh. Say it ain’t so.”

  “She’s not desperate, but she’s not short of offers, either. I’m tellin’ you, the risk is there.”

  He thought for a moment. “Can you keep a secret?”

  “Do chickens have lips?”

  “Uh, I’m guessing no.”