Princess Diaries Series: Forever Princess Part 30

J.P. said, "Actually, we-"

But I said, realizing just then where those elevators went-upstairs, to the hotel rooms-"No."

And Lars backed away again.

And the elevator doors closed and went away.

Here's the thing: I'm not going to say that I don't think J.P. ever cared about me. Because I think he did. I really do.

And the truth is, I cared about J.P., too. I did. He was a good friend at a time when I needed friends. Maybe we'll even be friends again, someday.

But not right now.

Because right now, I think a big part of the reason he liked me so much is because he wants to be a famous playwright, and he thought hanging out with me could help make him that way.

It sucks to have to admit this. That a guy really only liked me because I'm royal. How many times am I going to fall for this, anyway?

But you know what else sucks sometimes?

Actually being a princess. And having people who are so fascinated by this that they can't see the person you are behind the crown. The kind of person who wants to be judged on her own merits. The kind of person who doesn't care if someone offers her a quarter of a million dollars for her book. She'd rather have less money if it's from someone who really values her work.

Oh, sure. People will claim they like you for who you are. They might even do a really good imitation of it. So good, you'll even believe it. For a while.

The thing is, if you're smart, there'll be clues. It may take you a while to pick up on them.

But you will. Eventually.

And in the end, it all boils down to this: The people who were your friends before you got the crown are the people who are going to be your best friends no matter what. Because they're the ones who love you for you-you, in all your geekiness-and not because of what they can get out of you. Weirdly, in some instances, even the people who were your enemies before you got famous (like Lana Weinberger) can end up being better friends to you than the people you become friends with after you become famous. And even when those friends get mad at you-like Lilly was at me-you still need them, even more than ever. Because they might just be the only people who are willing to tell you the truth.

That's just the way it is. It's lonely on the throne.

Luckily for me, I had fabulous friends before I ever found out I was the princess of Genovia.

And if there's one thing I've learned in the past four years, it's that I better do my best to try to hold on to them.

No matter what.

Which is why I found myself giving J.P. the speech Grandmere had taught me-the one for letting suitors down gently.

"J.P.," I said, pulling the ring he'd given me off my finger. "I care about you. I really do. And I wish you the best. But the truth is, I think we're better off as friends. Good friends. So I want to give this back to you."

And I lifted his hand, and put the ring back in the center of his palm, and closed his fingers around it.

He looked down at his hand with an expression of abject misery on his face.

"Mia," he said. "I can explain why I didn't tell you about Lilly. The thing is, I didn't think you-"

"No," I said. "You don't need to say another word. Don't feel bad." I reached up and patted him on the shoulder.

I guess I could have felt sorry for myself because my prom had gotten totally and completely ruined. I'd gone to it with a guy who'd turned out to be a total phony.

But I remembered what my dad said about how it's the duty of royalty always to be the stronger person, and to make everyone else feel better. And I took a deep breath and said, "You know what I think you should do? Call Stacey Cheeseman. I think she has a total crush on you."

J.P. looked down at me as if I were nuts. "You do?"

"I totally do," I lied. But it was a white lie. And I was pretty sure she did have a crush on him. All actresses adore their director.

"This is completely embarra.s.sing," J.P. said. Now he was looking down at the ring.

"No, it's not," I said, patting him on the shoulder some more. "Now, are you going to call her?"

"Mia," J.P. said, his expression stricken. "I'm sorry. But I thought if you knew the truth about Lilly, you'd never-"

I held up my hand to indicate he should say no more. Really, you would think a man of the world such as he would know better than to keep trying to get me back when I had made it so clear I was done.

I wondered how much of his reluctance to call Stacey was rooted in the fact that she isn't really that famous. Yet.

But I decided this thought was ungenerous of me. I'm really trying to be more princesslike in my thoughts and actions.

I also wasn't trying to let my gleefulness over the situation show. You know, that even though my prom was a total bust, I'd gotten my best friend back, and I hadn't been a bit in love with my prom date, with whom I was breaking up, in the first place.

I tried to keep a solemn expression on my face as I stood on my tiptoes and kissed him.

"Good-bye, J.P.," I whispered.

Then I hurried away before there was any chance he could start begging, which is so unattractive in a suitor (well, so Grandmere says. It hasn't happened to me...yet. But I had a feeling it was about to).

And as I was hurrying, I flipped open my cell phone and made a quick call to the Royal Genovian lawyers. Their offices weren't open yet, because it was only seven in the morning, Genovia time.

But I left a message asking them to put a cease and desist on J.P.'s play, or whatever they had to do in order to prevent it from ever getting made into a movie, or even a Broadway show.

I mean, I know I was princessy and gracious during our breakup. And I do completely forgive what J.P. did to me.

But for what he did to Lilly? He's going down.

He really ought to have remembered that several of my ancestresses are known for strangling and/or chopping off the heads of their enemies.

It was as I was putting my phone away that I crashed right into Michael.

Yes, Michael.

I was totally flabbergasted, of course. What was Michael doing at the AEHS prom?

"Oh my G.o.d," I cried. "What are you doing here?"

"What do you think I'm doing here?" he demanded, rubbing his shoulder where I'd banged into him, handheld plastic tiara p.r.o.ngs first.

"How long have you been standing there?" I was seized with a sudden panic he might have overheard what J.P. and I had been discussing, vis-a-vis Lilly. On the other hand, if he had, surely there'd have been a murder already. J.P.'s, to be exact. "Wait...what did you hear?"

"Enough to make me feel nauseous," Michael said. "Nice move with the call to the lawyers, by the way. And is that really how you guys talk to each other?" His voice rose into a falsetto. "You know what I think you should do? Call Stacey Cheeseman. I think she has a total crush on you." He lowered his voice again. "Cute. What does that remind me of, exactly? Hold on. Wait, I know...Seventh Heaven-"

I grabbed his arm and dragged him around the corner, well out of earshot of J.P. (who hadn't yet noticed a thing, because he'd already gotten on the phone with Stacey).

"Seriously," I said, dropping Michael's arm when we were far enough away. "What are you doing here?"

Michael grinned. He looked so cute in his black Skinner Box T-shirt with his messed up hair, and his jeans fitting him just right. I couldn't help remembering all that making out we'd done yesterday. It came back as such a visceral memory, it was almost like a punch.

Of course, that might have been because I'd also gotten a big whiff of him when I'd crashed into him. That major histocompatibility complex is strong stuff. Strong enough to knock a girl out, practically.

"I don't know," he said. "Lilly told me a couple of days ago I was supposed to show up here and meet you by the elevators at around midnight. She said she had a feeling you were going to need, er, my a.s.sistance. But you seemed to be handling the situation just fine, if that whole ceremonial giving-back-of-the-ring thing was any indication."

I could feel myself turning bright red, realizing what Lilly must have meant. Having overheard my conversation with Tina in the girls' bathroom at school about my getting a hotel room with J.P. tonight, Lilly had sent her brother down here to stop me from doing something she knew I'd regret...

Only she hadn't told him exactly what he was supposed to be stopping me from doing. Thank G.o.d.

Lilly really was a friend, after all. Not that I'd ever doubted it. Well, very much.

"So are you going to tell me why Lilly felt my presence was so urgently needed here tonight, anyway?" Michael wanted to know, as he wrapped an arm around my waist.

"You know," I said quickly. "I think it's because she knew I always wanted to spend my senior prom with you."

Michael just laughed. Sort of sarcastically.

"Lars," he called over the top of my head, to my bodyguard. "Tell me the truth. Do I need to go back over there and turn J.P. Reynolds-Abernathy the Fourth into cream of wheat?"

Lars, to my total mortification, nodded, and said, "In my opinion, most definitely."

"Lars!" I cried, starting to panic. "No. No! Michael, it's over. J.P. and I just broke up. You don't have to hit anybody."

"Well, I think maybe I do," Michael said. He wasn't teasing, either. There was no smile on his face as he said, "I think maybe the earth would be a better place if somebody had turned J.P. Reynolds-Abernathy the Fourth into cream of wheat a long time ago. Lars? Do you agree with me?"

Lars looked at his watch and said, "It's midnight. I don't hit anyone after midnight. Bodyguard-union regulations."

"Fine," Michael said. "You hold him down, and I'll hit him."

This was terrible!

"I have a better idea," I said, taking Michael by the arm again. "Lars, why don't you take the rest of the night off? And Michael, why don't we go back to your place?"

Just as I'd hoped, this completely distracted Michael from his Kill J.P. Death Mission. He stared down at me in shock for nearly five seconds.

Then he said, "That sounds like a completely excellent idea."

Lars shrugged. What else could he do? I'm eighteen and a legal adult now.

"I am fine with this idea, too," he said.

And that's how I ended up in this limo, speeding downtown to SoHo, and to Michael's loft.

And now Michael has suggested that I stop writing in my journal, and pay attention to him for a little while.

You know what? This sounds like a completely excellent idea to me, too.

An excerpt from Ransom My Heart by Daphne Delacroix "Finnula," he said, again, and this time she recognized the need in his voice. It matched the need she felt in her own heart, in the thrum of her own pulsing veins. "I know I gave you my word I wouldn't touch you, but-"

Finnula wasn't at all certain how what happened next transpired. It seemed as if one minute she was standing looking up at him, wondering if he'd ever stop talking and just do it, for heaven's sake...

And the next, she was in his arms. She didn't know if he'd moved or she had.

But suddenly, her arms were around his neck, drawing his head down toward hers, her fingers tangled in his soft hair, her lips already parted to receive his.

Those strong golden arms, the ones she'd longed to have round her, imprisoned her, clasping her so close to his broad chest that she could hardly breathe. Not that she could catch her breath anyway, since he was kissing her so deeply, so urgently, as if she might at any moment be torn away from him. He seemed to fear that they'd be interrupted again. Only Finnula realized, with a satisfaction that surely would have shocked her brother, had he known of it, that they had all night long. Accordingly, she lengthened the kiss, conducting a leisurely exploration of those arms she'd so admired. Why, they really were every bit as perfect as she'd imagined.

Abruptly, Hugo lifted his head, and looked down at her with eyes that had gone an even deeper green than the emerald around Finnula's neck. She was panting from lack of breath, her chest rising and falling quickly, color bright over her high cheekbones. She saw the question in his glance, and understood it all too well. He didn't know that she had already made her decision, that it had been irrevocably made for her the second she'd seen him without that beard, and her heart-or something very like her heart, anyway-had been lost for good.

Well, maybe her decision had been made the second that bolt had slid into place. What did it matter? They were strangers in a strange-well, strange enough-place. No one would ever know of it. Now was no time for his oddly misplaced sense of chivalry.

"Not now," she growled, knowing full well why he'd stopped kissing her, and what his questioning look implied. "G.o.d's teeth, man, it's too late-" Whatever Hugo had been planning to say, her impatient cry silenced him upon the subject forever. Tilting her body back in his arms, Hugo rained kisses upon her cheeks and the soft skin beneath her ears, his mouth tracing a fiery path down the column of her throat to the neckline of her gown. Finnula, still anxious for the taste of his lips on hers, drew his head toward hers again, then gasped as his fingers closed over first one firm breast, and then the other.

The sensation of his mouth devouring hers, his hands on her straining b.r.e.a.s.t.s, was threatening to overwhelm Finnula. It was everything she'd suspected it would be...only so much more. The room seemed to sway around her, as if she'd drunk too much ale, and Hugo remained the only stationary, solid ma.s.s within her line of vision. She clung to him, wanting something...she was only just beginning to understand what that something was.

Then, when his knee slipped between her weakening legs, and she felt his hard thigh against the place where her legs joined together, the resulting spasm that shot through her was like nothing she'd ever experienced before.

Suddenly, she understood. Everything.

Sunday, May 7, 10 a.m., Michael's loft I HAVE MY SNOWFLAKE NECKLACE BACK.

It turns out when I dropped it in that hotel room that horrible night so long ago, Michael found it where it fell.

And he's kept it ever since.

Because (he says) he's never stopped loving me and thinking of me and hoping...

...just like I was hoping, that tiny ember I was keeping alive inside.

It turns out Michael was keeping one alive inside, too. He knew things had gone horribly wrong between us, but he thought time apart-for both of us to come into our own-might help.

He never thought another man would come along and split us permanently asunder. (Okay, he didn't put it quite like that, but it sounds more dramatic than saying he never thought I'd start going out with J.P. Reynolds-Abernathy IV.) And that's when he did ask Boris to keep an eye on me (not spy on me. Just keep him informed).

Michael thought (because of what Boris reported back to him) that J.P. and I were madly in love. And I guess for a time, we might have looked that way. To an outsider (especially to Boris, who doesn't understand actual live human beings, including-and perhaps especially-his girlfriend).

But still, Michael wouldn't give up hope. That's why he kept the necklace-just in case.

It wasn't until Michael saw me at the Columbia event that day and I acted so shy that he says he began to dare to dream that maybe Boris was wrong.

But then when J.P. gave me the ring for my birthday, he knew drastic measures were called for. That's why he'd left my party-to get busy making arrangements to send my dad the CardioArm (and also, as he put it, "Because I knew I had to leave before I wiped the floor with that guy's face").

It's all just so romantic! I can't wait to tell Tina.