Princess in the Spotlight (The Princess Diaries 2)

4. The time when I was ten and Grandmère took me and some of my cousins to the beach and I forgot my bikini top and Grandmère wouldn’t let me go back to the chateau to get it, she said this was France for God’s sake and I should just go topless like everybody else, and even though I didn’t have anything more up there to show than I do now, I was mortified and wouldn’t take my shirt off and everyone looked at me because they thought I had a rash or disfiguring birthmark or a shriveled-up Siamese-twin fetus hanging off me.

5. The time when I was twelve and I got my first period, and I was at Grandmère’s house and I had to tell her about it because I didn’t have any pads or anything, and later that night as I walked in for dinner I overheard Grandmère telling all her friends about it, and then for the rest of the night all they did was make jokes about the wonder of womanhood.

Now that I think about it, almost all of the most embarrassing moments of my life have something to do with Grandmère.

I wonder what Lilly’s parents, who are both psychoanalysts, would have to say about this.

TEMPERATURE CHART

5:20 p.m.—99.3

6:45 p.m.—99.2

7:52 p.m.—99.1

Is it possible I am getting better already? This is horrible. If I get better, I’ll have to go on that stupid interview. . . .

This calls for drastic measures: Tonight I fully intend to take a shower and stick my head out the window with my hair wet.

That will show them.

Thursday, October 23

Oh, my God. Something so exciting just happened, I can hardly write.

This morning as I was lying in my sickbed, my mom handed me a letter that she said had come in the mail yesterday, only she forgot to give it to me.

This wasn’t like the electricity or cable bills my mom usually forgets about after they have arrived. This was a personal letter to me.

Still, since the address on the front of it was typed, I didn’t suspect anything out of the ordinary. I thought it was a letter from school, or something. Like maybe I’d made honor roll (HA HA). Except that there was no return address, and usually mail from Albert Einstein High School has Albert’s thoughtful face in the left-hand corner, along with the school’s address.

So you can imagine my surprise when I opened the letter and found not a flier asking me to show my school spirit by making rice krispy Treats to help raise money for the crew team but the following . . . which, for want of a better word, I can only call a love letter:

Dear Mia (the letter went)

I know you will think it’s strange, receiving a letter like this. I feel strange writing it. And yet I am too shy to tell you face-to-face what I’m about to tell you now: And that’s that I think you are the Josiest girl I’ve ever met.

I just want to make sure you know that there’s one person, anyway, who liked you long before he found out you were a princess . . .

And will keep on liking you, no matter what.

Sincerely,

A Friend

Oh, my God!

I couldn’t believe it! I’d never gotten a letter like this before. Who could it be from? I seriously couldn’t figure it out. The letter was typed, like the address on the envelope. Not by a typewriter, either, but obviously on a computer.

So even if I wanted to compare keystrokes, say, on a suspect’s typewriter (like Jan did on The Brady Bunch when she suspected Alice of sending her that locket), I couldn’t. You can’t compare the type on laser printers, for God’s sake. It’s always the same.

But who could have sent me such a thing?

Of course, I know who I want to have sent it.

But the chances of a guy like Michael Moscovitz ever actually liking me as more than just a friend are like zero. I mean, if he liked me, he had a perfect opportunity to say something about it the night of the Cultural Diversity dance, when he was so nice to step in and ask me to dance, after Josh Richter dogged me so hard. And we didn’t just dance once, either. We danced a few times. Slow dances, too. And after the dance, we hung out in his room at the Moscovitzes’ apartment. He could have said something then, if he’d wanted to.

But he didn’t. He didn’t say a thing about liking me.