Princess in the Spotlight (The Princess Diaries 2)

And you know what? It looked good, just like the one in The Wizard of Oz! (She turned the writing so it was on the inside of the crown.)

“There,” Martha said, when she was through. “Glinda the Good Witch.” She looked at Lars. “And you’re easy. You’re James Bond.”

Lars seemed pleased. You could tell he’d always fantasized about being a secret agent.

No one was more pleased than me, however. My fantasy of Michael seeing me in this gorgeous dress was about to be realized. What’s more, the outfit was going to give me the confidence I needed to confront him about Jo-C-rox.

So, with my father’s blessings—I would have stopped to say good-bye to Grandmère, only she and Gerald Ford were doing the tango out on the dance floor (no, I am not kidding)—I was out of there like a shot—

And stumbled right into a thorny patch of reporters.

“Princess Mia!” they yelled. “Princess Mia, what are your feelings about your mother’s elopement?”

I was about to let Lars hustle me into the limo without saying anything to the reporters. But then I had an idea. I grabbed the nearest microphone and said, “I just want to say to anyone who is watching that Albert Einstein High School is the best school in Manhattan, maybe even North America, and that we have the most excellent faculty and the best student population in the world, and anyone who doesn’t recognize that is just kidding himself, Mr. Taylor.”

(Mr. Taylor is Shameeka’s dad.)

Then I shoved the microphone back at its owner, and hopped into the limo.

We almost didn’t make it. First of all, because of the parade, the traffic downtown was criminal. Secondly, there was a line to get into the Village Cinema that wound all the way around the block! I had the limo driver cruise the length of it, while Lars and I scanned the assorted hordes. It was pretty hard to recognize my friends, because everyone was in costume.

But then I saw this group of really weird-looking people dressed in WWII Army fatigues. They were all covered in fake blood, and some of them had phony stumps in place of limbs. They were holding a big sign that said Looking for Private Ryan. Standing next to them was a girl wearing a black lacy slip and a fake beard. And standing next to her was a boy dressed as a Mafioso type, holding a violin case.

The violin case was what did it.

“Stop the car!” I shrieked.

The limo pulled over, and Lars and I got out. The girl in the nightie went, “Oh, my God! You came! You came!”

It was Lilly. And standing next to her, a big pile of bloody intestines coming out of his Army jacket, was her brother, Michael.

“Quick,” he said, to Lars and me. “Get in line. I got two extra tickets just in case you ended up making it after all.”

There was some grumbling from the people behind us as Lars and I cut in, but all he had to do was turn so that his shoulder holster showed, and they got quiet pretty quick. Lars’s Glock, being real and all, was pretty scary-looking.

“Where’s Hank?” Lilly wanted to know.

“He couldn’t make it,” I said. I didn’t want to tell her why. You know, that last time I’d seen him, he’d been dancing with Gisele. I didn’t want Lilly to think Hank preferred supermodels to, you know, us.

“He cannot come. Good,” Boris said, firmly.

Lilly shot him a warning look, then, pointing at me, demanded, “What are you supposed to be?”

“Duh,” I said. “I’m Glinda the Good Witch.”

“I knew that,” Michael said. “You look really . . . You look really . . .”

He seemed unable to go on. I must, I realized, with a sinking heart, look really stupid.

“You are way too glam for Halloween,” Lilly declared.

Glam? Well, glam was better than stupid, I guess. But why couldn’t Michael have said so?

I eyed her. “Um,” I said. “What, exactly, are you?”

She fingered the straps to her slip, then fluffed out her fake beard.

“Hello,” she said, in a very sarcastic voice. “I’m a Freudian slip.”