Princess in Training (The Princess Diaries 6)

“All I want to know is,” he went on, in a sort of tired voice, “are we EVER going to Do It?”

Okay. Not Lilly and the presidency.

I practically choked on the tiny bite of pizza I’d taken, and had to swallow about a gallon of Coke before I was able to say, “OF COURSE.”

But Michael looked suspicious.

“Before the end of this decade?”

“Absolutely,” I said, with more conviction than I necessarily felt. But, you know. What else could I say? Plus, my face was as red as the pizza sauce. I know because I saw my reflection in the napkin holder.

“I knew going into this that it wasn’t going to be easy, Mia,” Michael said. “I mean, aside from the age difference and your being my sister’s best friend, there’s the whole princess aspect to it…the constant-hounding-bypaparazzi/can’t-go-anywhere-without-a-bodyguard thing. A lesser man might find all that daunting. I, on the other hand, have always enjoyed a challenge. Besides which, I love you, so it’s all worth it to me.”

I practically melted right there on the spot. I mean, seriously. Has any guy EVER said anything so sweet?

But then he went on.

“It’s not that I’m trying to rush you into something you aren’t ready for,” Michael said, as matter-of-factly as if he were discussing the next move he planned on making in Rebel Strike. How do boys do this, by the way? “It’s just that I know it takes you a while to get used to things. So, I want you to start getting used to this: You’re the girl I want. One day, you WILL be mine.”

Now my face was REDDER than the pizza sauce. At least, that’s what it felt like.

“Um,” I said. “Okay.” Because what else COULD I say to that????

Besides, it wasn’t like I was displeased. I WANT Michael to want me.

It’s just, you know, for him to SAY it like that was actually kind of…I don’t know.

Hot.

“So long as that’s clear,” Michael said.

“Crystal,” I said, after I’d choked for a while.

Then, he said as far as Doing It went, I was off the hook for the time being, but he expected periodic re-evaluation of our stances on that issue.

I asked how often he thought we should re-evaluate our stances, and he said about once a month, and I said I thought six-month evaluations might be better, and then he said two, and I said three, and then he said, “Deal.”

Then, he got up and went to offer Lars another slice and got sucked into a conversation Lars is having with the guy behind the counter about the Yankees’ chances in the World Series this year, even though to my knowledge, Michael has never watched a baseball game in his life.

He did, however, design a computer model in which you can input all the statistics concerning a team, and it will then tell you what their chances are of beating another team to within a two-point spread.

The fact is, I love him. He’s the boy I want. And one day, he WILL be mine.

And now he wants to know if I want to go get a gelato.

I said:

“I most certainly do.”