Party Princess (The Princess Diaries 7)

“Sorry, Grandmère. I don’t know any John Paul Reynolds-Abernathy the Fourth. And I actually have something a little more important to worry about than whether or not you get your island,” I informed her. “The fact is, I’m broke.”

Grandmère brightened. She loves talking about money. Because that often leads to talking about shopping, which is her favorite hobby, besides drinking Sidecars and smoking. Grandmère is happiest when she can do all three at the same time. Sadly for her, with what she considers fascist new smoking regulations in New York City, the only place she can smoke, drink, and shop at the same time is at home, on the Net.

“Is there something you want to buy, Amelia? Something a little more fashionable than those hideous combat boots you continue to wear, despite my assurances that they do not flatter the shape of your calf? Those lovely snakeskin Ferragamo loafers I showed you the other day, perhaps?”

“I’m not PERSONALLY broke, Grandmère,” I said. Although actually I am, since I only get twenty dollars a week allowance and out of that I have to pay for all of my entertainment needs, and so my entire allowance can be wiped out by a single trip to the movies, if I splurge on gingko biloba rings AND a soda. God forbid my dad should offer ME an American Express card.

Except that, judging by what happened with the recycling bins, I guess he’s probably right not to trust me with an unlimited line of credit.

“I mean the student government of Albert Einstein High School is broke,” I explained. “We went through our entire budget in seven months instead of ten. Now we’re in big trouble because we’re supposed to pay for the rental of Alice Tully Hall for the seniors’ commencement ceremony in June. Only we can’t, because we have no money whatsoever. Which means Amber Cheeseman, this year’s valedictorian, is going to kill me, most likely in a lengthy and extremely painful manner.”

In confiding this to Grandmère, I knew I was taking a certain amount of risk. Because the fact that we’re broke is this huge secret. Seriously. Lilly, Ling Su, Mrs. Hill, Lars, and I all swore on pain of death we wouldn’t tell anybody the truth about the student government’s empty coffers until we absolutely couldn’t avoid it anymore. The last thing I need right now is an impeachment trial.

And we all know Lana Weinberger would leap at any chance to get rid of me as student government president. LANA’s dad would fork over five grand without batting an eye if he thought it would help his precious baby daughter.

MY relatives? Not so much.

But there’s always the chance—remote, I know—that Grandmère might come through for me somehow. She’s done it before. I mean, for all I know, maybe she and Alice Tully were best friends back in college. Maybe all Grandmère has to do is make a phone call, and I can rent Alice Tully Hall for FREE!!!!

Only Grandmère didn’t look as if she were about to make any phone calls on my behalf anytime soon. Especially when she started making tsk-tsking noises with her tongue.

“I suppose you spent all the money on folderols and gewgaws,” she said, not entirely disapprovingly.

“If by folderols and gewgaws,” I replied—I wondered if these were real words or if she’d suddenly begun speaking in tongues and, if so, should I call for her maid?—“you mean twenty-five high-tech recycling bins with individual compartments for paper, cans, and bottles, with a built-in crushing device for the can part, not to mention three hundred electrophoresis kits for the bio lab, none of which I can return, because believe me, I already asked, then the answer is yes.”

Grandmère looked very disappointed in me. You could tell she considered recycling bins a big waste of money.

And I didn’t even MENTION the whole “Cans and Battles” sticker thing.

“How much do you need?” she asked in a deceptively casual voice.

Wait. Was Grandmère about to do the unthinkable—float me a loan?

No. Not possible.

“Not much,” I said, thinking this was WAY too good to be true. “Just five grand.” Actually, five thousand seven hundred and twenty-eight dollars, which is how much Lincoln Center charges campuses for the use of Alice Tully Hall, which seats a thousand. But I wasn’t about to quibble. I could raise the seven hundred and twenty-eight dollars somehow, if Grandmère were willing to fork over the five thousand.

But alas. It was too good to be true.

“Well, what do schools in your situation do when they need to raise money fast?” Grandmère wanted to know.

“I don’t know,” I said. I couldn’t help feeling defeated. Also, I was lying (so what else is new?) because I knew perfectly well what schools in our situation did when they needed to raise money fast. We’d already discussed it, at length, during the student government meeting, after Ling Su’s shocking revelation about the state of our bank account. Mrs. Hill hadn’t been willing to give us a loan (it’s doubtful she even has five grand socked away somewhere. I swear I’ve never seen her wear the same outfit twice. That’s a lot of Quacker Factory tunic sweaters on a teacher’s sal

ary), but she’d been more than willing to show us some candle catalogs she had lying around.

Seriously. That was her big suggestion. That we sell some candles.

Lilly just looked at her and went, “Are you suggesting we open ourselves up to a nihilistic battle between the haves and the have-mores, à la Robert Cormier’s Chocolate War, Mrs. Hill? Because we all read that in English class, and we know perfectly well what happens when you dare to disturb the universe.”

But Mrs. Hill, looking insulted, said that we could have a contest to see who could sell the most candles without experiencing a complete breakdown in social mores or any particular nihilism.

But when I looked through the candle catalog and saw all the different scents—Strawberries ’n’ Cream! Cotton Candy! Sugar Cookie!—and colors you could buy, I experienced a secret nihilism all my own.

Because frankly, I’d rather have the senior class do to me what Obi Wan Kenobi did to Anakin Skywalker in The Revenge of the Sith (i.e. cut off my legs with a lightsaber and leave me to burn on the shores of a lava pit) than knock on my neighbor Ronnie’s door and ask her if she’d be interested in buying a Strawberries ’n’ Cream candle, molded in the actual shape of a strawberry, for $9.95.

And trust me, the senior class is CAPABLE of doing to me what Obi Wan did to Anakin. Especially Amber Cheeseman, who is this year’s senior class valedictorian, and who, even though she is much shorter than me, is a hapkido brown belt, and could easily pound my face in.

If she stood on a chair, that is, or had someone hold her up so she could reach me.