Princess in Waiting (The Princess Diaries 4)

I listened in astonishment. Everyone, it seemed— Maya, the Moscovitzes’ housekeeper; Lilly; even Michael’s parents—had been in on Michael’s scheme to recreate the Screening Room right in his own apartment.

Only I had been in ignorance of his plan. Just as he had been in ignorance of my belief that he was about to break up with me.

“Oh,” I said, beginning to feel like the world’s number-one dork. “So… you don’t want to break up?”

“No, I don’t want to break up,” Michael said, starting to look mad now—probably the way Mr. Rochester looked when he heard Jane had been hanging out with that St. John guy. “Mia, I love you, remember? Why would I want to break up with you? Now come sit down and eat before it gets cold.”

Then I wasn’t beginning to feel like the world’s number-one dork: I totally felt like it.

But at the same time, I felt incredibly, blissfully happy. Because Michael had said the L word! Said it right to my face! And in a very bossy way, just like Captain von Trapp or the Beast or Patrick Swayze!

Then Michael hit the play button on the remote, and the first chords of John Williams’s brilliant Star Wars theme filled the room. And Michael went, “Mia, come on. Unless you want to change out of that dress first. Did you bring any normal clothes?”

Still, something wasn’t right. Not completely.

“Do you just love me like a friend?” I asked him, trying to sound cynically amused, you know, the way René would, in order to keep the truth from him—that my heart was pounding a mile a minute. “Or are you in love with me?”

Michael was staring over the back of the couch at me. He looked like he couldn’t quite believe his ears. I couldn’t believe my own. Had I really just asked him that? Just come out and asked him, flying in the face of all Tina and I had discussed?

Apparently—judging from his incredulous expression, anyway—I had. I could feel myself starting to turn redder, and redder, and redder, and redder….

Jane Eyre would so never have asked that question.

But then again, maybe she ought to have. Because the way Michael responded made the whole embarrassment of having had to ask completely and totally worth it. And the way he responded was, he reached out, took the tiara from me, laid it down on the couch beside him, took both my hands in his, pulled me toward him, and gave me a really long kiss.

On the lips.

Of the French variety.

We missed the entire scrolling prologue to the movie, due to kissing. Then finally when the sound of Princess Leia’s starship being fired upon roused us from our passionate embrace, Michael said, “Of course I’m in love with you. Now come sit down and eat.”

It truly was the most romantic moment of my entire life. If I live to be as old as Grandmère, I will never be as happy as I was at that moment. I just stood there, thrilled to pieces, for about a minute. I mean, I could barely get over it. He loved me. Not only that, he was in love with me! Michael Moscovitz is in love with me, Mia Thermopolis!

“Your burger is getting cold,” he said.

See? See how perfect we are for each other? He is so practical, while I have my head in the clouds. Has there ever been as perfect a couple? Has there ever been as perfect a date?

We sat there, eating our veggie burgers and watching Star Wars , he in his jeans and vintage Boomtown Rats T-shirt, and me in my Chanel ball gown. And when Ben Kenobi said, “Obi-Wan? That’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time,” we both went, right on cue, “How long?” And Ben said, as he always does, “A very long time.”

And when, just before Luke flies off to attack the Death Star, Michael put it on pause so he could go get dessert, I helped him clear the plates.

And then, while he was making the ice-cream sundaes, I snuck back into the TV room, and put his present on his TV table, and waited for him to come back and find it, which he did, a few minutes later.

“What’s this?” he wanted to know, as he handed me my sundae, vanilla ice cream drowning in a sea of hot fudge, whipped cream, and pistachios.

“It’s your birthday present,” I said, barely able to contain myself, I was so excited to see what he’d think of it. It was way better than candy or a sweater. It was, I thought, the perfect gift for Michael.

I feel like I had a right to be excited, because I’d paid a pretty hefty price for Michael’s gift… weeks of worrying about being found out, and then, after having been found out, being forced to waltz with Prince René, who was a good dancer, and all, but who kind of smelled like an ashtray, to tell the truth.

So I was pretty stoked as Michael, with a puzzled expression on his face, sat down and picked up the box.

“I told you that you didn’t have to get me anything,” he said.

“I know.” I was bouncing up and down, I was so excited. “But I wanted to. And I saw this, and I thought it was perfect .”

“Well,” Michael said. “Thanks.” He untied the ribbon that held the minuscule box closed, then lifted the lid….

And there, sitting on a wad of white cotton, it was. A dirty little rock, no bigger than an ant. Smaller than an ant, even. The size of the head of a pushpin.