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Princess in Waiting
by Meg Cabot
from the series
The Princess Diaries
Back in my room, I thought sadly about Michael. What was I going to say to him tomorrow, when Lars and I pulled up in the limo to pick up him and Lilly before school? That I'd gotten in too late to call? What if he noticed my nostrils flaring as I spoke? I don't know if he's figured out that they do that when I lie, but I think I'd sort of mentioned it to Lilly, since I have a complete inability to keep my mouth shut about stuff I really should just keep to myself, and supposing she told him?
Then, as I sat there dejectedly on my bed, pretty sleepy because in Genovia it was five in the morning and I was totally jet-lagged, I had a brilliant idea. I could see if Michael was logged on, and instant message him! I could do it even though my mom was on the phone with Grandmère, because we have DSL now!
So I scrambled over to my computer and did just that. And he was online!
Michael, I wrote. Hi, it's me! I'm home! I wanted to call you, but it's after eleven, and I didn't want your mom and dad to get mad.
Michael has changed his screen name since the demise of Crackhead. Now he's no longer CrackKing. He's LinuxRulz, in protest of the stranglehold Microsoft has on the software industry.
LinuxRulz: Welcome home! It's good to hear from you. I was worried you were dead or something.
So he had noticed I'd stopped calling! Which meant the plan that Tina and I had come up with was working perfectly. At least so far.
FtLouie: No, not dead. Just super busy. You know, fate of the aristocracy resting on my shoulders and all of that. So should Lars and I pick you and Lilly up for school tomorrow?
LinuxRulz: That'd be good. What are you doing Friday?
What am I doing Friday? Was he asking me OUT? Were Michael and I actually going to have a date? At last????
I tried to type casually so he wouldn't know that I was so excited, I had already freaked Fat Louie out by jumping up and down in my computer chair and almost rolling over his tail.
FtLouie: Nothing, so far as I know. Why?
LinuxRulz: Want to go to dinner at the Screening Room? They're showing the first Star Wars.
OH MY GOD!!!!!!!! HE WAS ASKING ME OUT!!!!!!!!! Dinner and a movie. At the same time, because at the Screening Room you sit at a table and eat dinner while the movie is going. And Star Wars is only my favorite movie of all time, after Dirty Dancing. Could there BE a girl luckier than me? No, I don't think so. Bite me, Britney.
My fingers were trembling as I typed:
FtLouie: I think that would be OK. I'll have to check with my mom. Can I let you know tomorrow?
LinuxRulz: OK. So see you tomorrow? Around 8:15?
FtLouie: Tomorrow, 8:15.
I wanted to add something like I miss you or I love you, but I don't know, it just felt too weird, and I couldn't do it. I mean, it's embarrassing, telling the person you love that you love them. It shouldn't be, but it is. Also it didn't seem like something Jane Eyre would do. Unless, you know, she had just discovered the man she loved had gone blind in a heroic attempt to rescue his crazy firebug wife from an inferno she'd set herself.
Asking me out to dinner and a movie didn't really seem the same, somehow.
Then Michael wrote:
LinuxRulz: Kid, I've been from one side of this galaxy to the other-
which is one of my favorite lines from the first Star Wars. So then I wrote:
FtLouie: I happen to like nice men.
(Copyright by Meg Cabot)
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