Who Made You a Princess? (19 page)

“Looks like you have to make a choice.”

“Looks like.”

He leaned in and pecked me on the cheek. A tingle ran down my neck and all the way to my hand. “May the best man win.”

The song ended and when the DJ started sampling disco from the seventies, he took me back to our table, still smiling.

Rashid, however, was not smiling. He looked as though someone had just crashed his favorite Hummer—and heads were going to
roll.

Gulp
.

Carly—oh, hey, she was back—bounced up. “I need to find the bathroom. Coming?”

Which, as you know, is code for
Danger! Clear the area
.

At this rate, my drink was going to be all ice water and no soda—and my dry mouth wasn’t gonna get any of it. Still, I left
it sitting there. When Carly’s eyes start talking louder than the music, you’d better listen.

Safely in the ladies’, we commandeered the handicapped stall together. “What’s going on?”

While she did what she had to do, she gave me the sitch. “Rashid is furious that you did a slow one with Danyel. Is there
more going on between you two than you told us?”

“Um. Maybe a little more. Maybe he kissed me.”

“Kissed!” Carly’s eyes widened as she finished up and did a hem check. “You never said you kissed the prince.”

“Yeah, well, a girl likes to keep some things to herself.”

“Well, a girl should think twice about it—Gillian would never have invited the guys up here if she’d known you two were serious.
We thought you were crushing on Danyel.”

“I was. I mean, I am.”

“And you’re kissing the prince.”

Ouch.
Don’t look at me in that tone of voice.

I leaned against the stall door and rubbed a hand over my cheek, careful not to smear my sparkles. “I don’t know what I’m
doing. When I’m with Rashid, I kiss him. When I’m with Danyel, I
want
to kiss him. And now that they’ve found out about each other, neither of them wants to kiss me.”

Carly gazed at me, obviously struggling between sympathy and
What were you thinking?
“Neither of them are the type to let the other be your beta boy,” she said at last.

I nodded. “If I’d known it was going to get this whack, I’d have said no when Rashid asked if I remembered him that first
day.” With a deep breath, I changed the subject. “We’d better get back out there. Think Brett would dance with me?”

“No way. I don’t want him getting shot by Farrouk.”

Somehow this wasn’t as funny as we both wanted it to be. We washed our hands and the music whumped us in the face when we
opened the bathroom door.

So did Gillian and Lissa, practically running straight into us.

“Whoa, girlfriends!” I stopped Gillian from hitting the wall. “What’s wrong?”

“That arrogant, selfish—” Gillian stopped herself from saying something she’d have to pray about, and tried again. “I’m sorry,
Shani. I know he’s your friend. But Rashid just left.”

“Left?” I goggled at her. “What do you mean, left?”

“Just what I said.”

Lissa chimed in. “He took the limo and Farrouk and Bashir and left us all stranded here downtown!”

And you know what? Instead of being angry or feeling abandoned or like I was going to lose him, a big happy wave inside me
crested into a laugh. “Are Danyel and Kaz still here?”

“Are you kidding?” Lissa said. “They’d no more leave us down here alone than jump off the Golden Gate.”

“Woohoo!” I pumped a fist at the ceiling. “It is time to par-tay.”

“Are you crazy?” Carly’s hands flew up helplessly. “You just offended Mr. Royalty and we’re all probably going to get house
arrest for the rest of term.”

I grabbed her around the waist and waltzed her down the passage. “All the more reason to enjoy ourselves now. We’ve got the
cutest guys in the room. We’re dressed so fine we can hardly stand ourselves. And we’re going to dance the heels right off
our shoes.”

And that’s exactly what we did.

Until her watched peeped one o’clock and Gillian reminded Lissa that if she planned on a ten o’clock service in the morning,
someone ought to find a cab. This wasn’t as much of a killjoy as you’d think, because when everyone else loaded themselves
into two of them, who was left over to drive back in Danyel’s Jeep?

I think those girls engineered that on purpose.

Whatever—I wasn’t complaining. Especially when he took my hand and held it all the way back to school. Rashid’s hands were
long and straight and fastidiously cared for. Danyel’s were callused from picking guitar and waxing surfboards and holding
summer jobs, his fingers sturdy and strong.

Was I making comparisons again? Was I finally going to make a decision? Because the time for that had come and gone. All I
can tell you is that during the chaos of unloading three vehicles at the front steps of the school, Danyel stopped me from
getting out. He leaned over and made as if to peck me on the cheek again.

Uh-uh. Decision time.

I surprised the you-know-what out of both of us by turning my head at the last second, so instead of my cheek, he got my lips.

My oh my, was it fine.

And then I did what I always do. I stepped back.

But this time I was laughing.

A New Princess for Yasir?

Spotted at the opening of Due, a new high-tech gallery and restaurant in the Marina area of San Francisco, was HRH Prince
Rashid of Yasir with a bevy of beauties in tow. But only one was wearing a custom-made Harry Winston diamond necklace featuring
the Star of the Desert, a 30-carat yellow pear-shaped diamond.

And royal-watchers around the world know what that means.

Yes, it seems Prince Rashid, young though he might be, has made his choice of bride. But who is she?
Paris Match
sent a special reporter to the West Coast to find out.

Sources close to the prince at Spencer Academy, a private high school for the scions of wealthy West Coast families and the
children of celebrities, say his exchange term there has been a big success so far—especially when it comes to the social
scene. With unlimited access to money and the cachet of his royal status, the prince is a catch by any definition. But who
is the mystery girl who has caught the royal eye?

Spencer student and fashion-scene regular Vanessa Talbot, daughter of the Principessa di Firenze and half royal herself, is
in a particularly good position to comment. “I’ve known Shani Hanna since we were freshmen here together,” said the brunette
beauty, who was wearing a Prada leather skirt and a sheer blouse by Philip Lim 3.1 for the interview. “She’s the nicest girl
in the world—but I’d certainly never peg her as someone who would interest a prince. He has, after all, been hanging out with
me and my friends almost exclusively since he arrived and we made him welcome.”

So what is the mysterious Miss Hanna’s appeal? While the school administration was tight-lipped on the matter, a student who
did not wish to be named had her own take. “She’s fun and nice and hangs out with the A-list. Why wouldn’t he like her?” When
questioned as to whom Spencer students considered the “A-list,” the girl was quick to explain. “People like Lissa Mansfield,
who’s Gabe Mansfield’s daughter, you know? His new movie is going to premiere next month and I’ll probably be invited. And
Gillian Chang, whose family owns the Formosa-Pacific Bank in New York. And Brett Loyola, whose family owns, well, big chunks
of San Francisco. People like that.” The girl paused to think a moment. “Not like Vanessa and Dani Lavigne and those people.
Shani is too smart. She sees right through them.”

While tinged with partiality and—may we say it?—a touch of jealousy, the unidentified student’s comments are revealing. Because
the next Princess of Yasir will need to be not only beautiful and socially expert, she’ll need to be capable of inspiring
love in not just one man, but an entire country. She’ll also need to be connected.

Shani Hanna seems to be fulfilling that role instinctively. It remains to be seen whether the young woman, still only in her
senior year of high school, will be the one who can tame the playboy prince and ascend the Lion Throne with him.

On location in San Francisco. —Roberta du Plessis,
Paris Match

HALFWAY THROUGH MIDTERMS
week, the only thing left to go was my art project. Since I was taking Jewelry Making, this was not as stressful as, well,
Econ or Bio, but still. You try soldering a pendant with hands that don’t shake just a little and see how far you get. On
the whole, I was pretty happy with my project. I’d made several of the glass beads myself, which looked like little pearls
with waves of color inside. The pendant was a composite Carly had done in Photoshop of all five of our faces, filtered as
though we were looking through a rainy window. To finish, I had to attach it with a pair of silver chains and tie on the clasp.
Once it was graded, I’d wear it with pride.

Unlike certain other necklaces I’d glommed recently.

It had now been a week and a half since the infamous Due opening, and the diamond necklace still sat in Ms. Curzon’s safe.
But wait
, I can hear you thinking.
You were going to give that back to him the next day.

I tried. But when I called him, it went straight to voice mail without even ringing. And then I had to hear from Vanessa Talbot,
of all people, in our Macroeconomics class on Monday.

“How was the Due opening?” she asked me, leaning across the aisle like she never does.

“Fine. Great. SRO.”

“We had a fabu time at Cream. Just a select few, and the celebrities, of course. I had such a hard time getting Channel Four
to leave me alone. But a red carpet brings them in like flies, though I suppose you wouldn’t know.”

I could mention a few other things that attracted flies, too, but I didn’t.

“Lucky Rashid.” She sighed. “It must be nice, is all I can say.”

In spite of myself, I had to ask. “What must be?”

She looked at me, surprised. “Didn’t you hear? Spencer is sending a tutor to proctor his midterms. He flew home to Yasir for
the week.”

“Oh, that.” I pretended this was old news. “I thought you meant something else. He told me he was going ages ago.”

Not.

How was I supposed to return the necklace if the guy was out of the country? FedEx it to Yasir, care of the palace? Did FedEx
even go to Yasir? Groaning inside, I tracked down Ms. Curzon and explained that the velvet box would have to stay where it
was a little longer.

“That’s not a problem, Miss Hanna,” she assured me. “The prince will be back. He was called home unexpectedly for a short
time, that’s all. He is still expected to earn this term’s credits at Spencer.”

Which was sort of a relief. Because I didn’t want him to jet out of my life thinking I was a two-timing skank. We’d been friends.
Maybe a little more. He might not be part of my future anymore, but I wanted my present to be on good terms all the way around.

And that meant talking to him. Somehow. Sometime. Soon.

So, a week and a half later, I was getting antsy when I still hadn’t heard from him. I’d heard from Danyel, though: Two prayer-circle
videos, numerous phone calls, and a bunch of IMs. On Wednesday, an actual paper letter came, handwritten in a spiky scrawl.

Dear Shani,

Thought I’d go retro and send a letter. Hope you like my midterm English project.

Yours, Danyel

Mine? I stared at the words. Somehow, knowing that his hand had held a fine-point blue Sharpie and guided these letters onto
the paper meant more than a bunch of e-mail and instant messages. They seemed more solid, somehow. You couldn’t just hit Delete
and make them go away. You’d have to act—rip or burn or crumple—to negate the action that had made them.

Hmm. I’d obviously been spending too much time near the physics lab. Newton’s Law, you know?

I opened the sheet folded inside the letter.

To my lady, a sonnet

I got no big house in Huntington Beach

Got no connections to pick up and call

No boss Ducati or Jaguar in reach

No PDA to keep track of it all.

What my God gave me is bigger than those

I stand on the sand and check out the waves

I talk straight up with the One that I chose

And wish I could talk with the girl I crave.

If I owned this beach I still would want you

Having means sharing—hey, I can do that

When you drove away you took my heart too

Handle it lightly, ’cuz it’s all I got.

I’ma wait here till you’re ready to choose

Meantime a song’s a good cure for the blues.

—Danyel

I sat on my bed, shattered, and yet every atom of me glowing. How could I have spent even a minute thinking there was a choice
between Rashid and Danyel? How could I have missed the totally obvious? What had I been thinking?

I scrabbled through my bag, through the stuff on my bed, tossed aside the books sitting on my desk. Augghhh! Where was my
phone?

Then I spotted it on the carpet, halfway under the bed. I grabbed it with one hand and it went off like a fire alarm. With
a shriek, I dropped it, then smacked my head on the bed rail trying to reach underneath and grab it before it went to voice
mail.