A/N: This is a story I've wanted to write for a while but haven't had a chance to- let's see how we go! These are scenes are either before or after scenes in the movie that I've imagined... mainly interactions between our three fave characters!

I'm so sorry about Runaway- I really wasn't feeling that great about it so I've deleted it so that I can edit it and see if it works out later...

The Princess Diaries doesn't belong to me!

"Do I really have to go this afternoon?" the teenager asked sulkily as she stood in the kitchen and sipped a cup of green tea, watching her mother wash paint brushes in a sink at the opposite end of the restored two storey former fire house that they lived in. "I barely know her- she lives in a different continent and she's never asked to see me before."

"Mia," Helen Thermopolis looked up from the sink with a sigh. "As I said yesterday, she is your father's mother and she would like to see you."

"Why the interest now? I mean, she hasn't been around for the past sixteen years, so what's changed?" the teenager persisted, twisting a strand of her frizzy brown hair around a forefinger.

"Amelia, you know about your father," Helen looked at her exasperatedly. "I don't know why..."

"What's her name again?" Mia was being deliberately obtuse and Helen rolled her eyes.

"You know that her name is Clarisse Renaldi...I don't know exactly why she wants to see you, but since your father died, it seems natural that she would like to see you...she's here to see you and I think having afternoon tea with her is a reasonable request."

"Afternoon tea- that sounds so old fashioned," Mia wrinkled her nose, looking like a typical teenager. "Why can't we just talk over the phone? Anyway," she hastily added as she noticed that Helen was looking more and more exasperated. "Why can't you come with me?"

"She didn't ask me," Helen turned away to put her brushes away, avoiding Mia's eyes.

''CAN you come?" Mia suddenly sounded nervous and Helen walked over and rested her arms on Mia's shoulders.

"No... I think that it's good that it's only going to be the two of you- it will be alright," she added reassuringly. "You'll be fine- just be yourself and I'm sjure Clarisse will love you."

"What if she doesn't?" Mia bit her lip, still looking uncertain.

"Then she's crazy- who wouldn't love you?" Helen tucked a strand of Mia's hair behind her ears and gave her a hug. "Now..." she continued after a moment, pulling away and turning Mia towards the door. "Stop procrastinating- take the rubbish out and go to school!"

"Aren't you going to wish me luck?" Mia teased when she reached the doorway, turning with a grin.

"You don't need it, you'll be fine... now go!"

0

Half a day later and on the other side of San Francisco, at the Genovian consulate, Clarisse Renaldi set down her pen, paperwork completed for the most part, and sat back in her chair with a sigh, relieved that her paperwork was done for the day but well aware that the more difficult part of her day was approaching- the reunion (or rather, first ever meeting) with her only grandchild, Amelia, whom she hadn't seen in nearly sixteen years.

She and Phillipe, Amelia's father, had promised to keep their distance until the girl turned eighteen, but now that Phillipe was gone (and the thought still brought tears to Clarisse's eyes), it was essential that her granddaughter knew about her heritage and... her destiny...she only hoped that the girl would be willing to listen to what she had to say and would sccept it.

"Your Majesty?" she heard from the doorway and Clarisse looked up to see Charlotte, her personal assistant, standing there. "Is there anything wrong, ma'm?"

"No, everything's fine, Charlotte...I'm finished with this paperwork, so if you could file it away for me..."

"Of course," the younger woman hurried forward to take the papers off Clarisse's desk. "Is there anything else?"

"Yes...where is Joseph?"

"He's just outside- did you want to see him?"

"Yes, send him in."

As soon as Charlotte left the room, Clarisse pushed back her chair and stood up, compulsively clasping and unclasping her hands before moving on to smoothing her black skirt down then fiddling with her pearl necklace.

"You wanted to see me, Your Majesty?" and she looked over to see her unflappable Head of Security, clad, as always in black, striding into the room and standing in front of her, his brown eyes regarding her calmly.

"Oh yes, Joseph... are your security men ready for this afternoon? I don't want to make her scared by seeing them, but I know they have to be there..."

Clarisse was painfully aware that she sounded flustered, both out of nerves for the meeting with Amelia and being in close proximity to him, someone she had always relied on and was now beginning to wonder whether she had feelings for him, before she stopped, closed her eyes and took a deep breath in, sternly telling herself to calm down, she had no reason to be concerned about this afternoon- before she realized Joseph was standing very close to her and his hand were resting on hers, stilling them from their compulsive actions.

"It's going to be alright," he said calmly.

"How do you know?" Clarisse was uncharacteristically panicked- a sensation she hadn't felt in years but Joseph could well understand why she was feeling like it. "We've never met... how is she going to react to meeting me and what I have to tell her? I'm sure..."

"Just take it one step at at time, Clarisse..." he said gently, both their hearts skipping a beat at the sound of her name. "It's going to be alright... Clarisse, look at me," he said and she almost reluctantly met his eyes. "It will be fine," he repeated in a softer tone. "I'm sure she's more like you and Phillipe than you expect... trust me," he finished, blue eyes meeting brown and she sighed, reluctantly pulling away from him.

"I hope you are right."

0000000

Finally, the hour of introduction had arrived and Mia had grudgingly walked from school to the consulate ('what kind of person lived in a consulate?' she had wondered to herself on the walk over), again wondering WHY she was there, before she stopped in front of the address she had been given and stared dumbly through the steel gates at the imposing house (mansion, she preferred to think of it as) with the well manicured lawns and the flag on the flag pole on the edge of the gravelled driveway.

Suddenly, Mia didn't feel quite as confident- she had been intending on going to see her grandmother and show her that she didn't need her- but the sight of this place and the flag made her wonder just exactly WHO Clarisse Renaldi was...maybe she was someone important, rather than a grandmother who had come from Europe to have tea with her grandchild (and maybe do a little shopping), and maybe this wasn't such a great idea after all...maybe she didn't want to meet this lady after all...

Before she had the chance to flee, however, the camera installed above the gates focused in on her and the intercom on one of the posts holding up the gates buzzed: "School tours are on Wednesday" and Mia knew she couldn't escape this time, so she, feeling braver and slightly indignant that the faceless voice just dismissed her as a silly school girl AND that they hadn't given her the chance to make up her mind about staying or going, pressed the button to connect her with the faceless person...

"I'm here for a meeting with my grandmother."

Clarisse, meanwhile, had changed her outfit and, despite Joseph's confident reassurances that everything would be fine, she was feeling oddly nervous and unsettled as she paced her bedroom upstairs, peeking almost childishly out of the curtains on occasion to see whether Amelia had arrived yet.

Just as there was a knock on the door, Clarisse was looking out the window and her heart jumped when, directly below her, she saw bushy brown hair on the threshold before, simultaneously, she disappeared out of view and Clarisse heard Joseph's voice outside the door.

"Your Majesty, it's time."

"I'm coming," she replied, glancing in a mirror as she walked past, smoothing her hair down and checking her outfit, before she continued walking toward the door, ready to meet her grandchild...

000

An hour and a half later, Helen, working on a painting, heard the slamming of the front door and turned quickly to see Mia standing in the middle of the room, breathless and glaring at her mother.

"How did it go?" she ventured timidly, although she could see that the meeting hadn't gone very well.

"A PRINCESS?!" Mia shrieked when she finally caught a breath. "I'm a princess?! You have got to be joking!"

"She told you," Helen said resignedly, setting down her brush- she had suspected Clarisse would, it was necessary, as Clarisse had told her on the phone the day before, but there had still been a tiny part of her that had hoped that she wouldn't say anything.

"Yes, SHE did- and SHE is Clarisse Renaldi, QUEEN of Genovia!" Mia said sarcastically before her expression softened slightly. "When did you find out that she was Queen and Dad was the Crown Prince? Did you know before you got married?"

"No- Phillipe never said anything when he was here for college- he only told me that he lived in Europe- but I was told once we were married and we had to return to Genovia."

Mia nodded- Helen had told her that she and her father had married after they finished college, and had lived in Europe for a year or so until she was born, but the marriage hadn't worked out (along with disapproval from his parents) so they had split up when Mia was a baby, Phillipe staying in Europe while Helen had returned to the States.

At that thought, Mia realized that the only contact with her father had been minimal, limited to letters, presents and her school tuition paid for...they had never met, she realized painfully, and they never would.

"Why didn't you tell me before now? I never knew my father and now I'm Crown Princess of a country I barely know anything about, I have to have lessons...and I have to spend more time with HER! WHY didn't you tell me?" Mia was getting angrier by the moment and Helen knew that it was useless to try and talk to her daughter until she had calmed down, but she tried anyway.

"We agreed that..."

"I DON'T care! She's not my grandmother!" Mia hissed, stalking up the stairs to her bedroom before spinning on her heel to glare at her mother. "I'm not a Princess and I don't want to have anything more to do with her!" before she turned and stormed into her bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

0

"She's very different to what I expected," Clarisse said honestly as she stirred her cold tea distractedly, staring blankly out into the garden, but the man sitting opposite her knew that she was talking to him. "She's attractive, yes, but her hair...and those shoes..."

"We both know appearances don't matter- but she's a lot like Phillipe, isn't she?"

"Yes," Clarisse looked at Joseph, her expression soft. "The moment I set eyes on her, I knew she was so much like him...but she's so shy, so...so...unpredictable...I certainly didn't expect her to run out like that!"

"She's a teenager, I would hardly call teenagers predictable."

"I'm sure you heard that she doesn't want to be a princess...I thought most little girls dreamed of being a princess and living in a palace, but she doesn't."

"You need to give her some time, Clarisse," Joseph said quietly. "This was completely unexpected to her- you, Phillipe and Helen kept this from her..."

"For her own protection- and to allow her to have a normal childhood!"

"Honorable intentions, I will say, but you cannot expect her to be able to deal with this immediately like Phillipe or Pierre would have."

"They were born to be Princes- they knew what was going on!"

"But Amelia is an American, with no idea of her heritage, and she's going to need some time... I'm sure she will come round and listen to you, but you have to give her time and you have to be patient with her."

There was a long pause as she considered his words, Joseph slightly concerned that he had overstepped his boundaries, before she gave him a crooked smile.

"Are you bossing me around, my Head of Security?"

"A little," he amended with a smile before, glancing around to ensure that there was no one around to watch them, he reached over and gave her hand a squeeze. "I know everything will work out."

"I hope so... I hope so."