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A/N: Anyone who has something to say, I would appreciate feed back. I'd like to know if you think it was worth posting. What do you like? What could make it better? How does the tone strike you? What do you think the point of it was? (I'm curious as to whether or not it got through). I hope you'll stop by and help me out!

Moving Beyond Mia

Chapter 1

May 28th, 2005

Alright, so I'm sitting at an awareness rally for the Invisible Children of Uganda, and suddenly I can't stop thinking about Mia. You know, it's because of her example that I even started keeping a dairy in the first place. (Diary? No, I think I like, 'journal' better; sounds more collegiate). I have no idea how you do it, but noticed that it did her some good and thought it was worth a try. Since I don't know the etiquette for these things (I'll have to e-mail and ask Mia; being a Princess probably means knowing the etiquette for everything) I guess I'll just have to start talking.

After I found out about the Princess bussiness (and had my freak-out…which I'm kind of not proud of now) I did my best to be a supportive best friend, even down to helping her work things out with Nicolas last year.

It had been a few months since Lily's surprise visit to Genovia; things must have been going well with Nicolas, because she hadn't heard from Mia since then…and she couldn't honestly say that she was unhappy with that.

I did, however, hear from Queen Clarice last week, which was odd. I didn't think she even had my address, let alone that she would think to write. Maybe we bonded a little, somehow, on my last trip. Lily suppressed a smile, remembering the moment when Her Highness had come to wake Mia and found a pajama-clad Lily under the covers instead. She didn't want to disrespect the dignity of the Royal Office, or anything, but the look on Clarice's face had been priceless. The sound of someone dropping a table to her left jarred Lily momentarily back to the present, but she wasn't ready to stop writing; something still didn't feel right. Jackson was covering the main table; he would call if he needed her. She shifted in her chair, angled the book in her lap, and focused in again.

A few days ago, when I realized how little my best friend's silence bothered me, I almost couldn't admit it to myself, let alone anyone else. I mean, what kind of person does that make me? It was tugging at me for a while, but it's not like I had anyone to talk it over with. My roommates hardly know who, 'Mia,' is; Michael wouldn't understand; my mom, I'm sure, would try, even though I doubt she'd know what to say, and my Dad…I love him, but we ran out of things to talk about when I was eight. So, I decided to do what Mia does; pour my heart out into a sheaf of paper. Lily hated to admit it, but she thought it was working…a little. She paused and took a breath, staring down at the page. Still not sure what she was looking for, Lily blinked to re-focus her eyes and started again with the first thing that came to mind.

"Lily Moscovitz, Official Best Friend of future Queen; I don't like you." That was how I introduced myself to Nicolas, the day that Mia had to do her Review of the Royal Guar; then I did it again when, 'Captain Kip Kelly' (what kind of a name is that?) started annoying me: "What if we all talked like that? 'Lily Moscovitz, Best Friend of Princess Mia, riding in the 'Stang.'" I just realized that I did that. In fact, as much as she hated to admit it to herself, sometimes she still did. When did my identity get wrapped up with Mia's? I mean, I love her, but somewhere along the line I think I settled into the role of her side-kick. Lily felt older memories stirring up in the back of her mind. She was still trying to decide if she wanted to see them as she shook out her wrist to continue on.

I just realized the really odd thing about Mia going AWAL lately; it means that there's nothing in her life that she wants to talk to me about. When we were just plain kids, not, "Lily and the Princess," we lived as total equals; we told each other everything. In fact, that was what made the whole Princess revelation so hard on me. Lily suppressed a smile as she remembered her own voice, '…Friends tell. This is your friendship Charm…I'm taking it off, and it's going in the dirt.'

Thankfully, Mia got over my initial reaction to …the news. It took me a whileto come to terms with it, but I was even more optimistic than she was in the end. She thought it was a nightmare. I call it a miracle.

Lily looked up from the page at the dozen or so people around her, scrambling from table to table, doing everything but turning cartwheels in the grass to get the attention of passing students, while pictures of child-soldiers stared out from the massive bulletin boards behind them. Note to self, Lily wrote quickly, tell Mia about the Forgotten Children. Maybe she can schedule a meeting with a Ugandan ambassador, or a least do some major awareness-raising in Genovia; maybe even do an international TV thing.

Lily felt her heart-rate raise as the flooded her imaginationThen her hand stopped mid-letter as the sound of her own words pushed up from the back of her mind again. She moved down a line and scribbled what she could catch of the memory. "Wanting to rock the world, but having zip power, like me…that's a nightmare." She paused for just a moment, then started again with new purpose. I don't envy Mia. Not her privilege, at least. What would I do with a closet the size of some people's back yards and a dozen rings that could feed ten thousand people each…Well, come to think of it I'd probably sell them, but that's not the point. I don't envy Mia for the perks of being a Princess, and I certainly don't envy her the headaches. What I envy is the power.

Lily stopped, took a breath, and stared at the page, not sure how she felt about what she saw. Well, I guess it's just as effective to have the ear of influence as to be influence yourself. It gets the same work done, as long as you're persuasive enough. But wasn't that what she'd been doing for the last seven years? Lily felt something in her stomach squirm as she wondered, for the first time, if that identity was good enough anymore.