Hello. Yes, I know it took ages for me to update but I'm both a very busy person and a very lazy one. ;)

Thanks for the few people who reviewed my story. I'm not totally satisfied with this chapter but I guess I better post it all the same or else I will never go on with this story.

I apologise again for my bad English. It sometimes is very hard for me to write in English. Now back to my master's thesis (which I must write in English too. Argh. Only 78 pages to go L . sigh)

DISCLAIMER- I own nothing. PD is all Meg Cabot's. And "It's not" is Aimee Mann's.

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So Lana arrived home yesterday evening. I was with Grandmère taking Princess lessons as usual when she arrived so at least I didn't have to welcome her. Well actually, I wonder what would have been best: being at home and have to welcome Lana or spending time with Grandmère? The first thing Grandmère said to me today was: "Amelia, I wanted to go shopping with you tonight, and I had already reserved the whole Channel shop for us but I changed my mind because it's totally hopeless. I don't see which clothes could make you look any better. At least you have beautiful eyes but apparently your breasts will never blossom. Well, don't worry too much about that, I know a very good surgeon who could fix that for you when you're a little older."

Yes, I know, she is totally right and I am just a tall freak with no breasts but she could pretend to find me beautiful like every nice grandmother would do.

"Grandmère," I shouted, "couldn't you sometimes be a little more supportive! I am your granddaughter, you know! Your only grand-daughter! Can't you like me just a little?" Wow, that was pretty assertive! Lilly would have been proud of me. But that didn't seem to move Grandmère at all, on the contrary…

"Amelia! How do you dare speak to your Grandmother like that? Have you already forgotten how to behave like a Princess? Of course, you never pay attention to what I say! You are a constant disappointment! Well I guess you will have to come here on Saturday afternoon too so that I explain to you one more time how to behave in a dignified, polite and charming way!"

I didn't know what to answer to that… She was totally unfair.

"And you are a very ungrateful young lady! I do everything for you, I sacrifice my time to give you classes, I try to comfort you over your lack of beauty and find solutions to your problems and yet you are not happy! You won't ever get a boyfriend without my help!"

"Grandmère, I already have a boyfriend! You don't seem to ever pay attention to what I say either!" So ok, I don't like Kenny that much but Grandmère doesn't have to know this. Plus the point is that if Kenny likes me and Kenny is a man (ok he is a freshman so we can't really call him a man, he is rather a teenage boy. Well in any case he is a male, a member of the opposite sex and that's quite a lot already!) then I am not totally repulsive to the male population! Hey who knows, some might very well find me attractive… Stop dreaming Mia! Kenny is certainly having a self-esteem problem, which led him to pick up a girl like me.

Note to myself: ask Lily about that theory!

But Grandmère is a total hypocrite, she can't prevent herself from being a smart-ass… so I still have to go to see her on Saturday. Great, I can't wait to be criticised again.

Then I went back home to find the hall was totally crowded… with tons of bags. All Lana's. God she's here for a month, not for 10 years! How can she own so many things anyhow?

Lana was in the living room but the only thing she said to me was "If you tell anyone that Frank is my father, I'll make your life miserable. I mean even MORE miserable… cause there's no way a freak like you can't have a miserable life already!" And then she ignored me for the rest of the evening. And the thing is… I already told most of my friends that Lana was coming over and, of course, I explained why… I mean, I couldn't pretend that I invited her over because she's my friend and we want to spend time together, could I? Everybody knows that Lana and I hate each other. Plus my friends would never speak to me again if I had to pretend I enjoy Lana's company. And that would make my life much more miserable than whatever Lana could do to me! What does she think? Hasn't she noticed already that Lilly is far scarier than she is? Even Grandmère is less dangerous than Lilly!

But having Lana at home is a total nightmare. I could see even mom and Mr. G. were pissed off. Lana spent the whole night on her cell phone and her conversations went like:

"Hi mom. Yeah, It's awful here. Yes, I know. I know. But really it is the freaks' paradise. How could you ever pick up such a pathetic thing for me to have as a father in the first place? Hello! And his new wife, if only you could see her… she's completely swollen. Yes that's right she looks like a whale and yet she's not even half way through her pregnancy. At least she is not as ugly as Mia!" Thanks Lana, you're so sweet. The good point is mom is no longer going to lecture me about Lana being possibly a nice person ever again! Actually mom rather looks like she is going to strangle Lana right away. But Mr. G. is holding her back. I don't know how he manages that when he himself looks so crossed. "Hi, Rose. Guess what, I'm staying at Thermopolis' house. It is a complete torture! The only reason I am here is that her grandmother, who is a very good customer of my father, practically begged me into staying with Mia while my parents are away. She really believes that I could have a positive effect on Mia's behaviour. Totally hopeless, I say. The poor old lady always dreamt of having a granddaughter like me, or so she said. She said I was graceful, elegant and pretty. Plus, you know what, she pays me for "babysitting" Mia!" Grrrrrrr, Lana is such a liar! I know Grandmère is a monster but somewhere at the very, very, bottom of her heart, I know she likes me… just a little… Wait, Grandmère doesn't even have a heart! I still don't think she likes Lana. I remember she said once that girls like Lana are very vulgar. But… what if she really spoke to Lana? After all, she said to me this very evening that she knew a very good surgeon who could fix my chest problem… Did she mean Mr. Weinberger? I bet so… No, calm down Mia! Grandmère can't be paying Lana to "babysit" me. Lana is here because she is Mr. G's daughter. And that's all. And we all know she is too ashamed to tell it to her friend (though according to me there is no real reason for her to be ashamed – except for Mr. G's gigantic nostrils!) "Oh Josh, oh oh, oh. He he he he. You are sooooooooooooo funny! I agree that Moscovitz girl definitely looks like a monkey. You know what, we should open a zoo area at school. We could call it the "Princess' fan club". She herself looks like a giraffe, and her friend Tina Hakim Baba is the perfect elephant…" Hell! I might look like a giraffe but Tina is certainly not that fat and Lilly not that hairy! And they are both intelligent, unlike Lana! "Hey Josh! It's me again! Me! Lana! Can't you recognise my voice?! Are you passing out already? But it's only 8! Should we do something this evening? You know my parents are away so we could do whatever we want. Yeah. Let's meet at my place in one hour, ok? See you soon." At this point Mr. G got very angry. He forbade Lana to go and asked her to spend the rest of the evening in "her" bedroom. He also screamed that he was very disappointed to see his daughter doesn't know how to behave herself as a guest. He then forced her to call back Josh and tell him she couldn't make it after all. Apparently Josh was not too happy about the news. They had some kind of a fight after which Lana walked to her room. She was so angry that she kicked the door and screamed like hell because she broke one of her foot nails doing so. I couldn't be happier!

Then I remembered that I have to take Princess lessons on Saturday afternoon and my mood sank. Actually it's not all that bad… I mean I had planned to see Kenny (or rather Kenny had planned to see me and I didn't know how to refuse without hurting his feelings, especially after I agreed to become his girlfriends. Lilly says I have to be a responsible person and act accordingly) on that afternoon and now I have an excuse to escape from my responsibilities and especially from his attempts to French kiss. I always feel so uncomfortable with him. I mean Kenny's nice but he is not really my type. I'm definitely into the Michael type of men. And the only common point between Michael and Kenny is the computer club. Sigh. Well now I guess I have to go e-mail Kenny about Saturday afternoon. Of course I could call him but I want to avoid that by all means. I would have to hear him swear his undying love to me. Creepy! I wish he would react like Josh and dump me right away. That would be perfect because he would be the heartless one and maybe I would even get a comforting hug from Michael. One can always dream! It doesn't cost anything… though return to reality can be quite painful.

I was dreaming of how it would feel to be French kissed by Michael when the phone rang. With the chance I have, it must be Kenny! And mom always refuses to say I'm not home when I am indeed at home. She says she would be a bad mother if she encouraged me to lie, she keeps on telling me this kind of motto: "You start with a small lie and you end up like your grand-mother!" Not very encouraging I must confess, but hello… who lied to me during 14 years by omitting to mention that my father was royalty? Mom sure has a short memory! Well I have to hurry and answer the phone now…

… It was not Kenny! I'm so happy! No it was not Kenny and not Grandmère either. Not even Lilly! It was… tadada… Michael! I'm so lucky. Maybe he likes me after all. He just wanted to know if life with Lana was not too horrible. How sweet of him! God, I love him so much… however I heard the voice of Judith in the background. And I have no chance over Judith because she's so bright and she knows how to clone flies and I just know how to…. I have no idea what! Maybe I know how to be a freak. Yeah, great! So all of this means that even if:

I found the courage to break up with Kenny I would be crazy enough to completely humiliate myself in front of Michael by confessing how attractive I think he is I survived Lilly's anger Michael liked me a little

à I would have no chance because he is going out with Judith I'm-so-bright-and-gifted-and-I'm-also-a-senior-unlike-you-Mia!

And I'm only his little sister's best friend who also happens to be a tall freak with gigantic feet, no breasts and an insane grandmother, and the princess of a small country near-by France (Not forgetting the fact that Lana is now my "sister". Still feel like puking when I think about it).

My life is such a mess. It actually inspired me to write a poem. To be honest I am really proud about it. Plus it took me only a couple of minutes to write it. Michael is so totally my muse. The only problem is that I have scribbled the poem on the back of the Chinese take-away menu and I can't seem to find it again. I went to feed Fat Louie, meaning that I was away from the kitchen for 5 minutes. Apparently that was enough time for Mr. G. to throw it away (he was cleaning the kitchen. I mean I thought it would be nice not to be the only person who is cleaning around in the house but apparently it was a mistake. God, I should take care of everything myself. Of course Mr. G. is an Algebra teacher so he only understands about number. He can't understand about art and that's how he ends up throwing away a masterpiece. Thinking about it I wonder how mom could marry such a "logical" man when she herself is such a great artist.) Anyhow I looked into the rubbish bean but I didn't want to really put my hands in there and the paper didn't seem to be on the top. It's not so serious because I still remember everything I wrote and so I'm going to transcribe it here now. I called it: "IT'S NOT" (N/A: "It's not" is in fact a great song by Aimee Mann, which you can listen at www.aimeemann.com , her official web site) and it goes like that:

I keep going round and round on the same old circuit
A wire travels underground to a vacant lot
Well something I can't see interrupts the current
And shrinks the picture down to a tiny dot
And from behind the screen it can look so perfect
But it's not

So here I'm sitting in my car at the same old stop light
I keep waiting for a change but I don't know what
So red turns into green turning into yellow
But I'm just frozen here on the same old spot
And all I have to do is to press the pedal
But I'm not

People are tricky you can't afford to show
Anything risky anything they don't know
The moment you try - well kiss it goodbye

So baby kiss me like a drug, like a respirator
And let me fall into the dream of the astronaut
For I'll get lost in space that goes on forever
And you may call the rest just an afterthought
And I'll believe it's you who could make it better
Though it's not
No it's not
No it's not...

I think I will go I.M. Tina and ask her what she thinks about it. Tina is the only one who knows that I love Michael. And she also knows how I feel about being royalty and being a freak. I'm sure she will find my poem awesome. I think it's actually better than the secret love poems I have had her write for Michael (so that neither he nor Lilly would recognise my hand-writing).

I'm back from the net and I just can't stop crying. I really hate Lana! I have to find a way to get rid of her. It's all Mr. G.'s fault, he should never have slept with a witch (what I really mean is a word starting by b and rhyming with witch, only I'm too polite to write it down). He has produced a monster or even worse: a heartless selfish spoiled cheerleader! I so wish that something bad happened to Lana. Wouldn't it be great if she ended up like the mean woman in Laclos' "Dangerous Liaisons"? The one who catches that sexual disease and gets those disgusting marks on the face. She becomes so ugly that she has to hide so that people won't puke whenever they take a glimpse at her. That would really teach her.

So here's what happened. Tina was not online but I wrote to Kenny about Saturday afternoon. Then I noticed that I'd received 10 new messages. Most of them from people I didn't even know and then one from Lilly and one from Lana. Why would Lana need to write to me? I mean we live in the same house so she can speak directly to me if she needs to. Plus I don't think she'd have anything to tell me. So I first read Lilly's message, which was really strange (though Lilly is a strange person so…):

"Mia,

Forget about Lana's rambling. She's dumb, we all know that.

She didn't realise it but what she did is great. You ought to be thankful!

See you in school tomorrow,

Lilly"

I had no clue what Lilly was speaking about. But I could guess that reading Lana's e-mail would help me figure it all. And that's what I did (I mean I read her e-mail) and since then I have been crying like hell. That b… -I mean witch- sent my poem to the whole school via e-mail. So Mr. G had not thrown it away after all. Thinking about it, I wish he had. God knows how Lana understood how to send an e-mail to the whole school (as Lilly said everybody knows she's not that bright) but she did anyhow. I just feel so bad. Everybody can now read my very private feelings. Plus as if it was not enough, Lana added some comments to it:

"Hi ya guys,

Take a look at our very own Princess's poem and see why she's the Queen of the freaks. Pathetic, heh? And she thinks she could be a writer, I bet. Plus Showalter, if I were you I'd wonder what she means by that last paragraph.

Lana

PS: Josh, I so dream that you would "kiss me like a drug, like a respirator".

PPS: Hey Mia, you don't even have a car!"

I still can't believe it nor can I believe that Lilly actually dared say that what Lana did was great. "You ought to be thankfully"… she must be kidding me! Sometimes I wonder what's going on in Lilly's head. Anyway I think now would be a good time to move to Genovia. Grandmère will certainly think so as well when she finds out about my poem. And I sure am not going to school tomorrow. No way! Maybe I could fake being sick.