A/N Okay, ever since I've read Storywriter92's fan fiction about Aladdin, I haven't been able to get this idea out of my head. So, if you like it tell me, if you don't, tell me and I will take it down to avoid humiliation. But at least I'm going to try. Ps: Something is messed up about the way uploads these, so just bear with me when I change scene's okay? Thanks!

"Oh my beautiful Princess, wake up," my mother was cooing above me as I opened my eyes.

Did she have to do that? I thought to myself. "I'm awake," I told her, rolling over in the bed that was in the room that had once been hers.

I imaged that it looked much the same when she was in here. The sheer curtains and the French sofa, along with the vanity, the canopy and the carpets, they had all been hers. Talk about living in somebody's shadow.

My mother, the infamous Princess Jasmine, walked over to the mirror and looked at her reflection. "Are you going to come down for breakfast?" she asked, pushing a few strands of stray hair back. She readjusted her turquoise headband and straightened invisible wrinkles from the same outfit she has always worn. She didn't seem to age from the portraits painted of her at least sixteen years ago.

"I may have a fruit or something," I told her. I sat up in the bed and looked around.

"Well, just find something to wear and then come down. There is another suitor here for you."

"I told you a thousand times, mother, I am not ready for suitors," I said with a moan.

"No, Leila, we have talked about this. Your father and I know what is best for you. At least meet the fellow."

I sighed. "Have I a choice?"

"No," she sighed with me, and came to my side. "You know how your father is."

"Yes."

"Hurry up and come downstairs for breakfast, you know how he is about that, too." She kissed me on the forehead and hurried from the room.

I dressed in a pink outfit similar to mothers, but with a long skirt, and I combed my hair; I decided to leave it down around my shoulders, because I hate having to wear my hair up. Father used to make me wear it back all of the time, but he hadn't cared about my hair in ages. He hadn't cared about me in ages.

So, after I looked appropriate, I went downstairs to see my mother waiting for me at the doorway to the dining room.

"That's much better. Are you sure you don't want to pull your hair back?" She asked.

"I'm sure, Mother."

"But you look so pretty with it pulled back. I have a ribbon or a headdress you can borrow."

"Do I not look just as pretty with my hair down?"

She sighed. "Yes, I'm sorry. I just don't want you to get in trouble."

"It's ridiculous to get in trouble because of my hair, anyway," I told her.

"Hush, he will hear you."

I entered the room and looked around. I saw the suitor immediately. He was very tall, at least a foot and a half taller than I, and he had dark curly hair that was cut very short. He looked mean, very mean. But I'm sure he had a lot of treasure and that is probably why he had made it past the guards.

"Ah, the beautiful princess Leila," the man said, taking my hand.

"It is nice to meet you," I said, pulling my hand away as he bent down to kiss it.

Father shot me a look, and mother looked worried.

"Varen, why don't you go to the sitting room while I have a word with my daughter," Father said. "Griselda," he said to the maid. "Show this nice man where the sitting room is."

The two left the room and I braced myself for the worst.

"You must be nicer," Father said, as he had one thousand times before, "or, pretty soon, you will have no suitors."

"Yes, sir," I said with a nod. I wanted to say that I was independent, like mother had been and that I was not a prize for anybody and didn't want to be treated as one.

"Now, go upstairs and put you're back. It is inappropriate for a girl to wear her hair down around men; I'm surprised Jasmine didn't catch that."

"Achmed, do you have to give her such a hard time?" Mother asked as I left the room. She grew silent after that. I assumed he gave her one of his 'looks'. Maybe he had even struck her.

"I tried to warn you," she said coming into my room later that night.

"I know."

"I am sorry," she said.

"Mother," I turned from my bed to face her, "will tell me again about Aladdin."

"I was young when I met him. My father was forcing me to marry a prince, and he was only a 'street rat', but he was very handsome," Mother got that distant look on her face. The one she always got when she was thinking about Aladdin. "We met one day at the market. He saved my life and then I almost got him killed for being caught with me. I didn't know it at the time, but he had found a genie and that genie had granted him wishes. His first wish was to be a prince, so he could marry me. But then the evil Jafar banished him to the ends of the earth, and I never saw Aladdin again."

"I wish I could find somebody like Aladdin," I said.

"Perhaps you will."