So I never did get to find out what it was J.P. was going to tell me.

After they were gone, and we’d said hi to her parents and gone into Tina’s room to get away from them, Tina apologized for having spent so much time in a liplock with Boris.

“It’s just,” she said, “he’s so cute, sometimes I can’t help myself.”

“It’s okay,” I told her. “I understand.”

“Still,” Tina fretted. “It was terrible of us to rub how happy we are in your face, when you’re still trying to get over Michael. What did you and J.P. end up talking about, anyway?”

“Oh,” I said uncomfortably. “Nothing, really.”

Tina looked surprised. “Because Boris said when he mentioned you were spending the night with me, J.P. wouldn’t stop talking about how the two of them had to come over here. Even though Boris explained about my dad’s rule. But J.P. kept saying he had something really important he had to tell you, and practically forced Boris to bring him here. Are yousure he didn’t say anything?”

“Well, we talked about a lot of stuff,” I said. I hate lying to Tina! But I can’t tell her we talked about being in therapy. I’m just not ready to admit that to her yet. I know it’s stupid—I know she wouldn’t judge me. But…I just can’t. “You know. Mostly about Lilly.”

“That’s interesting,” Tina said. “You know, Boris thinks J.P.’s in love with you, and I agree. Maybethat ’s what he wanted to say.”

I had a good long laugh at that one. Really, the best laugh I’ve had since Michael and I broke up. The ONLY laugh I’ve had since then, really.

But Tina wasn’t joking, it turned out.

“Look at the facts, Mia,” she said. “J.P. dumped Lilly the minute he heard you and Michael had broken up. He dumped her because he’s in love with you, and he realized he finally had a chance at getting you, now that you’re single.”

“Tina!” I wiped tears from my eyes. “Come on. Be serious.”

“Iam serious, Mia. This totally happened inThe Sheik’s Secret Baby …and I bet that’s why Lilly is so mad at you.”

“Because I gave away the fact that she had the sheik’s secret baby?” I couldn’t help giggling. It’s really hard to feel depressed when you’re around Tina. Even when you’re trapped at the bottom of a cistern.

Tina looked disappointed in me. “No. Because she suspects you’re the real reason why J.P. dumped her. Because he lovesyou. Which is totally unfair of her, because it’s not your fault. You can’t help it if guys fall in love with you, any more than the princess inThe Sheik’s Secret Baby could. But still, you have to admit—that’s totally what happened. It explains EVERYTHING.”

I laughed for, like, ten more minutes. Seriously, Tina lives in the cutest fantasy world. She really should write her own romance novels for a living. Or do stand-up comedy.

Too bad she wants to be a thoracic surgeon instead.

Sunday, September 19, 5 p.m., the loft

Hanging out with Grandmère is hardly ever fun.

Hanging out with Grandmère on basically zero sleep in the Genovian Embassy royal archive room is the total OPPOSITE of fun. Whatever is the least fun thing you can think of.

That’s what my day today with Grandmère was like.

Don’t get me wrong. I am totally interested in the lives of my ancestors.

It’s just…after a while, all those wars and famines? They kind of start seeming the same.

Still, Grandmère insists the royal archives are where I’m most likely to find material for my speech to Domina Rei.

“Now, remember, Amelia,” she kept saying. “You want to INSPIRE them…but at the same time, it’s important to AWE them. While also INFORMING them, of course. So that they go away feeling that you’ve fed not just their minds and hearts, but their SOULS as well.”

Okay, Grandmère. Whatever you say.

Also, hello, pressure much?

Grandmère, of course, gravitated toward the writings of the more well-known Renaldos and asked to be brought the complete works of Grandpère.

But I was more interested in some lesser-known works. You know, that maybe I could crib from without crediting, so it seemed like I made it all up myself?

Because I’mdepressed. That’s not exactly a big boon to creativity. Despite what certain songwriters might say.

The guy in charge of the archives—who actually looked a lot like the way I expected Dr. Knutz to…you know, elderly, bald, and goateed—did a lot of gusty exhaling as Grandmère sent him climbing around the files. We don’t keep, he tried to explain, ALL of the royal writings in the embassy. MOST of them are at the palace. They’d just brought a few tons over when the Genovian Embassy celebrated its fiftieth anniversary a decade ago, and they hadn’t had a chance to send them back yet, due to no one having expressed an interest in seeing them since….

Grandmère wasn’t interested in hearing any of this. Nor was she interested in hearing about why she shouldn’t have brought her toy poodle, Rommel, to the archive room, since animal dander can be harmful to ancient manuscripts. She kept Rommel exactly where he was, on her lap, and said, “Don’t stand there looking like a nutcracker, Monsieur Christophe.” (Which was actually really funny, because he DID look like a nutcracker!) “Bring us tea. And don’t scrimp on the finger sandwiches this time.”

“Finger sandwiches!” Monsieur Christophe cried, looking, if such a thing were possible, even paler than before (which is hard for a guy who clearly spends practically zero time out-of-doors). “But, Your Highness, themanuscripts …were any food or beverage to get on themanuscripts , it could—”

“Good heavens, we aren’t toddlers, Monsieur Christophe!” Grandmère cried. “We aren’t going to have a food fight! Now get us the complete writings of my husband, before I have to get up and do it myself!”

Off Monsieur Christophe went, looking extremely unhappy and giving Grandmère an excuse to turn her hypercritical eye toward me.

“Good Lord, Amelia,” she said after a minute. “What are those…THINGS in your earlobes?”

Crud. I forgot to take out my new chandelier earrings.

“Oh,” I said. “Those. Yeah. Well, I bought them the other day—”

“You look like a gypsy,” Grandmère declared. “Remove them at once. And what on earth is happening with your chest?”

I had tried to go conservative by putting on a Marc Jacobs dress with a Peter Pan collar that Lana assured me was the height of chic urban sophisticate. Especially when paired with brown patterned stockings and platform Mary Janes.

Unfortunately, it was what was beneath the brown wool bodice that had Grandmère up in arms.

“I got a new bra,” I said from between gritted teeth.

“I can see that,” Grandmère said. “I’m not blind. It’s what you’ve stuffed down it that has me confused.”

“Nothing’s stuffed down it, Grandmère,” I said, again from between gritted teeth. “That’s all me. I’ve grown.”

“That will be the day,” Grandmère said.

And before I knew what was happening, she’d reached out and pinched me!

On the boob!

“OW!” I yelled, leaping away from her. “What is WRONG with you?”

But Grandmère already looked smug.

“You HAVE grown,” she said. “It must have been all that good Genovian olive oil we pumped you full of this summer—”

“More likely all the harmful hormones with which the USDA pumps their cattle,” I said, massaging my now-throbbing boob. “Since I’ve started eating meat, I’ve grown an inch in height and another inch—well, everywhere else. So you don’t have to pinch me. I guarantee you, it’s all real. Also, OW. That really hurt. How would you like it if someone did that to you?”

“We’ll make certain Chanel gets your new measurements,” Grandmère said, looking pleased. “This is wonderful, Amelia. Finally we’ll be able to put you into something strapless—and you’ll actually be able to hold it up for a change!”

Seriously. I hate her sometimes.

Monsieur Christophe finally came with the tea and sandwiches…and Grandpère’s writings. Which were stored in multiple cardboard boxes. And all seemed to be about drainage issues, from which Genovia was suffering during most of his rule.

“I don’t want to give a speech about DRAINAGE,” I informed Grandmère. Actually, the truth was, I didn’t want to give a speech at all. But since I knew that kind of attitude would get me nowhere—both with Grandmère AND Dr. Knutz, who have a lot in common, if you think about it—I settled for whining about the subject matter. “Grandmère, all these papers…they’re basically about the Genovian sewage system. I can’t talk to Domina Rei about SEWAGE. Don’t you have anything”—I turned to Monsieur Christophe, who was hovering nearby, gasping every time either of us lifted up one of his precious papers—“more PERSONAL?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Amelia,” Grandmère said. “You can’t read your grandfather’s personal papers to Domina Rei.”

The truth was, of course, I wasn’t thinking of Grandpère. Although he had some nifty correspondence he’d written during the war, I’d been hoping for something by someone a little less…

Male? Boring? RECENT?

“What about her?” I asked, pointing to a portrait that was hanging in an alcove above the watercooler. It was a very nice little painting of a slightly moonfaced young girl in Renaissance-type clothes, framed elaborately in heavy gold leaf.

“Her?”Grandmère all but snorted. “Never mindher .”

“Who is she?” I asked. Mainly to annoy Grandmère, who so clearly wanted to keep on reading about drainage. But also because it was a very pretty picture. And the girl in it looked sad. Like she might not be unfamiliar with the sensation of slipping down a cistern.

“That,” Monsieur Christophe said in a weary tone, “is Her Royal Highness Amelie Virginie Renaldo, the fifty-seventh princess of Genovia, who ruled in the year sixteen sixty-nine.”

I blinked a few times. Then I looked at Grandmère.

“Why haven’t we ever studied her before?” I asked. Because, believe me, Grandmère has made me memorize my ancestral line. And nowhere is there an Amelie Virginie on it. Amelie is a very popular name in Genovia, because it’s the name of the patron saint of the country, a young peasant girl who saved the principality from a marauding invader by lulling him to sleep with a plaintive song, then lopping his head off.

“Because she only ruled for twelve days,” Grandmère said impatiently, “before dying of the bubonic plague.”

“She DID?” I couldn’t help it. I jumped up out of my seat and hurried over to the watercooler to look at the little portrait. “She looks like she’s MY age!”

“She was,” Grandmère said in a tired voice. “Amelia, would you please sit down? We don’t have time for this. The gala is in less than a week, we need to come up with a speech for younow —”

“Oh my God, this is so sad.” I guess one of the symptoms of being depressed is that you basically just cry all the time. Because I was fully welling up. Princess Amelie Virginie was so pretty, like Madonna, back before she went macrobiotic and got all into the Kabbalah and weight lifting and still had chubby cheeks and stuff. She looked a little bit like Lilly, in a way. If Lilly were a brunette. And wore a crown and a blue velvet choker. “What was she, like, sixteen?”

“Indeed.” Monsieur Christophe had come to stand beside me. “It was a terrible time to be alive. The plague was decimating not just the countryside, but the royal court as well. She lost both her parents and all of her brothers to it. That’s how she inherited the throne. She only ruled for, like Her Highness said, twelve days before succumbing to the Black Death herself. But during that time, she made some decisions—controversial at that time—that ultimately saved many Genovians, if not the entire coastal populace…including closing the Port of Genovia to all incoming and outgoing ship traffic, and shutting the palace gates against all visitors…even the physicians who might have been able to save her. She didn’t want to risk the disease spreading further to her people.”

“Oh my God,” I said, laying a hand on my chest and trying not to sob. “That is so sad! Where are her writings?”

Monsieur Christophe blinked up at me (because in my platform Mary Janes, I was, like, six feet two, and he was just a little guy—like Grandmère said, a nutcracker). “I beg your pardon, Your Highness?”

“Her writings,” I said. “Princess Amelie Virginie’s. I’d like to see them.”

“For God’s sake, Amelia,” Grandmère burst out, looking as if she could really use a Sidecar and a cigarette, and not the tea and finger sandwiches (without mayo) to which she’d been relegated by her doctor. “She doesn’t have any writings! She was dealing with a plague! She didn’t have time to write anything! She was too busy having the bodies of her maids burned in the palace courtyard.”