Calls to the Genovian Palace press office and Prince Phillipe were still unanswered at press time.

Friday, September 24, 11 p.m., limo on the way home from The Waldorf-Astoria

You know what? I don’t care.

I really don’t. I did the right thing. I know I did.

And Dad can yell all he wants—and go on saying that I’ve ruined all of our lives.

And Grandmère can swoon on that couch and call for all the Sidecars she wants.

I don’t regret it.

And I never will.

You should have HEARD how quiet that audience got when I started telling them about Amelie Virginie! It was quieter in that banquet room than it was in the school cafeteria today, when Lilly ripped me a new one in front of everyone.

And there were about twelve hundred more people in the room tonight than there were this afternoon!

And every single one of them was gazing up at me, totally enraptured by the story of Princess Amelie. I think I saw TEARS in Rosie O’Donnell’s eyes—TEARS!—when I got to the part about Uncle Francesco burning the books in the palace library.

And when I got to the part about Amelie discovering her first pustule—I TOTALLY heard a sob from Nancy Pelosi’s direction.

But then when I was describing how it’s about time that the world recognize that sixteen-year-old girls are capable of so much more than wearing some navel-bearing outfit on the cover of Rolling Stone, or passing out from partying too much in front of some nightclub…that we should be recognized instead for taking a stand and coming to the aid of a people in need…

Well. That’s when I got the standing ovation.

I was basking in the glow of everyone’s congratulations—and Lana’s mother’s reiteration that I’m welcome to apply for membership in Domina Rei just as soon as I’ve turned eighteen—when Lars tugged on my sleeve (I guess Domina Rei does let men into their events if they’re bodyguards) and said my grandmother was already passed out in the limo.

And that my father wanted to see me at once.

But whatever. Grandmère was totally just overcome with the emotion of finally being asked to join a club that has been snubbing her for the past fifty years, or whatever. Because I totally saw Sophia Loren go up to her and issue an invitation to join. Grandmère practically fell over herself in her eagerness to say she’d think about it.

Which is princess for, “I’ll call you in the morning and say yes but I can’t say it now or I’ll look too eager.”

Dad yelled at me for like half an hour about how much I’ve let the family down and what a nightmare this is going to be with parliament because it looks like our family has been hiding it all along and how now he’s going to have to run for prime minister if he wants to continue any of the initiatives he’s had planned and who even knows if he’ll win if some of these other losers run and how the Genovian people are never going to be able to adjust to being a democracy and how now there’ll be voter fraud and how I’ll still have royal duties anyway only now I’ll probably have to get a job someday because my allowance will be cut in half and he hopes I’m happy knowing I’ve basically just single-handedly destroyed a dynasty and how am I aware that I’ll be going down in history as the disgrace of the Renaldo family, until finally I was just like, “Dad? You know what? You need to take it up with Dr. Knutz. And you will, as a matter of fact, next Friday, when you and Grandmère accompany me to my appointment.”

THAT brought him up short. He looked all scared—like that time that flight attendant was claiming she was pregnant with his baby, until he realized he’d never met her before.

“Me?” he cried. “Coming to one of your appointments? With my MOTHER?”

“Yes,” I said, not backing down. “Because I really want to talk about how on your mental health assessment you checked off A little of the time in answer to the statement I feel as if true romantic love has passed me by when just a couple of weeks ago you told me that you’ll always regret having let Mom slip away. You totally lied to Dr. Knutz, and you know if you lie in therapy—even to MY therapist—you’re only hurting yourself, because how can you hope to make any progress if you’re not honest with yourself first?”

Dad just blinked at me, I guess because I’d changed the subject so abruptly.

But then, looking all irritated, he went, “Mia, contrary to what you might like to believe in that over-romantic imagination of yours, I do not sit around pining for your mother every minute of every day. Yes, occasionally I regret that things didn’t work out with her. But life goes on. As you will find that life after Michael does. So, yes, I do feel that true love has passed me by, a little of the time. But the REST of the time I feel hopeful that new love might very well be waiting for me right around the next corner—as I hope it’s waiting for you as well. Now can we get back to the matter at hand? You had absolutely no right to do what you did tonight, and I’m very, very disappointed that you—”

But I didn’t pay attention to the rest of what he said, because I was thinking about that phrase, hopeful that new love might very well be waiting for me right around the next corner.

How does someone make that transition? The transition from missing the person who they love so desperately that being without them feels like an empty ache inside their chest, to feeling hopeful that new love might very well be waiting for them right around the next corner?

I just don’t know.