4.   Lilly being incredibly annoying.

5.   Josh Richter (ACKKKKK).

6.   My then arch nemesis, Lana Weinberger.

7.   Michael.

My dad possibly conducting a secret love affair across the river is never mentioned anywhere.

Ugh! I am so depressed now.

And even though Marie Rose stocked my kitchen while I was gone, so my refrigerator is full of delicious things to eat—such as a tarragon chicken salad; wild-caught Alaskan salmon poached in a court bouillon with a cumin dill sauce; crisp prosciutto, rocket, and mozzarella paninis; black truffle macaroni and cheese; lobster-claw kebabs; meringue; and Genovian orange crème brûlée—all I feel like eating is the second Butterfinger I bought at the bodega. I am not following Dr. Delgado’s advice at all!

But I have to admit, the Butterfinger is helping, as is the fact that there’s an I Found the Gown marathon on TLC.

It would be so much simpler if I could just drive to a discount store like the girls on that show do and find the perfect gown (for $400)!

But I have a sneaking suspicion that after all the Butterfingers I’ve just eaten, there’s no gown in existence (especially for only $400) cleverly enough designed to hide the food baby I’ve developed and the press seems to feel compelled to comment on.

CHAPTER 40

4:44 p.m., Tuesday, May 5

Third-Floor Apartment

Consulate General of Genovia

Rate the Royals Rating: 7!

Okay, I think I just did something really stupid.

It probably doesn’t help that I’ve taken a couple of nips from the bottle of hundred-year-old Williams pear schnaps* that Michael and I were sent as an engagement gift from the chancellor of Austria (it was already open anyway, since the Royal Genovian Guard had to make sure it wasn’t poisoned—not by the chancellor, obviously—​which they did by tasting it themselves).

*Austrian schnaps is completely different from what Americans call schnapps. For one thing, if it’s prepared correctly, it actually tastes like something other than toothpaste.

I was just feeling so bummed out about everything after reading parts of Love in the Time of Shadows (radiation poisoning is so depressing! Why would anyone write about this? Unless it was a book about Hiroshima, of course) and all my own diaries that I was like, “Oh, whatever. It’s five o’clock somewhere! Skol!” and helped myself to a sip. Or maybe two. I don’t remember anyway.

And not just because my rank on Rate the Royals has sunk from number one (not that I care, since that website is a stupid blight on humanity and is best ignored) down to seven.

I am now even less popular than General Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Faisal, the Crown Prince of Qalif!

And, apparently, the Sultan of Brunei (the one who did something with a monkey, though we’ll never know what, thanks to Lazarres-Reynolds).

There is absolutely no reason for this to have happened other than my having kicked the founder of the website out of my community center for planting listening devices in the women’s restroom (which I now regret not having him arrested for. Ling Su was right).

But even worse than this, there was a post from RoyalRabbleRouser, who was stalking me all last year. He disappeared for a while, most likely due to having joined a cult or a radical terror group, or possibly the cast of a reality show. Reality-show casting agents recruit the same kind of people as cults and terror groups do, ones who feel like there is something missing from their lives, very often romantic love.

And since the only way woman-haters like my stalker are going to get a date is if they kidnap one or one is assigned to them by a cult leader or central casting, often such people’s decision to join up proves to be a good one . . . until they get blown up or kicked off the show.

It must have been the latter since RoyalRabbleRouser has shown up again—probably due to the news that I’m getting married, at least based on his message about being glad that “the princess slut” is finally letting “Mike” make “an honest woman of her.”

“It’s about time, too,” writes RoyalRabbleRouser. “Maybe now she’ll let him work while she stays home and squeezes out a few puppies, like a decent woman should. Hopefully she’ll learn to cook, too. But probably she’ll just keep on making her asinine speeches about how women should work, while letting her servants do the cooking.”

Um . . . yes. Yes, I will. Because that’s the job for which I employ them, and if I didn’t employ them, they would have no paycheck, and without a paycheck they would have no way to feed their families, and then they would starve. It’s called economics, RoyalRabbleRouser. Look it up.

At the center we’re trying hard to provide teens with the mentoring, education, and job training they need so that when they leave school they’ll be invulnerable to the kind of thinking RoyalRabbleRouser supports, but sometimes I worry it’s not enough. Obviously the Frank Gianini Community Center needs to expand globally.

I really have to start following Dominique’s advice and stop reading this stuff.

But I can’t stop reading texts from Lana Weinberger (whose birthday wishes I’d forgotten to return). She sent another, even more alarming than the last:

<Lana Weinberger “TheRock”

HRH Mia Thermopolis “FtLouie”>

Bitch, how could you get engaged and not even tell me? I had to hear it from Trish who heard it from her mom who saw it on TMZ! You are a twat and a half!

But don’t worry, you can make it up to me by making me and Trish bridesmaids! And we’re not just going to be lame bridesmaids who do nothing but look good and carry your train. We’re actually going to do stuff. See the attached—we have your bachelorette party all planned out! It’s going to be at a place in Genovia called Crazy Ivan’s. You’ll LOVE it!!!!