Royally Jacked (Romantic Comedies, The) (12 page)

This is way worse than watching David Anderson and all his superathletic friends. Like, times a billion and one. David didn’t talk to me very often, but at least he wouldn’t have ignored me by walking ahead of me on the way to school. If he saw me, he’d have waited for me to catch up. He’d have kept right on talking to his jock friends for the most part, but still.

Georg catches my eye, and I almost wave, but he gets this
look,
then turns right
back to the blonde, who doesn’t even seem to notice the hitch in his conversation.

Then it hits me. He knows. He
knows
I’m into him and he doesn’t want anyone to know he even knows who I am, let alone that he kissed me.

He seems so comfortable, yakking away with all his perfectly perfect buds, that all I can think is
Yeah, tell me again how you don’t have any friends, Georg. Tell me again how awkward you feel all the time
. He sure doesn’t look it—especially since he’s all dressed up. Not really fancy—he’s wearing jeans—but he’s definitely a notch above everyone else. He’s got on a soft, blue crewneck sweater under this absolutely stunning black leather coat. It makes him look a lot older than sixteen.

There’s not an ounce of doubt in my mind that this guy is going to be prom king when he’s a senior. He’s so popular, it’s probably not even going to be a big deal to him, and I can’t trust a guy who thinks that way.

I mean, the guy probably has a
real
crown hooked over his bedpost. And can I really trust a guy who has a crown in his bedroom?

Especially one who only seems to be awkward around ME?

I find an empty bench away from Georg and all his fantabulous friends and start rummaging through my backpack, trying to ignore the horrible pressure in my chest that tells me I am falling for the wrong guy. Again. I shove my wallet out of the way and find a half-smashed tampon—of course, a day late—then realize that I still need that tampon. I only have four left at home.

Crap.

I’m going to have to stop at that quickie mart on the way home and hope they stock girly products with English labels or some kind of picture, so I don’t accidentally buy Depends or something equally revolting. I also have to hope that Georg and his friends aren’t stopping into the store for the Schwerinborg equivalent of Twizzlers.

I check my wallet to make sure I have enough cash, then realize I’m screwed. All I have is one euro—which is about the same as a buck—and an American twentydollar bill. Since the cafeteria takes a swipe
card that deducts from Dad’s bank account, I hadn’t thought to ask him for any euros other than what I needed for the Coke machine in the Munich airport.

This is bad. Very bad. And I so don’t want to ask Dad to buy me tampons. That’d just be wrong.

“Hi. It’s Valerie, isn’t it?”

I bury the tampon under a couple of books in my backpack and smile at the feminine voice to my left. The quad’s pretty crowded, but there are three girls looking at me. I think the blond one spoke—I introduced myself to her in chemistry yesterday. “Hi. Yeah, it’s Valerie. You’re Ulrike, right?”

She nods, and the look on her face isn’t openly hostile or anything, so I figure I’m okay. Ulrike is one of those girls I’m always suspicious of based on looks alone, though Christie tells me this is really shallow. Ulrike’s about five-foot-seven, and has this white-blond hair that looks shimmery, even today with the misty weather and nothing but the gray high school building and the snowy Alps behind her. In the sunshine, you just know she’s stunning.

“I heard you live at the palace?” she says, still smiling at me.

“Yeah, my dad works for Prince Manfred.”

“So you must know Georg?” Another one of the girls jumps in without bothering to introduce herself. She’s a teeny tiny brunette, and totally pretty. Of course.

“We’ve talked a couple times.” I drop my backpack onto the bench beside me and make a point not to look across the quad toward Georg. I’m not sure why, but all of a sudden my bullshit detector’s blaring, and it’s warning me to keep things chill. “But I just moved here a couple weeks ago, so I really don’t know anyone yet.”

“Well, now you know us,” Ulrike smiles, though the girl who asked if I know Georg doesn’t seem all that thrilled about Ulrike talking to me.

They—well, mostly Ulrike—invite me to eat lunch with them, so I do, even though it’s more like they’re eating with me, since I was the one who snagged the bench in the first place. I wonder if I’m in their spot or something.

Ulrike’s okay, I decide after a few minutes.
Just from listening to her talk, I can tell she’s fairly popular. She’s into sports and apparently shes on student council. Her dad’s some kind of diplomat from Germany. The third girl, Maya, moved here from New York when she was six for her mom’s international banking job. She’s a junior, but she and Ulrike live next door to each other and play soccer together, so they hang out a lot.

I keep glancing at the brunette who asked me about Georg, hoping she’ll introduce herself. Ulrike finally does it for her: Her name’s Steffi, and of course Ulrike says all kinds of nice things about her, including the fact that Steffi’s vice president of the sophomore class—excuse me, of
year ten
—and was elected to homecoming court last year
and
this year. I tell Steffi I’m glad to meet her (hey, Dad raised me to be well mannered) and that it’s cool she’s on student council with Ulrike. Of course, the whole time Steffi just sits there eating her tuna on wheat like what Ulrike’s saying is no big thing. Then, when I compliment Steffi on this funky hair clip she’s wearing, she only shrugs. Not an embarrassed-to-be-complimented
shrug, but a shrug that makes it clear she thinks she’s entitled to a compliment or two.

I hate her already.

Finally the warning bell rings. I wad up my trash and Steffi does the same. Then she hesitates and looks up. I think she’s actually going to speak to me.

Not.

“Hey, Georg,” she says with a megawatt grin plastered all over her face. I turn around, and of course there he is. He’s intentionally not looking at me as he gives us a group hello.

Do I have a big, fat letter
L
stamped on my forehead, or what?

Georg asks Maya how much homework got assigned in French IV today, since he’s heading there next. While Maya flips through a blue notebook looking for the assignment, I start to tell Georg what it is, since I had French IV with the same teacher right before lunch.

This is the moment Steffi finally deigns to speak to me. “Oh, Valerie,” she says in this repellent whisper that’s totally meant to be heard, “did you ever solve your little
problem yesterday? I saw you headed into the first-floor bathroom after school, and you looked desperate!”

I want to smack her. She is evil, evil, evil. And was she freakin’
following
me or something?

Georg swallows and looks uncomfortable, though his eyes are totally focused on Maya, which means he heard Steffi but is pretending he didn’t. When Maya finally finds the right page in her notebook and tells him the assignment, he scribbles it down, then heads to class, with Steffi right at his elbow, because of course her Spanish III class is right next door to French IV.

He doesn’t even look at me.

And naturally Steffi never notices that I didn’t answer her. Bitch.

The whole way home—I take the
strassenbahn
again, just because I know Georg is still in the school building and can’t cross the quad fast enough to jump on the same one—I’m thinking I should e-mail Jules and tell her that to date, my Armor Girl theory is dead on. It’s even correct on an international scale, because I am beginning
to suspect that Steffi is going to play the role of Shallow Princess to my Armor Girl. Here’s the evidence:

1) Georg liked talking to me over break, but no one else was around. This clearly makes me a “safety” girl, like the Armor Girl—someone who makes you smile during those trying times when there are no Shallow Princesses around to kiss up to you.

2) I drew a flattering picture of Georg. Armor Girl made Heath some cool armor. Both of us do nice things without expecting anything in return.

3) In public, the hero walks off with the Shallow Princess and totally forgets about the Armor Girl.

I try think of a number four, but I can’t. Truth is, when I push the analogy, it doesn’t work.

Heath never kissed the Armor Girl and gave her the let’s-be-friends speech. He never acted like he liked her that way at all. Maybe that part of the movie ended up on the cutting-room floor, I don’t know. But my gut tells me—despite what happened at lunch today, and despite the fact Georg didn’t walk to school with me—that he
really is a nice guy. He can’t possibly be the type who would kiss an Armor Girl and forget all about it.

And it’s not like he told me he’s into Shallow Princess Steffi. Heath told Armor Girl flat out that he wanted the Shallow Princess, and he wanted her bad. He even had Armor Girl help him
get
Shallow Princess, and Armor Girl cheered when Heath kissed her. I even think she meant it.

If I saw Georg kiss Steffi, I’d hurl.

Okay, I am thinking about all this way, way too much.

And I’m getting tempted to call Mom and tell her I want to come live with her. Gabrielle, Lake Braddock, tofu dinners, and all.

When I get back to our apartment, Dad’s already there. It’s only three-thirty and he’s supposed to be working, so I give him a little grin, even though I feel less than cheerful.

“Now that’s not a happy smile.” He stops messing around in the kitchen and frowns at me. “Bad day at school?”

Geez, is every thought I have that obvious?

“Nah.” I drop my backpack onto the table, then open the fridge and grab a Coke Light. “Nothing some caffeine and a bowl of chocolate ice cream can’t fix.”

Dad reaches past me and puts his hand on the freezer door to hold it shut. “I promised your mother that you’d eat healthy foods. I picked up some fresh tilapia fillets this morning, and I’ll make some vegetables to go with it. Get a few vitamins into your diet.”

“Just give me a carrot to go with my ice cream,” I retort, picking up a minicarrot from the pile of veggies he’s already chopped into a bowl on the counter. He shakes his head, but moves away from the freezer and starts slicing an oversize yellow squash.

I take a sip of soda, then grab another carrot. “Besides, how’s Mom going to know what I’m eating?”

“Maybe when you write her back?”

I freeze with the carrot halfway to my mouth. “Mom wrote me? A letter?”

He tips his head toward the Formica table. “It’s under the Wal-Mart circular.”

“Why did she send a Wal-Mart circular?”

“She didn’t. It came in the regular mail.”

“They have
Wal-Mart
in
Schwerinborg
?”

“They’re everywhere.” He laughs to himself as he covers the bowl of veggies with plastic wrap. “So if there’s anything you need, remind me and well go this weekend. But I’ll warn you, their products aren’t quite like what you’d find at home. They carry mostly European brand names.”

I flip past the Wal-Mart ad—despite Dad’s offer to go shopping, I have zero interest in taking him shopping for feminine products, which is all I need, since he got me a new pillow and a hair dryer already—and see a large, padded manila envelope plastered with U.S. stamps. Mom’s neat, rounded handwriting across the front gives me an instant wave of homesickness, as if I wasn’t missing Virginia enough after the little episode with Steffi and Georg on the quad today.

“The fish needs to marinate,” Dad says as he slides the veggies into the fridge, ready to sauté later. “I’m going to run out to handle a few things for Prince Manfred, so why don’t we meet back here at five thirty for dinner?”

Did I mention how cool my dad can be? You’d think he’d be acting like Jules’s mom did when her parents got divorced, asking Jules every five seconds what her father said about her. But even though I know he’s curious (otherwise, how would he remember exactly where in the stack of mail he’d placed Mom’s letter?) Dad’s clearly going to give me some space.

I tell him that’ll be fine, and once he’s out the door, I rip the envelope open. A flat package, wrapped in pink paper with a silver ribbon, falls out onto the table. I resist the urge to tear into it and read the letter first, because I know Mom would want me to.

Dear Valerie,

I hope you’re getting settled. I hate that you’re so far away! I think about you every day, you know. I miss my baby girl.

Here, I’m getting moved into my new apartment. I’m also getting ready to look for a job. I don’t have to do too much to get my teaching certification updated, so I’ll soon be interviewing
for elementary school positions for the fall. Wish me luck!

Gabrielle has agreed to be a leader for Weight Watchers and she’s going through training now, which means that I’m alone at home a lot of nights. So if you’re up late, you can call me anytime—you won’t be bothering Gabrielle. And if you’re feeling uncomfortable there, or school isn’t going as you hoped, you know you always have a place to live with me. In the meantime, if you have a rough day, I’ve tucked in a little gift I hope will help you through.

I guess that’s about it. I’m scheduled to get my Internet hookup next week, so I’ll start e-mailing then. By the time you get this, I may be online, so check your computer!

Until then, please know that I’m thinking of you and your dad. I want you both to be happy, despite what you may think.

Lots and lots of love,

Mom

I put the letter down, then flop into the wobbly chair. I can’t decide whether to open the gift or to peruse the Wal-Mart circular while I clear my brain.

I feel tears coming, but I grind my fists against my eye sockets for a minute to force them back. I’m not sure if I’m mad or depressed or what. All I know is that my life is royally jacked, and there’s not a gift in the world short of a time machine that can fix it. And I’m not sure even that will help, since Mom seems to think she should have come out of the closet ten years ago. If I traveled back much farther than that to try to fix things, I wouldn’t even have been born.