Spin Control (10 page)

I AM NOT GOING TO THINK ABOUT THIS!!

It’s all just so wrong, them doing
whatever it is they do, and even worse, my thinking about it so much.

“Valerie?” Mom sets down her teacup and leans on the counter to catch my attention. “Didn’t you have something to show your friends up in your room?”

I grunt an uh-huh, because I think she means the presents I brought from Schwerinborg. Dad, ever the protocol expert, bought some beautiful bracelets for everyone in a really pricey Freital jewelry shop. (And yes, I wanted to do it myself, out of principle, but I couldn’t leave the palace without the press following me. And I couldn’t have afforded what Dad spent, anyway, so who am I to gripe?)

But part of me also wonders if Mom is making her suggestion because she wants time alone with Gabrielle. Though why, when they’ve had the last few weeks without anyone else around, is beyond me.

Maybe they feel like they’re on their honeymoon or something, now that Mom and Dad are separated and Mom’s officially filed for divorce.

“Yeah, let’s go upstairs so we can talk,
Val!” Jules says after licking the last of the chocolate off a Ho Ho wrapper. She not-so-subtly punctuates the remark by bashing one of her boots into my instep. “We have a ton to catch up on!”

Natalie sticks out her tongue and bugs her eyes at me.

“Okay, that is beyond disgusting,” I tell her, even though Natalie just being Natalie makes me feel a better, in a bass-ackward sort of way. “I mean, OUCH.”

“Ouch is right,” Jules says under her breath, but as we all get up, Christie glares at her, making it clear that she not only heard Jules’s comment but that she wants Jules to lay off until she gets the whole story.

Thankyou, thankyou, thankyou, Christie.

“So, things haven’t changed one bit with you since the last time we were all in here,” Jules says in a totally fake but funny voice once we get into my room and the doors shut. “You’re exactly the same old VaI we all know and love. You’re open, honest—”

“I get it already.” I don’t even bother to sound apologetic. Although, with the
honesty thing, I wonder whether Jules is referring to Georg, my mom, or both. I’m not sure which topic sucks more to deal with, but since I know they know about Georg—at least as much as they read in the
Post
—I figure I should lead with that. “Look, I really didn’t mean to hide anything from you guys. But everything happened so fast.”

“You’re telling me.” Jules fiddles with my hairbrush, then sets it back down on top of my dresser. “I can’t believe your mom moved on already. I mean, the divorce can’t be final. Its way too fast. Have they even filed yet?”

Natalie sprawled on my bed when we came in, but at Juless question, she sits up straight and stares at her. “What are you talking about?”

I hate that Jules is such an expert on the whole marriage-divorce thing. And not just because it sucked to be her as a kid, since her parents got divorced when we were all in third grade. Her mom remarried the next year, but that marriage blew up the summer before we started sixth grade. Her parents then remarried—each
other, of all people-when we were in eighth grade.

On top of the whole why-won’t-my-parents-just-settle thing ruining her elementary school years, the experience made Jules way too perceptive about how adults handle relationships. Well, at least perceptive enough to tell that my mom and Gabrieile aren’t just friends.

I make myself face Jules’s stare-down. “It was obvious the minute you walked in the door, huh? I should have known you’d figure it out.”

“WHAT was obvious?” Natalie demands. I know she suspects what we’re hinting at now, but she can’t bring herself to believe it. She looks at Christie, whose eyes are huge, because Christie’s in awe of Jules for figuring it out so easily. Natalie looks at Jules for confirmation, then to me. “No way. NO WAY! Are you serious?”

“Dead serious. Unfortunately.”

“Oh, wow. Your mom’s a dyke now? Gay?” She pauses for a second before asking, “What
is
the proper word? ‘Lesbian,’ I guess? Unless she’s bi—?”

“Well, definitely not ‘dyke,’” I tell her, though I’m really not sure about any of this stuff either. “I think ‘lesbian’s the most PC, but ‘gay’ works, too. And no, I don’t think she’s bisexual. Just gay.”

“That completely blows. I was hoping I was wrong.” Jules turns my desk chair around and sits in it backward. “Just for that, I completely forgive you for keeping the Prince Georg thing to yourself. There will be no retribution whatsoever. The boots are off.”

“Gee,” I say, and I can’t help but grin at her. “My ass and I both thank you.”

I can tell that Jules and Natalie really do feel bad for me, which wasn’t at all what I expected. I know, I know, they’re my
buds,
and I should trust them. But this isn’t something any of us have dealt with before. Jules’s situation was completely different, plus you never
really
know where most people stand on the whole gay issue until they’re face-to-face with it, no matter what they’ve said in the past. It’s just too dicey for most people to handle.

“How’s your dad dealing with it?” Christie asks. “I hope he’s okay.”

She’s always been really tight with my parents, so this can’t be easy news for her, either. She’s been coming over to my house to hang out and for sleepovers since we were really little.

“He doesn’t talk about it much.” I give them all a half-shrug. “I mean, he’s probably got plenty to say, but he wants me and Mom to stay close. I think he’s afraid if he gets negative about the situation, it’s going to make me more ticked off at Mom than I already am.”

“About her being gay?” Nat asks.

“No. I’m not mad about that.” I don’t think. “Though I’m not
happy
about it, you know? I’m more mad that she was lying to us all this time.”

“Did she know she’s … well, you know. Do you think she’s known all along?” Christie asks.

I can tell from the way she’s scrunching her nose that ever since Christie arrived and discovered the truth, all this has been slowly percolating in her head. And now that I think about it, she was pretty quiet when we were having our Ho Ho time downstairs.

She’s probably been thinking about all the times Mom has seen her naked, or at least in her bra and underwear. Like when we’ve gone to the day spa as a treat from Mom, or when Mom stuck her head in my room when Christie and I were changing clothes to go running or to a dance or whatever.

Or maybe Christie’s more enlightened than most people, and instead, she’s thinking about all the other stuff that had me going berserk the first week or so after I found out. I mean, my mom declaring she’s gay is as close as it gets to Christie having her own mother come out of the closet.

Well, except Christie’s mom used to be a nun (before she met Christie’s dad). And Christie’s pretty religious herself. So maybe she’s just thinking that my mom’s a horrible sinner, and how awful it is for me that my mom might go to hell.

Whoa. I hope that’s not what Christie thinks.

I flop onto the bed next to Natalie. Careful to choose just the right words, I say, “I dunno. I think she was lying to herself as much as to me and Dad about her orientation.”

I catch Christie’s eye, just for reassurance, and I realize that at least part of my hunch about Christie’s feelings is dead on. While I can’t tell whether she thinks Mom is committing some huge sin, as far as she’s concerned, we’re in this together. My bad news is her bad news.

I am so so so so glad she’s my best friend. No matter what her belief system tells her, she’s at least going to
try
to be understanding.

“You’re angry because you think your mom cheated on your dad,” Jules says before Christie does. “Otherwise, how could she have hooked up with Miss Thang down there so quickly—right?”

I just nod. The whole room suddenly fills with this whispered chorus of
I’m so sorry
s and
oh that’s terribles
, and I can’t help but not want to hear it anymore.

“Can we talk about something else?” I ask, even though I know what they’re going to want to talk about. “Not that I’m blowing you guys off, but another topic would sure make me feel better. I’m sick of thinking about the whole my-mother-is-gay thing right now.”

“Hmmmm … Georg the Gorgeous?” Jules gets a wicked grin on his face. “You know if he lived within a twenty-mile radius of here, he’d be mine.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I say, as Natalie tosses one of my pillows at Jules’s head and tells her to give me a break. So I fill them in on everything—starting with my meeting Georg and our flirting a little, then our date to his dad’s fancy event. I tell them about making out in the palace garden and in the public restroom, though I try to be casual about that part, as if I’ve kissed lots of guys and making out with Georg that night is just another part of the story and not the absolute best, most mind-blowing thing that’s happened to me in my life.

I also tell them about the cigarettes (that we were NOT smoking) and about my dad catching us. I finish up with all the stuff about the
Majesty
reporter, the bizzaro conversation at lunch with Ulrike and her buddies, the photos in the European papers, and the entire concept of spin control.

“So you don’t know if you and Georg
are together or not?” Christie’s incredulous as she asks this. “You
have
to have a gut instinct—I mean, you don’t even have a hint, like from his tone of voice or anything?”

“Nope. Not a clue.” Was she not listening? I mean, I suppose I could tell them about the little smile he gave me in the hall at school, but then they’d tell me I was giving him credit where credit’s not due, or they’d tell me I’d imagined it—either way, I don’t want to hear it.

“How well do you really know him?” Natalie asks. “Not to be harsh on the guy, because it does sound like he’s pretty damned incredible, and I mean, he’s a freaking
prince
. But how can you not know if you’re together?”

“Look, things were kind of crazy right before I left. How many relationships have you been in where the entire staff of a freaking
press office
wants to weigh in on every little thing you do? It changes things.”

Not that I have any basis of comparison, and neither do they. Jules and Natalie are both short-term-relationship types.
Their M.O. with guys is to go out, make out, and then get out.

And Christie’s had one—ONE—boyfriend. They’ve been together for quite a while now, which explains why she responds: “But if you two really like each other, and want to be together, that shouldn’t matter. I mean, look at Jeremy and me. If we’re separated, like when he goes to running camps in the summer to train for cross-country season, we’re still a couple. We don’t have to talk about it or anything—it’s a given.”

“So you guys are telling me that ’cool it’ means Georg has dumped me?”

They all look at one another, then Jules shrugs. “Maybe. I mean, we weren’t there, and since you left us out of the loop it’s not like we can give you a fair assessment.”

“What I think,” Natalie tells me in a very deliberate tone, “is that you need to decide whether
you
want to be with
him
. That’s what really matters.”

I frown at her, because she’s sounding like my mother—or, more accurately, like one of Mom’s self-help gurus. “I can’t be with him if he doesn’t want me, so I don’t
know that that’s helpful. I mean, what if I
do
want him, but he doesn’t want me?”

“Then forget him,” Jules mutters, “and I’ll have a crack at the boy.”

I ignore her. In the most unemotional and firm voice I can manage, I say, “Well, we can debate it all day long, but there’s no point. I won’t know anything for sure until I get back to Schwerinborg and Georg and I can sort it all out.”

Assuming the spin control plan actually works and we’re allowed to have more than a five-minute face-to-face conversation alone, that is.

“That’s not true,” Christie cuts in. “Just go out with David while you’re here. I bet you decide pretty quickly whether Georg is really the guy for you once you’re out with David. Even if Georg is a prince and you think he ‘gets’ you.”

Right. I can tell what she’s really saying is: 1) Georg
doesn’t
get me, or he would have known to explain “cool it”—or to not even say “cool it” in the first place; and 2) David
does
get me, so who cares if Georg does or not, since I’ve been crushing on David practically my whole life?

“I agree with Christie,” Natalie says. “What can it hurt?”

Well, it can hurt Georg. But I’m not going to say that aloud because it’s clear to me that they’re all in David’s corner.

“Okay, fine. I’ll go out with David.” I point a finger at Christie. “But it is NOT a date. Casual really has to mean casual, okay? Make that crystal clear to David and to Jeremy. I still believe I’m the Armor Girl.”

“You’re wrong,” Christie says. “But you can wait and see for yourself.”

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: Are you there?

I know this is your old e-mail address from home, but I thought I’d try to send to it on the off-chance you’d get it.

I’m at an Internet café in Zermatt—l managed to get over here from my hotel without anyone from the press following me. I think I can safely send you a message, but you know how that goes, so I’ll keep this basic.

I just wanted you to know I meant what I said after the dinner. The way things happened afterward, I wasn’t sure you’d know that anymore.

Don’t respond-this is only a temporary address-but I promise we’ll talk as soon as possible after we both get back. I’ll find a way. Even if I have to sneak out at midnight to do it.

G-

I forgot how completely, totally, unequivocally gorgeous and witty David is. I had a crush on him for nearly a
decade
for a very, very good reason.

I keep peeking over at him in the next chair, watching him watch the movie (and hoping he doesn’t see me doing it), and thinking about how his surfer-blond hair and smooth, just-tanned-even-in-the-winter skin makes him look like he belongs in a movie himself.