Almost My Prince Read online

  But I usually never got to experience anything beyond that first twenty minutes, beyond that first whiff, beyond that settling-in period which reminded me of rotting flowers that had never had their water changed.

  “I have to go,” Mom said to Granny in that way Mom did when her mind is already halfway out the door. “Howard needs me.”

  I need you.

  I banished from my mind that little girl pleading for her mom to stay. Hadn’t I already learned? The few things I could count on in this world were death, taxes—and Mom leaving.

  I stirred myself to sit up straight, and I opened my eyes to see Mom text something on her phone. No doubt to her Howard.

  Mom looked over to me expectantly when she heard me rise.

  “Go, I don’t need you,” I said it as a statement. But I couldn’t swear it was fact.

  What followed was the well-rehearsed scene all three of us had performed over a trillion times growing up. Granny and I trailed after Mom, making her preparations to leave, like servants eager to please their master.

  Around and around and around. All over the apartment. Mom needed this. She was leaving that. And then there was the other thing…

  Me.

  And this other thing…

  The prince.

  And that other thing…

  Scandal.

  She couldn’t leave it be. And she’d decided to postpone her return to work in order to lecture me. Not for my sake per se, but more for her—to satisfy that she was doing her motherly duty by telling me when I did something wrong.

  As if I couldn’t already see what was wrong in black and white—and color, too—from the tabloids.

  But Mom was a firm believer in the policy of CYA, that is, cover your …um, derrière. Her lecture was about how I should have covered more of mine, literally.

  I sat down at the kitchen table and propped my head up with a hand. It was a long lecture. I hadn’t bothered to listen to her specifics—I’d heard the variation of all these words before:

  “Your father and I are so ashamed.”

  Over and over and over.

  Her words washed into my soul like water from a burst pipe swooshing down a street drain, channeling all my insecurities, all my childhood pain, all my mistakes into the very hub of my heart.

  My veins struggled to help my heart pump away all that muck lurking in its deepest, darkest depths. But it was too much, too rooted, too determined not to leave.

  I had no choice but to take the residual heartache as my roommate.

  Even Granny, who could massage away most any pain with her masterful fingers, couldn’t reach the depth of that ache, no matter how hard she tried.

  “So what if the papers have her in her knickers tomorrow?” Granny busied her hands by changing out the water in the lilacs she’d “borrowed” from underneath our apartment building’s welcome sign. “Nothing different than a bathing suit.”

  Thank God for Granny—at least she could make sweet lemonade out of plain old dirt.

  The blast of Def Leopard’s “Pour Some Sugar on Me” hollered from Granny’s cellphone all the way from our shared bedroom. With each new song she used as a ringtone, I swear the volume also ratcheted up a couple notches.

  She gave me her puppy dog eyes, the ones she used whenever the apartment manager caught her cutting his flowers, and then she left me alone with Mom.

  “And is this different than a bathing suit?” Mom edged in closer to where I sat at the kitchen table. She flipped through one of the tabloids. She’d tabbed them, the way Grandpa used to do with his court cases, with oodles of color-coded stickies.

  OMG, there were so many pictures of me in the tabloids that she had to break out her sticky notes?!

  She handed me her Exhibit A, dotted with stickies—hot pink—oh, man, that’s the one color Grandpa had reserved exclusively for guilty verdicts. Coincidence?

  Or not.

  Mom’s heels ticked by me with military precision. Her steps coiled around the table. Around and around and around.

  My throat constricted. I struggled to breathe.

  What would I find?

  Pictures of this…

  Me.

  Pictures of that…

  The prince.

  Over and over and over.

  And that other thing…

  A doll.

  Yep, a doll.

  The Gossip Weekly tabloid had taken a poll on “Who Wore It Best” and compared me with the doll. For a Halloween contest, I’d worn a replica of a Fashion Royalty doll outfit.

  Although Barbie doll sized, Fashion Royalty dolls wore these exquisite, intricately tailored outfits by celebrity designer Jason Wu and the Integrity Toys team. Each outfit had a name, like Intimate Reveal or Tricks of the Trade or City Prowl or Sensuous Affair—I could go on with the names of hundreds more outfits.

  Granny had copied the doll-sized design of Modern Comeback Veronique to fit me. We’d won first place—and much needed rent money—in the costume contest with Granny’s version of the pink and black lace bustier set.

  “Of course, we all want to know this.” Mom turned the page to a picture of the prince and me with this headline:

  “Has Sass Finally Tamed the Prince?”

  She cast me an expectant look.

  I avoided her eyes. My heart smacked against my chest, but I kept my breathing steady and my eyes trained on that infamous picture. I’d expected this one to show up again at some point.

  The Prince had his arm around my waist when we’d posed for the camera. Harmless, until he’d folded the contest prize check and spontaneously inserted it into the deep V of my Modern Comeback costume’s bustier.

  I’d done what any self-respecting girl would’ve done—I’d slapped him.

  Just his hand—not his face, not his arm, and not my finest moment.

  Tabloid headlines declared it, “The Slap That Will Tame the Prince.”

  Perhaps they were right—for once. That slap did change something between us. I wasn’t any longer the mere friend of his little sister. I’d advanced to his friend in my own right.

  Now he pressured me for more, much more.

  “We’re not getting married,” I said to Mom. “So don’t get your hopes up.”

  “Dear, it’s your life.” Mom eased into the chair next to me. She allowed her hand to curve over mine. Warmth washed over me like a gentle Caribbean wave, but eventually it had to recede.

  In three-two-one…

  “But if he hasn’t asked you to be his mistress, and instead he’s asked you to marry him”—she paused, maybe to see if I would confirm or deny if he had—“then we can finally all be a family, Sassandra.” She clasped her hands together. “Your father would be so proud to show off his daughter, a princess, a future queen.”

  “You said virtually the same thing when I went to Harvard, Mom, about him being so proud that he’d no doubt recognize me then,” I said. “He didn’t even show up for my graduation.”

  Mom deflected the question back to the tabloids. “A year ago, you’d caused another scandal. What could you expect from him? Why would he want people to know he has a daughter who goes around in public practically nude?” She pointed to a tabloid picture of me in the Modern Comeback bustier.

  “Actually, that covered more of me than a bikini.” I said it as if I offered her a bowl of Lucky Charms without all the marshmallows. It was best not to add fluff when talking to Mom.

  “Should we ask him?” Mom flicked the page to another hot pink sticky and pointed.

  There, I squinted down at a picture of Bo Hunter, the blockbuster action movie hero, who’d draped his arm around me and, at least the way the camera had caught the angle, let his gaze travel down the deep V of the lacy bustier—presumably to where I hid my “lucky charms.”

  Blood rushed through my veins and my pulse beat in rapid fire.

  Hells bells.

  Not again. This picture leaked right before the opening of Bo’s hit movie last fall. B
o and I were good friends and talked weekly. So I didn’t mind how Bo played off the picture back then, like he was a ladies’ man.

  Truth was he loved women’s clothing and had one of the largest doll collections I’d ever seen. But who would go to see an action movie with a hero who played with dolls?

  I sputtered out, “But we were at the doll convention, and—”

  “Gawd, not the doll convention excuse again.” Mom’s smooth control was unraveling like the cheap rayon shirts she’d worn in high school.

  “But we were at a doll convention, Mom.” Gotta roll my eyes here. This was my gazillionth time explaining something that had happened with Bo months ago. “I was showing him how Veronique didn’t come with glued-on eyelashes that year. He was leaning over me to see for himself and—”

  “Strange how there’s not even a hint of a doll in this picture,” Mom said. “Looks like you were at some sort of wild frat party.” She tried to stitch her words together evenly, but they came out fragmented.

  “I swear, Sassandra, if you don’t get that prince to marry you, you’ll look to the whole world like a”—she paused and spewed out—“whore.” Her voice held uncertainty, “Are you?”

  Now that was a slap. Not to my hand, not to my arm, not to my face—just to my heart.

  “No, I’ve never even gotten to second base with a guy, but a real mom would already know that,” I slapped back the words.

  Not our finest moment as mother and daughter.

  I opened my mouth to say something, such as I’m sorry or I didn’t mean that or please forgive me. But it wouldn’t matter.

  Mom and I were like two pieces of jewelry all tangled and knotted together. To work out the kinks in our relationship, Mom would have to pry into a past she’d rather abandon. Plus, she might break a nail.

  Mom ignored me and inspected her nails. “Oh, just think of what all of this—two scandals now—could do to Howard.” She sighed. She commenced pacing around the tiny pillbox of our apartment.

  I dislodged a tabloid from the stack and pointed at the picture with Bo. “As I’ve told you again and again, Mom, this isn’t what it seems.”

  She didn’t bother with me. Instead, she positioned the back of her hand over her forehead like a cold compress.

  To everyone in DC, Mom presented herself as a polished diamond—no stress could tarnish her shine. But beneath the surface, Mom had nerves that were more like the frayed ends of a thread cleverly hidden from sight.

  It reminded me of how I was one of Mom’s loose ends, hidden away with Granny all these years—out of sight, away from the rest of the country to discover.

  All because of my eyes and the unique emerald color I shared with my father. One look at us together and everyone would have known I was his. Or so he obsessed over.

  If only I’d had Mom and Granny’s chocolate-colored eyes, then I could’ve lived with my mom and…

  Not Granny?

  The air whooshed out of my lungs. No, I wouldn’t trade Granny for anything, not even for Mom.

  After her phone call, Granny rolled back into the room like a deflated tire. When she stopped at the wall where Grandpa’s plaques hung, she slid her fingers across his diploma frames for Harvard undergrad and Stanvard Law School, the number one law school in the country.

  She fiddled with the plaques in mock adjustment, and she seemed lost in her own thoughts.

  But I needed Granny’s help. Mom was hot on my tail. “Granny, tell Mom what happened with Bo again.”

  “You were debating about Veronique’s hair.” Granny turned away from the wall and plunked down into a chair.

  “No, the eyelashes,” I added.

  “All I remember is the hair.” She buffed her hands against her knees and did that nervous foot tap she did when something was wrong. “Such a letdown, that hair.”

  Hair… our code word. She was using it, but why? She didn’t want Mom to know something, but what?

  Mom stilled her footsteps and alternated her gaze between Granny and me. “Who was that on the phone?” Mom said saccharine sweet.

  They say you can catch more flies with honey than vinegar, but Mom hadn’t realized artificial sweetness still came off as bitter.

  Mom didn’t like being left out of juicy information, and as sure as she’d hounded me for information about the prince, she’d pester Granny next.

  I knew it. She knew it. Hell, even Granny knew it.

  Granny, cornered, cut to the chase. “Lexi.” My cousin at Stanvard Law. Lexi had said she’d poke around the Admissions Office to see what she could find out about my waitlist status.

  My heart did a backflip and landed on my stomach. “What did she say?”

  Fat tears hurled themselves down Granny’s cheeks, and she tried to rescue each one with her fingers.

  I handed her a paper towel—the grainy sensation made me wish we’d splurged on that ultra-soft tissue at the store. Granny deserved better. Her face was blotted red and splotchy from it, and I sagged to the floor and cuddled against her knees.

  Each of Granny’s tears chopped like a blade into the inside of my chest, but my guilt over possibly causing her these tears ratcheted up the intensity like one of those high speed blenders on pulse.

  Granny had not cried since Grandpa’s death. These tears could only mean that what she was about to say would be like a death. I didn’t want to hear the word that would bury my grandparents’ Stanvard Law dream for me.

  “Rejected,” she choked out between sobs.

  I was gutted.

  I reached for her hand, the same way I had Grandpa’s in that cold hospital room when he’d asked me, his “Sassy Little Genius,” for my promise to go to Stanvard Law and follow in his footsteps as the State Supreme Court Chief Justice.

  Granny had clasped his other hand, assuring him, “She will. I’ll make sure of it.”

  And then Grandpa was gone. I had no rewind button to ask him, “Does almost count?”

  There was no almost about this.

  I’d failed Granny, too, and reduced her to a promise-breaker—tantamount to a liar.

  I was no better than that rough, gritty snot rag of a paper towel she was using right now—the one Granny insisted was “fine,” even though I knew it wasn’t.

  I’ll clean this mess up somehow, Granny. I promise…

  I called Lexi for any insight on my rejection while I leaned beside Granny. Pretty much, Granny echoed everything she’d said. According to Lexi, I was…

  “So close to getting in,” Granny moaned. More sobs. Something about Lexi hacking illegally into files. More sobs. Something about me and the file comments saying, “Not professional.” More sobs. “Too scandalous.” More sobs. “Tabloid vixen.”

  Mom interrupted, “Gawd, even Stanvard thinks you’re a whor—”

  Not that word again.

  “Tabloid vixen,” I interjected. “Got it, Mom, and thank you for making sure I completely understand what some people might think about me.”

  “Add the school district, too. The manager asked me to give you this when he let me in the building.” Mom handed me an opened, certified envelope from William Lawson High School. “They fired you from that teaching job.”

  A sharp pain pierced a direct hit into my chest. Not my first real job, too? That’s where Grandpa had first taught before he went to Stanvard Law. The county later renamed the school after him.

  I thought I’d done everything right to earn my spot, but the school didn’t even give me a chance to show them I was good enough to be there.

  They didn’t want me.

  What could I have done better to show them I wasn’t this Tabloid Vixen, that I was worthy to teach at Grandpa’s school? I managed to graduate top of my class, founded a national afterschool program, and even contributed a few chapters to the textbook the students used.

  Plus, for whatever it was worth, those education researchers dubbed my senior year field study, the “Wellborn” Collaboration Technique, after my last name�
��they even cited it in their academic papers.

  None of that mattered.

  Those full-color tabloid shots of me trumped anything laid out in black and white on my resume. I might as well brand “Tabloid Vixen” across my forehead on my next job interview. What serious employer would ever hire me now?

  I fingered the torn, scalloped edges of my termination letter, when it dawned on me, “Mom, you read my private mail!”

  “I am your mother.”

  “Exactly who my parents are would be an interesting FYI for the tabloids, don’t you think?”

  Mom paled to the color of a white diamond.

  “Don’t worry, Mom, I have no desire to acknowledge my father any more than he does me.”

  “Isabel, for the love of dolls,” Granny said, dabbing the last drops from her eyes. “Just go back to work. I’m sure Howard needs you, and we’ll take it from here.”

  “I need to make sure that none of this will affect Howard.” Mom crossed her arms. “He’s too important.”

  That about summed it all up. Howard always came first.

  She knew it. I knew it. Hell, even Granny knew it.

  What the tabloids wouldn’t give to know that, too.

  “Howard can’t handle this kind of publicity, especially now.” She flicked her hand towards the window, as if she almost believed that such a simple command could dismiss all the press hanging outside our apartment.

  The press wasn’t a pawn to be played with at Mom’s whim. They had the power to hunt down a queen—or a future queen, as they saw it.

  I didn’t propose to play this game with them, with my mom, with Howard. But I was in it now. If only I could start over, undo this tabloid trap, clear that board clean with a simple…

  Knock-knock-knock.

  Someone was at the door.

  Hells bells. What now?

  “Prince Michael Gives ‘Sassy’ Wink”

  -Gossip Weekly

  “Rumors Circulate About Prince Michael and His ‘Sassy’ Proposal”

  -Royal Rumor Report

  The knocks at the door echoed throughout our apartment. When I heard the first one, I thought the paparazzi had somehow pushed past our apartment manager.