Royally Crushed (9 page)

“Val, it’s not that I think you’re spilling your guts to a stranger. I know you’re good about keeping our family
matters private, but I just thought I’d give you a word of warning. That’s all. We’re new here and Georg’s father is my boss. So let’s keep our ears and eyes open and learn our way around, all right?”

I nod. I’m a listen-first-speak-second kind of person, anyway.

“Georg’s an okay guy though, isn’t he?” I ask a few minutes later, after Dad pesters me about whether I got any studying done. Maybe Dad knows something about Georg. He hears all the gossip about politicians, celebrities, and their kids, and he usually even knows which rumors are true.

“As far as I know, Prince Georg’s fine. He’s supposed to be quite intelligent, and he’s never gotten into any kind of trouble that would embarrass his family . . . like smoking cigarettes. Or pot.” He says this with a funny look that makes me wonder if he’s joking, or if he’s really thinking I might be taking the occasional drag at parties since I made the wisecrack about him doing it.

“Well, that’s good,” I say, not willing to give an inch. I’ve
never
smoked that stuff and Dad should know it. My grades are too important to me. Besides, I got in enough trouble just getting caught with cigarettes last year. Getting busted with a joint would be something else entirely, especially if I got arrested. Thanks but no thanks.

“I’ll leave you alone then,” he says, giving my foot one
last squeeze before walking to the door. I burrow back under the covers, but just before he shuts off the light, he turns around. “Valerie?”

“Yeah?”

“You have a lot of talent. I wish you’d shown me your drawings yourself.”

“They’re okay,” I say, but secretly I’m glad he likes them. Dad has taste, and he doesn’t give compliments easily.

“Have you ever shown them to your mother?”

“No.”

“Oh.” He stares at the sketch of Georg, and I realize he thinks this is a real bonding moment. He knows something about me that Mom doesn’t.

Then, of course, he ruins it by going and suggesting art lessons.

“Dad—” I shoot him my best warning stare before he gets going about all the access I’ll have to great teachers here in Schwerinborg. He should remember that piano lessons killed any and all interest I had in the piano. There’s no way I’d do that to my sketches. Even if I never do end up making a career of it, what would I do to get through AP English every day?

“Okay. Just a suggestion.” Then his eyes get a mischievous look. “But I bet Georg would be really impressed if you got his chin just right. Art lessons would help.”

He walks off before I can hit him in the head with the nearest baseball-sized object, which happens to be my alarm clock. Lucky for him.

He is so not funny.

I’m in the middle of looking over the formula for determining molar volume—which means I’m mostly thinking about how much I hate chemistry—when I finally hear what I’ve been listening for. Someone at the door to the library.

Refusing to look anxious, I keep right on scribbling down the formula.

I do
not
want Georg to know I’ve been thinking about him for, oh, the last fifteen hours straight. I bet he gets a lot of that. Like, from every single female in school.

I still can’t figure out why he even bothered to say hello to me, let alone ask if he could hang with me in the library again today.

“Fräulein Winslow?”

I jump about a mile. The guy standing behind me is definitely not who I was expecting. He’s about fifty years too old to be Georg, and his voice sounds like he’s been chain-smoking since he was seven. I wouldn’t want my voice to sound like that even if I was a hundred. I make a mental note to limit my emergency smoking to once a year, if that.

“I hope I did not disturb you.” The man smiles. He’s got gray hair and a potbelly that sticks straight out. He looks more pregnant than fat. But he’s wearing a nice suit and he’s smiling, so I figure he’s okay, even if he did call me a Fräulein and has such a thick accent I can barely understand him. Plus, this section of the palace isn’t exactly open to the world. There’s a metal detector and a fleet of security guards to get through first.

“No. May I help you?” I ask. Dad would like that I’m being all formal and polite.

“My name is Karl Oberfeld,” he says, “but you may call me Karl. Your father mentioned that you are spending today in study, so I thought I might bring you some refreshment—a Coke and some pretzels, perhaps?”

I sit up straighter. “Um, sure. But you don’t have to. I mean, I can get my own from my apartment.” It still feels weird referring to a group of rooms with motel decor as an
apartment
, but Dad assures me that’s what it is.

“It would be my pleasure to bring you a snack from the kitchen.” I can tell from his expression that he thinks it’s odd that I want to get my food myself, so I tell him okay, I’ll take a Coke and pretzels, but to make it a Diet Coke.

Of course, when he walks away, I realize I should have said Coke Light. I sound like such an American. It’s kind of embarrassing.

So a few minutes later, when I hear footsteps again, I turn around expecting Karl. Of course,
now
it’s Georg. And of course, I’m looking desperate, since the very mention of Diet Coke has made me thirsty.

“How’s the studying going?” Georg asks. I just wave at my books with a you-know-how-it-goes flip of my hand. He takes the chair next to me, but seems a little hesitant, as if he’s afraid he’s interrupting. I have to wonder: Why does everyone always seem to feel uncomfortable here? Like they’re
bothering
you just by wanting to talk. Is this a palace thing?

“You don’t have to memorize all those for the exams”—he jerks his head toward the formulas scribbled on my notebook page—“they give them to you. They just want to see if you’ve learned to apply them.”

I can’t help but groan in total disgust. “You’re kidding, right? I’ve been trying to pound these into my brain all over again.”

“You’re better off not studying at all, I think.” He leans forward as he says this, and there’s a cute little twinkle in his eyes, like I’m amusing him. “Though I’m sure my parents would make me study too.”

I laugh. He might be a prince, but he’s cool. I hadn’t thought about it, but I suppose it wouldn’t look good for Prince Manfred and Princess Claudia if their only son
flunked out of school. It’d probably be all over the
National Enquirer
. Or the
Schwerinborg Enquirer
, if there’s such a thing. So much for Georg living a total life of luxury.

“I don’t know what it is,” I say, “but as soon as I finish an exam, all the formulas I have to memorize for it go right out of my head. I figure that if I get a job in a lab someday, no one’s going to care if I open up a book and look up a freaking formula. Besides, since I’d be using them every day, and I wouldn’t have to worry about learning stuff for five or six other classes at the same time, I’d memorize them whether I wanted to or not.”

“Exactly!” He’s giving me that slow, sexy smile again, and it’s like we have this scary-weird-cool connection. Then he adds, “Not that I want to be a scientist. I think it’d be about the most boring job in the world. Or, at least, it would be for me,” he says, covering, and I can tell he’s worried that I’m secretly dreaming of becoming a rocket scientist and he might have offended me. “Is it something you think you’d find interesting?”

“No way!” I laugh again, even though all this giggling is probably making me sound like one of those bimbettes from Christie’s favorite TV show. Eeww. I compensate by telling him, “My science grades have always been really good, all As, but there are things I’d rather do with my life.”

“Like what?”

I hesitate. Telling him I want to sketch for a living would make me look like I’m too stupid to do anything
real
. Like be a lawyer or an architect or run my own business or something, which is what my parents want and expect. But I just can’t get myself psyched up for anything like that. Not yet.

“I’m still thinking about it,” I finally say. “Most of my friends’ older brothers and sisters seem like they change their minds once they get to college, so I’m trying not to get too focused on any one thing until then.”

“So what will you major in?”

“Nothing that has to do with science, that’s for sure,” I joke. “But I’ve got two more years to figure it out. You’re a junior, though. So what about you?”

Of course, as soon as the question is out of my mouth, I think,
Duh, Valerie!
The dude’s got his future all mapped out. He’s going to rule a country! He’s going to major in economics or political science or something like that, and then he’ll work in some government job until his father kicks off.

I am amazed by how stupid I can be sometimes.

Thankfully I am saved by my dear buddy Karl. Apparently Georg saw Karl in the hall and told the old guy what he wanted too, ’cause Karl has a Coke Light for me, a Coke for Georg, and a mondo-sized bowl of pretzels. He
also has a few cut-up sandwiches on a tray, which make my tummy start to rumble the minute I see them.

I can get used to service like this.

Karl gives Georg a little bow, then leaves the room. A
bow
. Georg must think, judging from my idiotic question, that I’m a disrespectful smart-ass.

“If I could be anything at all,” Georg says, handing me a sandwich on a little plate, “I think I’d be a professional soccer player.”

“Really? Do you play a lot?” It occurs to me that it’s probably rude to ask, since I’m guessing most Schwerinborgians (if that’s what they’re called—I’ll have to check with Dad—maybe it’s
Schwerinborgers
or just
the Borg
, like on
Star Trek
) would automatically know this kind of trivia about their prince. But since this is the way I talk with my friends, and Georg’s never actually come out and
told
me he’s a prince—and doesn’t seem to want me to know, judging from the way he was uncomfortable with Karl bowing to him in front of me—I decide to just be my laid-back, friendly self, and so what if he thinks I’m rude.

Although my laid-back, friendly self was also of the opinion that someone with Georg’s background would dream of a sport that involves horses and where he has to wear jodhpurs. Not
soccer
.

“I play indoor soccer all year. And at school I made
varsity on the outdoor team my freshman year.” He says it without bragging, simply as a statement of fact. “I had to work pretty hard to do it, though. I was certain I’d get busted back to the JV team after every single game.”

“But you weren’t, were you?”

He shakes his head between sips of Coke, and his cheeks get pink. It’s totally cute.

“Next year, when I’m a senior, I hope I’m the captain. I’d really like to play pro for a year or two before I go to college.” He glances up at the fireplace, where there’s an oil painting showing a woman who’s probably one of his ancestors. She’s wearing a high collar and looks just as constipated as all the old guys whose portraits are hanging in the halls. For a minute, I wonder if Georg will ever sit for one and if the artist will be obliged to make him look just as cramped.

He looks away from the picture at the same time I do, then takes another long swig of his Coke. “There’s no way my parents will allow it. They want me to go straight through school.”

“Mine too,” I reply as soon as I swallow my bite of sandwich. I don’t know what magic Karl has worked on these things—they’re filled with your basic deli turkey, cucumbers, and a sauce I don’t recognize—because they’re phenomenal. “I never thought of doing anything else, though.
But maybe if I was good at something like soccer, I would.”

He doesn’t say anything, so I wonder for a minute if he’s kind of depressed about the soccer thing. Maybe if I apologize for calling Schwerinborg gray and boring yesterday, it’ll remind him of how much he likes living here and cheer him up a little.

But then he’d know I know he’s the prince.

I may have to ask Dad about how to handle this point of etiquette, though I don’t want to let on to Dad that I get along with Georg so well. Dad will get all jumpy about it, and I don’t want to get Georg in trouble either. I get the feeling he hasn’t told anyone about his soccer dream. Or at least not his parents, and I don’t want Dad to let on to them. Parents talk, as Jules, Natalie, Christie, and I discovered after Jules’s mom saw us hanging out with a group of high school boys at the 7-Eleven during our lunch hour when we were all in eighth grade. I didn’t get to go to that 7-Eleven again for almost a year, my parents were so sure that I was going to hook up with some older guy who might, in Dad’s words, “take advantage of my youth.” Right. We never even found out those guys’ names.

“So what do you do for fun around here?” I ask. “Besides hang out in the library, I mean.”

He gives me a smile that makes my stomach freeze. It’s bizzaro—he’s not
that
good-looking. At least not classically,
every-girl-would-die good-looking. There’s an edge to him that takes him out of total hottie contention. Still . . .

Maybe I’m just lonely is all.

“I don’t, usually,” he says, grabbing another of Karl’s sandwiches. “I play soccer, I go to the movies. Stuff like that. But it’s vacation time now and my parents both have schedules they couldn’t rearrange, so we couldn’t go anywhere this year.”

“You wouldn’t rather hang with your friends?”

One of his eyebrows shoots up. “Who says you’re not a friend?”

“THANKS.” I TRY NOT TO LOOK TAKEN OFF GUARD,
but it’s kind of cool, being called a friend by a freakin’
prince
. Especially since I can tell he actually means it. At least, I hope he does, because otherwise, I’m pretty much friendless here. It’s a pretty safe assumption that if Georg decides he doesn’t like me, I’m basically screwed at school. No one’s going to want to be buddy-buddy with the girl the prince says is a total reject. And I wouldn’t blame them either.
I’d
even ignore me.