Mia Goes Fourth

Lilly: No, I'm not. Though I don't know why I should be so nice to you, since you didn't even remember his birthday.

I felt something clutch at my throat. 'His birthday?' I shrieked. 'Oh my God, Lilly, I completely forgot!'

'Yes,' Lilly said. 'You did. But don't worry. I'm pretty sure he didn't expect a card or anything. I mean, you're off being the Princess of Genovia. How can you be expected to remember something as important as your boyfriend's birthday?'

This seemed really unfair to me. Michael and I have only been going out for twenty-one days, and for twenty of them,

I had neither seen nor spoken to him, not even once. Plus, I have been busy. I mean, it is all very well for Lilly to joke,

but I haven't seen her christening any battleships or campaigning among her populace for the rights of bottlenose dolphins.

It may never have occurred to anyone, but this princess stuff is hard work.

'Lilly,' I said. 'Can I talk to him, please? Michael, I mean?'

'I suppose,' Lilly said with a sigh, sounding very tired of me. Then she screamed, 'Michael! Phone!'

It was a long time after that that I finally heard some footsteps, and then Michael going to Lilly, 'Thanks,' and Lilly going, 'Whatever.' Then Michael picked up the phone and went, kind of curiously, since Lilly hadn't told him who it was, 'Hello?'

Just hearing his voice made me forget all about how it was gone two in the morning and I was miserable and hating my life. Suddenly it was like it was two in the afternoon and I was lying on one of the beaches I was working so hard to protect from erosion and pollution by tourists, with the warm sun pouring down on me and someone offering me an icy-cold Orangina from

a silver tray. That's how Michael's voice made me feel.

'Michael,' I said. 'It's me.'

'Mia,' he said, sounding genuinely happy to hear from me. I don't think it was my imagination, either. He really did sound pleased, and not like he was getting ready to dump me at all. 'How are you?'

'I'm OK,' I said. Then, to get it out as soon as possible, I went, 'Listen, Michael, I can't believe I missed your birthday. I suck.

I can't believe how much I suck. I am the most horrible person who ever walked the face of the planet. I should be in jail, like Winona Ryder.'

Then Michael did a miraculous thing. He laughed. Laughed! Like missing his birthday was nothing!

'Oh, that's all right,' he said. 'I know you're busy over there. And there's that time-zone thing, and all. So, how is it? How

did your speech go? The one on Genovian TV? Did your crown fall off? I know you were afraid it might.'

I practically melted right there in the middle of my big fancy royal bed, with the phone clutched to my ear and everything.

I couldn't believe he was being so nice to me, after the terrible thing I had done. It wasn't like twenty-one days had gone by at all. It was like we were still standing in front of my stoop, with the snow coming down and looking so white against Michael's dark hair, and Lars getting mad in the vestibule because we wouldn't stop kissing and he was cold and wanted to go inside already.

I couldn't believe I had ever thought Michael might fall in love with some Floridian girl with boobs and a boogie board.

I mean, I still wasn't exactly sure he was in love with me, or anything. But I was pretty sure he liked me.

And right there, at past two in the morning, sitting by myself in my royal bedchamber in the Palais de Genovia, that was enough.

So I told him about my speech, and how I'd ruined it by going off about the plastic six-pack holders, which Michael agreed was a vitally important issue. Then I told him about the sea turtles, and about my plan to organize teams of volunteers to

patrol the beaches during nesting season to make sure that the eggs were not disturbed by tourists, or by the machines they bring in every morning to comb the sand and pick up all the seaweed that washes up during high tide.

And then I asked him about his birthday, and he told me how they'd gone to Red Lobster, and Lilly had an allergic reaction

to her shrimp cocktail and they'd had to cut the meal short to go to Promptcare because she'd swelled up like Violet in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, and now she has to carry a syringe filled with adrenaline around with her in case she accidentally ingests shellfish ever again, and how Michael's parents got him a new laptop for when he goes to college and

how when he gets back to New York he is thinking about starting a band since he is having trouble finding sponsors for his webzine Crackhead on account of how he did that ground-breaking expose on how much Windows sucks and how he

only uses Linux now.

Apparently a lot of Crackhead's former subscribers are frightened of the wrath of Bill Gates and his minions.

I was so happy to be listening to Michael's voice that I didn't even notice what time it was or how sleepy I was getting until

he went, 'Hey, isn't it like three in the morning there?' which by that point it almost was. Only I didn't care because I was so happy just to be talking to him.

'Yes,' I said, dreamily.

'Well, you'd better get to bed,' Michael said. 'Unless you get to sleep in. But I bet you have stuff to do tomorrow, right?'

'Oh,' I said, still all lost in rapture, which is what the sound of Michael's voice sends me into. 'Just a ribbon-cutting ceremony

at the hospital. And then lunch with the Genovian Historical Society. And then a tour of the Genovian zoo. And then dinner

with Minister of Culture and his wife.'

'Oh, my God,' Michael said, sounding alarmed. 'Do you have to do that kind of stuff every day?'

'Uh-huh,' I said, wishing I were there with him, so that I could gaze into his adorably brown eyes while hearing his adorably deep voice, and thus know whether or not he loved me, since this was, according to Tina, the only way you could tell with boys.

'Mia,' he said, with some urgency, 'you'd better get some sleep. You have a huge day ahead of you.'

'OK,' I said, happily.

'I mean it, Mia,' he said. He can be so authoritative sometimes, just like the Beast in Beauty and the Beast, my favourite Broadway show of all time. Or the way Patrick Swayze bossed Baby around in Dirty Dancing. So, so exciting. 'Hang

up the phone and go to bed.'

'You hang up first,' I said.

Sadly, he got less bossy after this. Instead, he started talking in this voice I had only ever heard him use once before, and

that was on the stoop in front of my mom's apartment building the night of the Non-Denominational Winter Dance, when

we did all that kissing.

Which was actually even more exhilarating than when he was bossing me around, to be truthful.

'No,' he said. 'You hang up first.'

'No,' I said, thrilled to pieces. 'You.'

'No,' he said. 'You.'

'Both of you hang up,' Lilly said, very rudely, over the extension. 'Grandma needs to call Uncle Mort in Schenectady to

see how his toe surgery went.'

So we both said goodbye very hastily and hung up.

But I'm almost positive Michael would have said 'I love you' if Lilly hadn't been on the line.