Princess' Diaries

"Then after that. No dawdling. You will bring with you a list of the ten women you admire most in the world, and why. That is all."

My mouth fell open.Homework? There’s going to behomework? Nobody said anything about homework!

"And close your mouth," she barked. "It is uncouth to let it hang open like that."

I closed my mouth. Homework???

"Tomorrow you will wear nylons. Not tights. Not kneesocks. You are too old for tights and kneesocks. And you will wear your school shoes, not tennis sneakers. You will style your hair, apply lipstick, and paint your fingernails—what’s left of them, anyway." Grandmère stood up. She didn’t even have to push up with her hands on the arms of her chair, either. Grandmère’s pretty spry for her age. "Now I must dress for dinner with the shah. Good-bye."

I just sat there. Was she insane? Was she completely nuts? Did she have the slightest idea what she was asking me to do?

Evidently she did, since the next thing I knew Lars was standing there, and Grandmère and Rommel were gone.

Geez! Homework!!! Nobody said there was going to be homework.

And that’s not the worst of it. Panty hose? To school? I mean, the only girls who wear panty hose to school are girls like Lana Weinberger, and seniors, and people like that. You know. Show-offs. None ofmy friends wear panty hose.

And, I might add, none of my friends wear lipstick or nail polish or do their hair. Not forschool, anyway.

But what choice did I have? Grandmère totally scared me, with her tattooed eyelids and all. I couldn’t NOT do what she said.

So what I did was, I borrowed a pair of my mom’s panty hose. She wears them whenever she has an opening—and on dates with Mr. Gianini, I’ve noticed. I took a pair of her panty hose to school with me in my backpack. I didn’t have any fingernails to paint—according to Lilly, I am orally fixated; if it fits in my mouth, I’ll put it there—but I did borrow one of my mom’s lipsticks, too. And I tried some mousse I found in the medicine cabinet. It must have worked, since when Lilly got into the car this morning, she said, "Wow. Where’d you pick up the Jersey girl, Lars?"

Which I guess meant that my hair looked really big, like girls from New Jersey wear it when they come into Manhattan for a romantic dinner in Little Italy with their boyfriends.