“This is sort of off the wall,” I admit. “But what if we watched the sing-along version of Mama Mia?”

Sheila, who has the lead of the Queen Mother in the school play, practically squeals. “That would be so much fun.” She looks at the guys. “If you get to be Greek gods, we should get to have some fun too.”

“The new students would just be getting here and I think it would be sort of a fun icebreaker, since it’d be interactive.”

Brad says, “Done. Let’s go get some coffee.”

I meet up with Riley and Dallas for breakfast. Apparently Camden told Dawson that he was losing tone. So he’s been on a morning protein shake kick, since, well, yesterday. As much as he likes a huge breakfast of bacon and eggs, I doubt it will last long. Plus, his brother was totally giving him shit. His tone looks very fine to me.

Dallas finishes up his breakfast and says, “When Katie and I had our little fling, I starting slacking in testing pickup lines. It’s time to dust them off and get them back out there.

“When you and Katie had your little fling, I hardly saw you. I missed you.”

He smiles at me. “I missed you guys too.” He laughs. “Okay, that’s sort of a lie. I was having fun, but I should have made time for you.”

I nod, agreeing with him “So what pickup line is up for today?”

“I’m not sure, but, Kiki, have you always been so cute?”

I look at him kind of funny, wondering what that has to do with anything. “Uh . . .”

“Or did it take practice?” he finishes.

I break out in laughter. “Oh, that’s really cute.” I smile at him. “Get it? Cute?”

Riley rolls his eyes at us. “You’re both so incredibly lame.” He picks up his coffee cup and holds it out in front of us. “Want to hear a secret?”

“I do. Is it Homecoming gossip?”

“I grind so fine, I’m practically coffee,” he says with a straight face, then busts out a grin.

“That is so lame. That has to be a Camden line.”

Riley laughs then says, “Wait a minute. Why is Dallas’ pickup line cute and mine’s not?

“When Dallas does them, like the magically delicious line and this one too, he’s giving me a compliment. In yours, you are giving yourself a compliment. Unless the guy is really hot and I’m looking to get picked up, I would probably flip you off, laugh in your face, or suggest you and your hand have their own party.”

“At least my hand never tells me no,” Riley says sort of seriously. Which causes Dallas to start laughing again.

“Dude, it’s like we’ve switched roles. You were the player and now, thankfully, I am.”

My eyes get big. “Dallas?! Did you have sex with someone else? Do I need to have a talk with you? Who else have you played with?”

“Cool your panties. No, I haven’t slept with anyone else. But I am working on it, so you can skip the sex talk.”

“How about a responsible sex talk? You know that you need to be responsible, right?”

“Thanks, Mom, but I know to wrap it up.”

“Dallas, it’s not a present. I’m serious about this.”

Dallas slaps Riley on the back as the bell rings. “I’m going to use Riley’s condoms before they dry rot.”

Riley shakes his head. “That is so not cool.”

Wet and wearing a towel.

5:45pm

I was sneaky during drama today. I mentioned to the Costume Director that I have some really cool silver sequined ribbon that would look great across the bottom of the cheerleading skirt I’ll wear when I meet The Good Prince and offered to sew it on.

I’ll sew it on later tonight but, for now, I have the costume on under a pair of Dawson’s sweats and a big sweatshirt.

He told me if I wore the skimpy thing to his room, he wouldn’t give me shit about the play. And with practices starting tonight, I want to make sure he’s fully supportive.

But, before I surprise him, I stop at Riley’s room to give him the fluffy rug. I ordered a new one last night. Everyone loves sitting on it and I think the rug is half the reason we always seem to congregate in Katie’s and my room.

But Riley earned it.

He and Dallas aren’t in there, so I spread it out in the space between their beds and head to Dawson’s room.

“Dawson?” I’m not sure why I’m calling out to an empty room, but his bathroom door opens immediately.

“Just got out of the shower.”

He’s wrapped in nothing but a damp white towel and it’s clear he hasn’t actually dried off yet. There are still beads of water sliding down his muscular chest. One is running straight down the center of his body, through his thick ab muscles and toward the towel.

I quickly move closer to him. My hand drawn to the bead of water. I catch it before it hits the towel, then run my fingertip back up its path.

“You should be wet and wearing a towel every time I stop by.”

“And you have way too many clothes on,” he replies with a grin.

I look down at his baggy sweats. “There’s kind of a reason for that.”

I run and lock his door, then stand in front of his bed, and strip the sweats off. Showing him the skimpy cowboy-style cheerleader costume.

He grins at me, drops his towel to the floor, and practically leaps across the room, knocking both of us onto his bed.

“You have play practice every night this week, don’t you?”

“Yeah, and you promised not to give me shit about it if I wore this for you.” I move out from under him.

I stand in front of the bed, to give him a good view of the costume, then slide off my underwear and toss them on his desk.

“That’s even better. You gonna do a cheer for me?”

“That’s the plan.”

“I like the plan.” He rolls onto his side and puts his arm under his head. “Go team! Go.”

I do a half cheer, half dance thing. Making sure that the skirt flips up a lot in the process.

Since he’s lying there naked, it’s pretty easy to tell that he’s enjoying it.

He jumps up off the bed and unties the little center tie that holds the top together.

I take off the rest of the costume and lay it carefully across his chair.

“Come here, my little cowgirl,” he says as he pulls me back on the bed.

Shut up and look pretty.

7pm

I’m first up at play practice tonight. We’re practicing the scene right before the Queen Mother tells her sons, the Good Prince and the Bad Prince, that the first one of them to marry will win the throne. She will also tell them about the reality-show-style contest and how it will all conclude with a rose ceremony at a ball in the Royal Gardens.

I’m cheering at a football game where the Good Prince, Jake, is enthralled by my dancing. After the game he gets someone to introduce us. It’s a fun scene. We have one of those instant, amazing connections. Sparks. Witty banter. Then he boldly asks me for a date.

We run through it a few times before Jake gets the lines right during the instant connection part. “That’s what I’m looking for,” our director says. “Okay, next up. Good Prince, Bad Prince, and Queen Mother.”

I go back to the spot where Aiden is waiting for me. He agreed to meet me here for tutoring during the play, which should work well. It means I’m able to spend time with Dawson after football practice and then go to dinner with him.

Aiden says, “Maybe we should have a ball at my Royal Vineyard.”

“Did I miss the part where you told me you’re really a Prince?” I tease.

He gives me an easy laugh. The deep laugh he does when he’s entertained. “Afraid not. But it would be cool to do something like that at our house. I can’t wait to live there again.”

“Really? What do you want to do? Like, don’t you want to go to college?”

“Yeah, I do. I’d like to play soccer in college. Get my degree. Maybe see about getting drafted into the Major Soccer League. It’d be cool to play pro for a bit.”

“You seem like you’re good enough.”

“I don’t know. A lot depends on how you do in college and if you stay healthy.”

“Then what? Do you know what you’ll major in? What kind of job you want?”

Aiden leans back in his chair and crosses his feet on the top of the seat in front of him. “I’ll probably major in business. But I’ll get my trust fund soon and if I live reasonably, I’d never have to get a job. But I want to work.”

“Doing what?”

“Don’t laugh, okay?” he says seriously.

“I won’t.”

“I’d like to produce and sell my own wine.”

“Why would I laugh about that? That’s totally cool.”

“What about you? Still thinking about acting? I can’t believe you had your lines memorized for that first scene already.”

“I have almost all my lines completely memorized, not just the first scene. And yes, I still think I’d like to act. Not very many actresses make it big though, so I’d have my work cut out for me.”

Especially if I don’t use my mom’s name to get auditions.

Not that it matters. I couldn’t be on a big screen anyway with Vincent still looking for me.

“So do you dream of winning an Academy Award?”

“Not really. I know it’s a big deal, but I’d rather be in big blockbuster-type hits. Movies that really entertain people.”

“Like the Trinity series. Those movies are badass, but they will probably never win those types of awards.”

“Exactly. I'd like to be in moves like that. And romantic comedies. Not the all serious cry-me-a-river roles. Like The Notebook.”

“You don't like The Notebook?”

“I love it. It’s just not what I want to play.”

“You can cry on command.”

I laugh again. “Yeah, that's true. But I write scripts too. Maybe I’ll do that instead.”

“You write scripts?”

“I used to. I was a weird kid. Instead of writing stories and poems, I wrote screenplays.”

“What made you want to do that?”

Uh, crap. What did?

“I got to go on one of those backstage type tours for school. Someone’s dad worked for a production company. They let us sit in a live studio audience. I came home and told my mom I wanted to write a fairytale movie, so she helped me look up how format a script.”

“I think that’s really cool. You said that you used to write them. Does that mean you don’t anymore?”

“I stopped writing them when I came here.”

“Why?”

“I decided to start living life without a script, I guess you could say. I was kinda lame. I thought I could get my life to follow a script. Like I could write the script for the perfect life and then live it.”

“But that didn’t work?”

“Not really. For scripts to work, everyone has to a have a copy and know their lines.”

“Tell me about one of them.”

“I told you one last night. The one with the dress in it.”

Cheerleader, Good Prince, Bad Prince. You’re up.

“I’ve got to go. I’ll talk to you later, Aiden.”

I go back on stage. This is the scene where my character and The Good Prince—although at this point, I don’t know that he’s a prince—share an amazing date. Because the play itself is a comedy spoof, we have one of those only-in-the-movie dates where you’re together all day and do like a million different things. In the play, they all happen very quickly and it’s pretty funny for the audience because as Jake and I are onstage, the background behind us quickly scrolls through different settings. In the last one, we are on a beach in the moonlight and share our first kiss. It’s supposed to be a magical true love kiss. One that the Bad Prince sees. The Queen Mother has already told the princes about the contest. And although I’m not a contestant yet, the Bad Prince schemes to make me one, so that I will find out that my true love didn’t tell me the truth about being a prince, which will make me question our love.

Jake whispers to me before we start. “Are we supposed to do the kiss?”

“I don’t know. Just listen for the director. Seems like mostly he’s been working on line delivery and where he wants us on the stage. If he doesn’t tell us to stop, keep going.”

I close my eyes for a second and become her. The girl with big dreams. The girl who believes that fairytale love does exist.

Jake and I run through our lines, moving across the stage on our fantasy date, and then coming to stand center stage, where a large moon is dropped down behind us. It’s really cheesy and pretty funny that we share our kiss with this huge golden moon literally directly behind us.

Jake and I turn to face each other.

His hands are down by his sides, so I gently take them in mine. I slowly lean in toward him until our lips barely touch.

“And, stop there,” the director says. “What you did, Keatyn. How you held his hands. That was perfect and it looked beautiful in front of the moon. Jake, your body position was a little off. I’d like to see you both lean in at the same time.”

I come down from the stage feeling practically giddy. Like a girl that did just fall in love. Only I’m in love with this play. With the process. I feel fulfilled and at home up there.

Maybe someday.

I look at the moon that is being pulled back toward the ceiling and start to make a wish on it.