Plain Jane

C2 - Plain Jane

“I am still trying to convince your father.  You must understand that you are his only daughter, heir to the Norway throne.  It will take more than a heated argument,”  her mother says in a calm tone.

Julia takes a deep breath, “does he want me to run away?”  Julia signals her assistant to come closer, “give me my phone please.”

“Julia, please, let your father calm down first and think about it,” her mother pleads.

Julia ignores her mother and rings her father.  The phone didn’t ring long.  Julia does not say a word, she just patiently waits for her father to give her, her way. 

“Fine but there will be certain conditions,”  she hears her father's voice of defeat. 

“Thank you, daddy,”  Julia says before handing the phone to her mother.

The next morning Julia’s assistant pulled open the curtains to her bedroom making Julia pull the covers over her face to shield her eyes from the bright light.

“Your mother is ready to give you the conditions of your new life, Plain Jane.”

Julia takes the covers off her face as she sits up, “really?”

“Yes.  Now go clean up while I get your outfit for the day ready.”

“It better be a pair of jeans!”  Julia demands as she walks into her on-suit bathroom.

‘Oh-boy, this girl has a rude-awakening on her way,’ Julia’s assistant thought to herself.

After the assistant laid out a summer dress that falls just below the knee, the assistant left the room.

Julia is surprised when she walks back into her room with no assistant in-sight, “guess I should get used to it.”

Julia looks at the floral printed dress on her bed and sigh.  She goes to her closet to look for anything plain but is not surprised when she couldn’t find anything.

After putting the dress on she tied her hair up in a ponytail; something she was never allowed to do.

“Good morning mom,”  Julia greets her mother as she sits down at the breakfast table.

“Good morning my darling,”  Mellisa says as she turns the page of her gossip magazine.

After taking a sip of freshly squeezed juice, Julia decided to ask her mother about the conditions of her soon-to-be new life, “so, let me hear the conditions then.”

Mellisa puts her gossip magazine to the side, “I have to commence my duties as dutches and former wife of the king and mother to his child.  You, however, will be enrolled in an all-girl private boarding school not too far from here.”

“That is not a normal life.  Everyone in Norway knows who I am!  I want to go to a country where no one will know who I am,”  Julia says slightly disappointed.

“Well, then call your father and sort it out yourself,”  Melissa says taking a sip of her coffee. 

“Do I have to do everything myself?”

“You want a normal life and that means doing things yourself,”  Melissa says sighing.

“Fine, I will do everything myself,”  Julia says as she got up from the table.  “Excuse me.”

Julia notices her assistant strolling in with a package, “this is the best I could do this early in the day.”

Julia opens the bag and notices a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, “yours?”

“Yip,”  her assistant smiles.

“Thank you,” Julia says walking off to get changed.

“What was that?”  Melissa asked curiously.

“She wanted some normal clothing to start her normal life.”

“Oh, ok,” Melissa says picking up her gossip magazine again.  “You can take the rest of the week off, take a holiday or something, and make sure your mobile is off so that Julia can not reach you.  Perhaps a week without an assistant will make her change her mind.”

“Awesome, thank you,”  the assistant takes out her phone and place it on the table.  “This is my phone; will pick it up in a week's time. Bye,” she leaves before Melissa changes her mind.

After Julia got dressed she looked at herself in the mirror, “mm, this look suits me.  Think I need a hat; baseball cap should do the trick.”

Julia goes to her walk-in-closet that is bigger than her bedroom and searches between her fanmail stuff, “where is that baseball cap that cute guy gave me at that soccer game last year in Italy?”  Julia asked herself as she searches around in the pile of her favrote items.

“Ah-ha,”  Julia exclaims as she pulls out the baseball cap and puts it on her head.

Julia looks at herself in the mirror again, ‘think I need to change the color of my hair and defiantly tint my eyebrows.’  Julia puts on a pair of pumps as she owned no takkies and turns her hair into a bun to hide it under the baseball cap.

Julia checks that she has her wallet with her identification and her bank card, ‘as long as I draw amounts under one thousand my mother won't get the alert notifications.’

Julia gives herself one more lookover in the mirror before climbing out of her bedroom window, “good thing my room is on the ground floor,” she laughs out loud thinking how she uses to beg her mother for a room on the top floor.  Julia walks swiftly across the gardens to where she knows the staff leaves their bicycles. After finding the right size she got on and off she went.  The officers at the gate didn't even stop her; why should they? Plenty of the staff dressed down after their shift, especially the ones that did not stay at the castle.