Princess Isabella writes to Daniel Westling

30 April 2010
Kancellihuset nursery

Käre Daniel,

Today I write to you in sheer distress and pleading for your assistance in calming my fragile heart. Oh, my darling, presque-cousin, it is almost too much to bear to watch my dear Fjolle-Far, Frederik, reach such depths of sadness and misery.

Life seems to be harder for Far every day. You realise this all started with Cousin Madeleine breaking off her engagement with that Cousin Felipe look-a-like she was with for so long? It’s just so sad and pathetic what Jonas did. After hearing of such skanky behaviour on his part, Dr. Geldstein was alerted to look in his files only to discover that Jonas and my mother are actually very closely related. His maternal ancestors were also from Port Seton and cousins to my "professor" grandfather. Proves that an ancestral fishy smell is damned hard to wash off!

To make matters worse, the news is out that the entire family had been involved with helping Madde reach this decision over the past several months. It’s as if hearing that royal family unity on top of breaking up with a skank can happen, put Far over the edge of reason. "Why don’t I get that support? What can I do?" I hear him in his room every night after More, or Her Royal Highness the Countess of Monpezat (as I am more and more required to refer to her, as we grow further apart), leaves Far’s little den and calls for a maid to flick the lightswitch in the halls onto "flattering pink light" as she proceeds, so she can return to the penthouse. (The maid is, of course, to flick the light back to "fluorescent green tinge" every time Fred appears, to ensure that his self-esteem is kept low when he glimpses himself in any of the 5,000 mirrors Mor has installed).

Far comes often once my soi-disant mama has departed, to talk to me about his troubles … he always wanted me to be named for your adorable bride Victoria. He knows we are all made of the same royal stuff. Sorry, DanDan, but there are just some things that we get that you outliers don’t, even though we love most of you all the same. (It takes quite some outlier to test our capacity for love of the people!) More often makes me jump out of my skin when her Hoganson habits surface. A whore AND a bogan!

Sometimes when he has been reassuring himself with a few sherberts after a particularly Hoganson-influenced family dinner (Mama is partial to Chiko Rolls and ABC Soup), Far reminds me that my honorary uncle, Dr. Yehudi Geldstein, was given orders by my darling Farmor Daisy to make sure that, after the sheer genetic disaster that is my brother Christian, that all Hoganson genes were to be excluded from my genetic makeup. He thanks the Heavens (he is rediscovering the Lutheran church, you’ll be pleased to know!) that all the royal cousins gave DNA samples for him to clone and use on lucky me - including Auntie Lilibet in England! She’s really my cousin, but I love calling her Auntie since she’s so much more cuddly than my Daisy. (Less smoky, too.) No wonder Far gets confused on his relationship to her!

Poor dear DanDan, all of this royal parentage and intertwined family tree business must be so confusing for you! Did you know that it’s More who is related to Vlad the Impaler and the ghost of Anne Boleyn, and not Far? Funny! More is also related to Maggie Kirkpatrick and Myra Hindley! They and Vlad are where my horrid brother gets his murderous tendencies from. By the way, Daniel, if you get offered a White Elephant, it’s safe to accept it. Nikolae Ceausescu’s one is the one they gave More. I think that was Daisy being cute and perspicacious.

Anyway, let me elaborate a little. Far has never really come around to you coming between him and sweet Victoria, but he seemed to accept the relationship as one not unlike his own: a real royal getting her street ya-yas out with a regular Joe. Then came the engagement. And while we were truly very happy for you both, Far went deeper into the realisation that he may never have Victoria for himself. Nothing personal, Dansie, it’s just that he has always seen her as his ideal partner. Naturally, marriage to More never changed that. My darling Daisy made him take one for the team on thatty.

Anyway, I can’t hardly take it anymore with the crying and the moaning and the poor me’s and all that feeling sorry for himself business. My inheritance is already being depleted by More’s shopping sprees, and her inquiries into suitable South American surgeons, and now Fardy-Far-Far is drowning us in invoices for mass orders of Kleenex, rollmops and scotch.

Seriously, that bizarre Hoganson genetic material is contagious – and that worries me. I am still made of different stuff, but I do stress. I was terrified the other day when my poor little left foot showed the beginnings of a bunion just like More’s. I hope I can put it down to her attempts at surreptitiously footbinding me with two-year-old shoes, and not some hideous and spontaneous Hoganson invasion of my person. More’s Munchausen’s Syndrome by Proxy was finally diagnosed by my teachers - they have me in proper orthopaedic footwear during school hours to try and reverse the club foot affect from the supportless, designer ballet slippers and jodhpur booties More has me wear for photoshoots. But they have to restore my "at home" footwear each afternoon. My nannies cry, but dry their tears by the time we get home, because More gets a kick out of seeing any of the servants cry.

I assure you I was getting to the point where Farfar Henrik throwing me off the balcony of Amalienborg into the crowds – symbolically on Daisy’s birthday – was a loving gesture and sweet surprise. He seemed to be saying, take her, any of you, she will have a better life! Then who comes out of the shadows to "rescue" me but More! I fought valiantly to enable my beloved Farfar to aid my rescue, but thanks to diet pills and steroids, More could wrestle even my most resistant form from any pair of man’s arms. Plus, she employs the presque-zizi as a lever. Now that’s simply beyond the pale, as anyone would agree, and a significant aggravation of abuse.

Oy! Hehe, I got that from Dr. Geldstein! As well as a distinct and constant craving for a sesame bagel with a schmear and the New York Times crosswords every morning. Funny. More knows all about Yehudi – she found out long after the fact, having been convinced that he was a beauty therapist and the saint who was blending up lamb foetus poultices for her complexion. No plastic surgeon could have fixed the expression on her face when she found out. We all cowered under the single fluoro light in the palace that wasn’t tunable to soft pink. She wouldn’t go near us – it was like having a bunch of garlic held over us!

So here’s the long and short of it: I’m on the prowl for a job transfer and since Uncle Yehudi told me about you and Cousin Vics not being able to have your own boganson babies, I’d like to apply for the job. The wonderful news is that genetically I have more of Vickie in me than More anyway! It’s perfect!

I feel obligated to inform you that since I would already be the first born in our new family, that I would also be the future Queen of Sweden. Trust me, the war on Denmark and my brother King Xian Amin Mugabe Ceausescu will be like no other in the long history of our two countries over territory and liquor taxes. You think there are a lot of drunken Swedes passed out along Nyhavn today? You ain’t seen nothing yet – you’ll need stilts to walk amongst the passed out along Strøget! And how would you and my darling new mother like a country home in the south of Sweden, near the border with Germany? I think you get what I am saying about expanding territory.

Mind you, while Xian is really, really thick, he is quite frightening, and we should all take comfort in the knowledge that historical "nemesis" Norway is completely on board with this idea, too. Ah, sweet Cousin Haakon and his darling wife and children! Have you seen Haakon’s face when he is within a bargepole of Mary? She never sees it – he is clearly in fear of turning into stone. Poor Denmark. A bit of nostalgia for what could have been will surely make me feel bittersweet over the eventual union of Norway and Greater Sweden as we watch royal Denmark swirl down the drain of history as if a soup of spit, hair and toothpaste, replete with a mad gurgle of expletives from bamboozled (and boozed) Bogansons and scraggled armies of Freckled Gargoyles before they ever reach the Rosenborg jewel vaults.

So back home I’ve had my spies send out feelers to the rest of the family, and my darling Uncle Joachim and his beautiful brood are naturally supportive of my transfer. They know. Oof, do they! I will miss speaking French with them on a regular basis (that really gets More’s cornichon). Let me tell you a secret – Marie is utterly fluent in English, and so is Jokke, and so is Daisy, and so is Fred – but they simply refuse to enable More’s monolingualism and are still far from recognizing that a woman so well endowed with native cunning could be so slow!

They take comfort in knowing that we will all be united at grand family occasions. I will happily help broker some deals between the female heirs of the Netherlands, Spain and Belgium so that the wonderful Schackenborg line can begin its glorious reign over all of royal Europe. Perhaps Auntie Marie will have another beautiful boy for darling Ingrid-Alexandra in Norway. I’m not sure yet who I shall choose for myself. Adorable Sverre Magnus is too closely related, but those Belgian boys are cute. Or perhaps I should revive an illustrious young archduke or anonymous German prince. Believe me, Dan, with a mother like mine, I’m afraid I won’t be risking marrying "outside".

Remember, too, that as the Freckled Gargoyle cousins from Down Under reach marriageable age, More will be bribing the minor aristocracy with rubies prised from Ingrid’s parure. (Don’t worry, I’m keeping watch on the jewels and I check her bedside table nightly for jeweller’s pliers, under the guise of a goodnight kiss. She has always had a carat testing kit. She tests all the jewels Far gives her since Daisy passed off a gold plated brooch on her after Christian’s birth.)

Dan-Dan, I needn’t labour on account of my cause. My claims of gender discrimination by my own mother will soon be filed with the Swedish Royal Ministry of Human Rights as soon as all of these other details of my new name, official transfer papers, visa, etc. have been processed through the Ministry of Immigration. Oh, I’m going to make such a wonderful and enthusiastic Swede!

Here’s the catch, though, dear Daniel. I shouldn’t really give a true account of More. I should rather be emphasizing her best points. You, my noble friend, will have to run off with More so that Far can have his darling Vickan. Can you do it for us all? I can work with Daisy – Henrik will be able to swing anything with Daisy in the next six months, she is high on the sexually explicit statue he bought her for her birthday. She thinks it is heterosexual! I can guarantee that the payout would be substantial. Far would put his country into debt to build you a gym empire anywhere in the world outside the Scandinavian countries.

The only part missing from my thesis and plan is attempting to convince myself that you and Mary could possibly hit it off – even with More as a beard. Every man has his price, though, Daniel. Please just name it! You would make a great Australian. You look like Jemaine from the Conchords – and they are so jealous of New Zealand having those two! You also look just like their favourite senator, John Faulkner, the Mr. Darcy of Australian politics. If you have a thirst for rock star or political power and influence, Australia is your best bet! They can even arrange a McMansion in a seaside suburb called Manly for you. More just loves it there!

Now, if you insist on having Victoria, you would best be tolerant of a side affair between her and my Far. You have to understand, Dansie, this is how the royals have been doing it for centuries! We can play it either way, depending on your preference, but do give us notice if you’d like to stay on as Victoria’s public husband. My main focus is refuge for myself – I know, that sounds selfish and unroyal, and it’s a further plea for my case. I must remove myself from her sphere of influence!

Much love,

Izzy
Soon to be Princess Ingrid-Victoria Benedikte Marie