Meg Cabot: Princess on the Brink

Lilly considered this. Then she shrugged again and went, “Well, yeah. That, too.”

“Okay,” I said. “I’m officially going to throw up.”

“Well, don’t do it in the guacamole. Will you go away now?”

“No,” I said. “What does Michael want to talk to me about at Number One Noodle Son?”

“Probably,” Lilly said, “that he wants you to Touch It.”

When I lifted the serving spoon from the sour cream and aimed it at her, she shrieked and said, laughing, “Seriously, I don’t know. I’ve barely seen him this summer, he’s been so busy with his stupid electrical engineering project.”

So I put the spoon down. I knew she was telling the truth. Michael had been busy with his Advanced Topics in Control Theory course, which he explained to me, when I asked what the heck that meant, was all about robots. His final project for the class had been a robotic arm that could be used to help perform closed-chest, beating heart surgery, “the ultimate goal,” Michael had said, “in the robotic surgery field.”

Yes. I have a boyfriend who builds robots. It’s SO COOL!!!!!

When Lilly and I got back to the table, it was really hard for me even to look at Boris’s face—although it’s actually semi-attractive now that he no longer wears a bionater and started seeing a dermatologist and got Lasik eye surgery and all of that.

Still. All I can see when I look at him now is Lilly’s hand down his pants. Right there with his sweater.

“Oh my God, Mia,” Ling Su cried as I sat down. “What happened to your hair?”

This is really not the kind of thing you want to hear when you’ve just gotten your hair cut.

“Astor Place Hairstylists,” I said. “Why? You don’t like it?”

“Oh, no, I like it,” Ling Su said quickly. But I totally saw her exchange looks with Perin, whom, I might add, has even shorter hair than I do. And mine’s pretty short.

“I think Mia looks great,” J.P. said. He was sitting down at the other end of the table, across from Lilly. He wasn’t looking too bad himself, actually. His tousled blond hair had been streaked even blonder in places by the sun—his parents have a place on Martha’s Vineyard, which is where he’d spent the bulk of his summer, brushing up on his windsurfing skills.

And it had totally paid off. I mean, if a killer tan and pretty well-defined arm muscles count for anything.

Not that I was looking. Because I already have a boyfriend with his own killer arm muscles.

And okay, Michael probably didn’t get tan this summer, because he was too busy with his summer school robot project.

But he’s still hotter than J.P.

Who, besides, is Lilly’s boyfriend.

Or something.

“Very gaminesque,” J.P. said, nodding at my head.

“I know what that means,” Tina said excitedly. “Like Audrey Hepburn inRoman Holiday !”

“I was thinking more Keira Knightley inDomino ,” J.P. said. “But that works, too.”

It’s nice to have such supportive friends.

Well, SOME supportive friends, anyway. I can’t believe Lilly won’t tell me if she and J.P. Did It. If they did, you can’t tell by looking at them. You’d think if they’d given each other their Precious Gift, there’d at least be some footsies under the table.

But the only thing I saw them do that was at all intimate was J.P. giving Lilly a bite of his Yodel. AndI’ve given her bites of my Yodel.

But that doesn’t mean I’m about to give her my Precious Gift.

Tuesday, September 7, Gifted and Talented

Okay, it really isn’t fair that, besides the whole being-putin-Intro-to-Creative-Writing-and-not-Intermediate-Creative-Writing-thing, I should also have such a sucky afternoon schedule. Look at this. Just LOOK:

Period 1

Homeroom

Period 2

Intro to Creative Writing

Period 3

English

Period 4

French

Lunch

Period 5

G and T

Period 6

PE

Period 7

Chemistry

Period 8

Precalculus

Physical education, then CHEMISTRY, then PRECALCULUS??? Is it too much to ask that I have ONE FUN CLASS in the afternoon? ONE THING TO LOOK FORWARD TO???

But no. It has to be SUCKZONE from 1:25 p.m. on.

Seriously. That is just wrong.

And who do they think they’re kidding, putting me in advanced algebra? ME?

Whatever. Considering how bad my practice PSAT math score was, maybe I can talk Dad out of making me go to princess lessons this year, and have mandatory tutoring instead.

AND MICHAEL COULD BE MY TUTOR!!!!

Hey, it could happen. He tutored me all through Algebra and Geometry. And I passed both of those. Why shouldn’t Dad also hire him to be my tutor for Precalculus?

And maybe he could tutor me in Chemistry, too. Because I heard that class is no joke.

Oh, great. Lilly wants to talk about the student election. She says she’s going to nominate me at Assembly today.

Seriously. I just don’t know. I mean, she’s got our platform all set up and everything. All I have to do is run.

But I barely had a minute to myself last year! And if I really want to be a novelist—or a screenwriter, or even a SHORT STORY writer, or whatever—I HAVE to have some time to myself in order to ACTUALLY WRITE SOMETHING. I mean, besides my journal andBattlestar Galactica fan fics.

And then there’s Michael. I barely got to see him last year, we were both so busy with school. On top of which I also had princess stuff to do, not to mention a new baby brother. Something’s got to give this year.

And I’m thinking it’s going to be student government.

Why can’t LILLY run for president? I mean, I know she thinks everybody hates her, but that’s just not true. I’m sure they’ve all forgotten about how she tried to convince the trustees to make the day an extra period longer so we could squeeze in a mandatory Latin class.

How am I going to break it to her that I don’t want to run, though? Especially when she’s already gotten seventy-fiveVote for Mia T-shirts printed up, and is looking into leasing the school roof to cell tower distributors and using the extra income to provide free laptops to the school’s scholarship students?

Man. Being responsible blows.

Tuesday, September 7, Chemistry

Wow. Kenny Showalter is in this class. Is it impossible for me to take a science class in this school and NOT have Kenny Showalter be in it?

Apparently so.

Somehow he got even TALLER over the summer. He’s as tall as Lars now.

Unfortunately for him, however, I think he still weighs less than I do.

He just sat down next to me. I wonder if he’ll want to be lab partners again. This wouldn’t be the worst thing, since if he hadn’t been lab partners with me last year in Earth Science, I’d have flunked. Or at least gotten much worse than a C.

Hey! J.P. just walked in. J.P. is in this class, too!

Thank God. At least there’s ONE normal person I can ask what’s going on. I mean, Kenny is great and all, but, you know. There’s always that TENSION between us, because of his dumping me for thinking I was in love with Boris Pelkowski. God, that was so long ago! You’d think we’d both be over that by now, but it’s still there, this little bit of tension between us when he’s doing my homework for me.

I just waved for J.P. to sit on my other side, which he very nicely did. God, he is so great. I’m SO glad Lilly is going out with him. I have to admit, I didn’t have much faith in her taste in guys for a while there, what with Jangbu and Franco and all. But she’s really redeemed herself with—

Whoa. Kenny just passed me a note.

Mia—I didn’t know you were taking Chemistry this year. Want to be lab partners again? Why break with tradition?