Meg Cabot - Party Princess

“I’m just trying to have a good time,” I said. I was excruciatingly aware of J.P.’s gaze on me. Why that should have made me feel so uncomfortable, I don’t know. It just did. “It’s not like I don’t drink all the time in Genovia.”

“Sure,” Lilly said. “Champagne toasts with foreign dignitaries. Wine with dinner. Not beer .”

“Whatever,” I said again. And moved away from her—

—and smacked right into Michael, who was like, “Oh, hey, there you are.”

And then he looked down at the beer in my hand and went, “What are you doing?”

“Oh, you know,” I said, tossing my head again, all casually and party-girl-like. “Just having a good time.”

“Since when do you drink beer?” Michael wanted to know.

“God, Michael,” I said, laughing. “Whatever.”

“She said the same thing to me,” Lilly informed her brother, as she took her camera from J.P. and stuck the lens into both our faces.

“Lilly,” Michael said. “Quit filming. Mia—”

But before he got to say whatever it was he was going to say, his computer’s Party Shuffle (he’d wired the speakers in his parents’ living room to his hard drive) started to play the first slowish song of the evening—Coldplay’s “Speed of Sound”—so I went, “Oh, I love this song,” and started dancing, the way Lana had said to.

The truth is, I am not even the biggest Coldplay fan, because I don’t really approve of the lead singer letting his wife, Gwyneth Paltrow, name their kid Apple. What is going to happen to that poor kid when she gets to high school? Everyone is going to make fun of her.

But I guess that beer, skunky as it had been, did the trick. Because I didn’t feel anywhere near as self-conscious as I had before I’d started sipping it. In fact, I felt sort of good. Even though I was the only person in the whole room who was dancing.

But I figured that was okay because a lot of times when one person starts dancing, everyone else does. They are just waiting for someone to break the ice.

Only I couldn’t help noticing that as I danced, no one was joining me. Especially Michael. He was just standing there staring at me. As was Lars. As was Lilly, although she was doing it through a camera lens. Boris and Tina, over on the couch, stopped kissing and started looking at me instead. The college girls were staring at me, too. One of them leaned over to whisper something to one of her friends, and the friend giggled.

I figured they were just jealous because I had actually made an effort to dress up for the party, what with my beret and all, and kept dancing.

Which was when J.P. totally came to my rescue. He started dancing, too.

He wasn’t really dancing with me, since he wasn’t touching me, or anything. But he kind of walked over to where I was and started moving his feet around, you know, the way really big guys dance, like they don’t want to draw a lot of attention to themselves, but they want to join in the fun.

I was so excited someone else was finally dancing, I sort of shimmied (Feather taught us that term—it’s when you wiggle your shoulders) closer to him, and smiled up at him, to say thanks. And he smiled back.

The thing is, after that, I guess—technically, speaking—we were sort of dancing together. I guess, technically, what was happening was, I was dancing with another guy. In front of my boyfriend. At a party being given by my boyfriend.

Which I guess—technically speaking—constitutes really bad girlfriend behavior.

Although I didn’t realize it at the time. At the time, all I could think about was how stupid I’d felt when no one would dance with me, and how happy I was that J.P.—unlike my other so-called friends—hadn’t left me hanging there, dancing by myself, in front of everyone… particularly Michael.

Who hadn’t even told me I looked nice. Or that he liked my beret.

J.P. had said I looked more beautiful than the loveliest Mediterranean sunset. J.P. had come over and started dancing with me.

While Michael just stood there.

Who knew how long J.P. and I would have kept dancing—while Michael just stood there—if just then the front door hadn’t opened, and Dr. and Dr. Moscovitz hadn’t come in?

And okay, Michael had gotten permission to have the party and they weren’t mad about it at all.

But still! They walked in right as I was dancing! With ANOTHER GUY! It was super-embarrassing!!! I mean, they’re Michael’s PARENTS!!!!

This was almost as embarrassing as the time they walked in when Michael and I were kissing, you know, on the couch over Winter Break (well, okay, we were doing MORE than kissing. There was some under-the-shirt and over-the-bra action going on. Which I will admit for a girl who doesn’t want to have sex until prom night of her senior year is pretty risky behavior. But whatever. The truth is, I got so involved in the whole kissing thing, I didn’t even notice what Michael’s hands were doing until it was too late. Because by then I was LIKING it. So in a way, I was like, THANK GOD Dr. and Dr. Moscovitz walked in when they did. Or who knows WHERE I’d have let Michael’s hands go next?).

Still. This was even MORE EMBARRASSING than THAT time, believe it or not. Because, I mean—dancing! With another guy!

Which I don’t even know if they saw, because they were like, “Sorry, don’t mind us,” and hurried down the hall to their room before any of us could practically even say hello.

Still. Every time I think of what they MIGHT have seen, I go all hot and cold—the way Alec Guinness said he always felt every time he saw himself in the scene in Star Wars: A New Hope where Obi Wan talks about feeling a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

Worse, as soon as the Drs. Moscovitz were gone—I totally stopped dancing when I saw them; in fact, I froze—Lilly came up to me and whispered, “Were you supposed to be sexy dancing or something? Because you sort of looked like someone stuck an ice cube down your shirt and you were trying to shake it out.”

Sexy dancing! Lilly thought I was sexy dancing! With J.P.! In front of Michael!

After that, of course, it was impossible to keep up my party-girl charade. I fully went and sat down by myself on the couch.

And Michael didn’t even come over to ask me if I’d lost my mind or challenge J.P. to a duel or anything. Instead, he followed his parents, I guess to see if they’d come back early because something was wrong, or if the conference had just ended early, or what.

I sat there for like two minutes, listening to everyone around me laughing and having a good time, and feeling my palms break into a cold sweat. I was surrounded by people—surrounded by them!—but I swear I had never felt more alone in my life. Sexy dancing! I’d been sexy dancing! With another boy!

Even Lilly had stopped filming me, finding the sight of Doo Pak tasting Cool Ranch Doritos for the first time much more interesting than my intense mortification.

J.P. was the only one who said a word to me after that—besides Tina, on the couch opposite mine, who leaned over and said, “That was a very nice dance, Mia,” like I’d been doing some kind of performance piece, or something.

“Hey,” J.P. said, coming over to where I was sitting. “I think you forgot this.”

I looked at what he was holding. My three-quarters-empty beer! The substance responsible for my having thought it might be a good idea to do a sexy dance with another boy in the first place!

“Take it away!” I moaned and buried my face in my knees.

“Oh,” J.P. said. “Sorry. Um… are you all right?”

“No,” I said to my thighs.