Meg Cabot - Give Me Five

'I'm all right, I'm all right,' my mom said, patting us both on our heads. 'Let's not make a bigger deal out of this than has been made already.'

'But it IS a big deal,' I said, feeling tears trickle down my face. Because it is very upsetting, getting a phone call in the middle

of French class from an assistant fire chief, telling you that your mother is in hospital.

'No, it's not,' my mom said. 'I'm fine. The baby's fine. And once they get the rest of this Ringer's lactate into me, I get to go home.' She shot the nurse a look. 'RIGHT?'

'Yes, ma'am,' the nurse said, and closed the curtain so that the four of us - my mom, Mr. G, me and my bodyguard — could have some privacy.

'You have to be more careful, Mom,' I said. 'You can't let yourself get worn out like this.'

'I'm not worn out,' my mom said. 'It's that damned roast pork and noodle soup I had for lunch—'

'From Number One Noodle Son?' I cried, horrified. 'Mom, you didn't! There's like one million grammes of sodium in that! No wonder you passed out! The MSG alone—'

'I have an idea, Your Highness,' Lars said, speaking in a low voice in my ear. 'Why don't you and I go across the street and

see if we can get your mother a smoothie?'

Lars always keeps such a level head in a crisis. That is no doubt on account of his intensive training with the Israeli Army. He is a distinguished expert marksman with his Glock, and pretty good with a flamethrower, too. Or so he once confided in me.

'That's a good idea,' I said. 'Mom, Lars and I will be right back. We're going to get you a nice, healthy smoothie.'

'Thanks,' my mom said weakly, but for some reason she was looking more at Lars than at me. No doubt because her eyes were still out of focus from the whole fainting thing.

Except that when we returned with the smoothie, the nurse wouldn't let us back in to see my mom. She said there was only one visitor per hour per patient in the ER, and that she'd only made an exception before because we'd all looked so worried and she'd wanted us to see for ourselves that Mom was OK, and I'm the Princess of Genovia, and all.

She did take the smoothie Lars and I had bought, and promised to give it to my mom.

So now Lars and I are sitting in the hard orange plastic chairs in the waiting room. We'll be here until my mom gets dismissed.

I already called Grandmere and cancelled my princess lesson for the day. I must say, Grandmere wasn't very alarmed, once she heard my mom was going to be all right. You would think relatives of hers faint in the Grand Union every day. My dad's reaction to the news was much more gratifying. He got ALL worked up and wanted to fly in the royal physician all the way from Genovia to make sure the baby's heartbeat was regular and that the pregnancy wasn't putting undue stress on my mom's admittedly worn-out thirty-six-year-old system—

OH, MY GOD!!!!!!!!!! You'll never guess who just walked into the ER. My OWN royal consort, HRH Michael Moscovitz Renaldo to be.

More later.

Tuesday, May 6, the Loft

Michael is SO sweet!!!!!!!!! As soon as school let out he rushed over to the hospital to make sure my mom was all right. He found out what happened from my dad. Can you IMAGINE???? He was so worried when he heard from Tina that I had

gone rushing out of French that he called MY DAD when he couldn't get an answer at the Loft.

How many boys would willingly call their girlfriend's dad? Hmmm? None that I know of. Especially if their girlfriend's dad happened to be a crowned PRINCE, like my dad. Most boys would be too scared to call their girlfriend's dad in a situation like that. But not my boyfriend.

Too bad he still thinks the prom is lame. But whatever. Having your pregnant mother pass out in the refrigerated section of the Grand Union has a way of putting things into perspective.

And now I know that, much as I would have loved to have gone, the prom is not really important. What is important is family togetherness, and being with the ones you love, and being blessed with good health and—

Oh, God, what am I talking about? Of COURSE I still want to go the prom. Of COURSE it's still killing me inside that

Michael refuses even to entertain the IDEA of going.

I fully brought it up right there in the St. Vincent's ER waiting room. I was helped, of course, by the fact that there's a TV in

the waiting room, and that the TV was turned to CNN, and that CNN was doing a story on proms and the trends towards separate proms in many urban high schools - you know, like one prom for the white kids, who dance around to Eminem, and one prom for the African-American students, who dance around to Ashanti.

Only at Albert Einstein, there is only one prom, because Albert Einstein is a school that promotes cultural diversity and plays both Eminem and Ashanti at its events.

So since we were still waiting for my mom to get through with her Ringer's lactate, and we were all three of us just sitting there - me, Michael, and Lars - watching the TV and the occasional ambulance that came rolling in, bringing yet another patient to the ER, I went, to Michael, 'Come on. Doesn't that look like fun?'

Michael, who was watching the ambulance and not the TV, went, 'Getting your chest cracked open with a rib spreader in the middle of Seventh Avenue? Not really.'

'No,' I said. 'On the TV You know. Prom.'

Michael looked up at the TV, at all the students dancing in their formal wear, and went, 'No.'

'Yeah, but seriously. Think about it. It might be cool. You know. To go and make fun of.' This was not really my idea of a perfect prom night, but it was better than nothing. 'And you don't have to wear a tux, you know. I mean, there's like no rule

that says you do. You could just wear a suit. Or not even a suit. You could wear jeans and one of those T-shirts that look

like a tux.'

Michael looked at me like he thought I might have dropped a globe on my head.

'You know what would be even more fun?' he said. 'Bowling.'

I heaved this enormous sigh. It was sort of hard to have this intensely personal conversation there in the St Vincent's ER

waiting room, because not only was my bodyguard sitting RIGHT THERE, but so were all these sick people, some of whom were coughing EXTREMELY loudly right in my ear.

But I tried to remember the fact that I am a gifted healer and should be tolerant of their disgusting germs.

'But, Michael,' I said. 'Seriously. We could go bowling any old night. And frequently do. Wouldn't it be more fun, just once,

to get all dressed up and go dancing?'

'You want to go dancing?' Michael perked up. 'We could go dancing. We could go to the Rainbow Room if you want. My parents go there on their anniversary and stuff. It's supposed to be really nice. There's live music, really great old-time jazz, and—'

'Yeah,' I said. 'I know. I'm sure the Rainbow Room is very nice. But I mean, wouldn't it be nice to go dancing some place

with PEOPLE OUR OWN AGE?'

'Like from AEHS?' Michael looked sceptical. 'I guess so. I mean, if like Trevor and Felix and Paul were going to be there . . .' These are the guys from his band. 'But you know, they wouldn't be caught dead at something as lame as the prom.'

OH, MY GOD. It is EXTREMELY hard to be lifemates with a musician. Talk about marching to your own drummer.

Michael marches to his own BAND.

I know Michael and Trevor and Felix and Paul are cool and all, but I still fail to see what is so lame about the prom. I mean, you get to elect a Prom King and Queen. At what other social function do you get to elect monarchs to rule over the proceedings? Hello, how about none.

But whatever. I am not going to let Michael's refusal to act like a typical male seventeen year old get in the way of my enjoyment of this evening. You know, the family togetherness my mom and Mr. G and I are currently having. We are all