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Mia Goes Fourth

I pointed at the long table across the cafeteria from ours, at which Lana and Josh and all of their school-spirit minded, incredibly well-coiffed cronies sat. The thought of losing Shameeka, who was always so elegant and yet at the same

time sensible, to the Dark Side made my heart ache.

'Of course not,' Shameeka said, disparagingly. 'Getting on to the Albert Einstein High School cheerleading squad is not

going to change my friendships with all of you one iota. I will still be the camera person for your television show . . .' she nodded to Lilly, '. . . and your Bio. partner . . .' to me, '. . . and your lipstick consultant. . .' to Tina, '. . . and your portrait model,' to Ling Su. 'I just may not be around as much, if I get on to the squad.'

We all sat there, reflecting upon this great change that might befall us. If Shameeka made the squad it would, of course,

strike a blow for geeky girls everywhere. But it would also necessarily rob of us Shameeka, who would be forced to

spend all of her free time practising doing the splits and taking the bus to Mount Kisco for away games with Phillips Prep.

The silence at the table was palpable . . . well, except for the bing-bing-bing of Michael's electronic game. Boys -apparently even perfect boys, like Michael - are immune to things like mood.

But I can tell you, the mood of this year so far has been pretty bad. In fact, if things don't start looking up soon, I may have

to write this entire year off as a do-over.

Still no clue as to what my secret talent might be. One thing I'm pretty sure it's not is psychology. It was hard work talking

Tina out of giving up her books! And we didn't manage to convince Shameeka not to try out for cheerleading. I guess I can

see why she'd want to do it -I mean, it might be a little fun.

Though why anyone would willingly want to spend that much time with Lana Weinberger is beyond me.

Thursday, January 21

French

Mademoiselle Klein is NOT happy with Tina and me for skipping yesterday.

Of course I told her we didn't skip, that we had a medical emergency that necessitated a trip to Ho's (for Tampax), but

I am not sure Mademoiselle Klein believes me. You would think she would show some feminine solidarity with the whole surfing-the-crimson-wave thing, but apparently not. At least she didn't write us up. She let us off with a warning and

assigned us a five-hundred-word essay each (in French, of course) about snails.

But that isn't even what I want to write about. What I want to write about is this:

MY DAD RULES!!!!!

And not just a country, either. He totally got me out of the contessa's black-and-white ball!!!!

What happened was - at least according to Mr G, who just caught me outside in the hall and filled me in - the filibuster

over the parking fees was finally broken (after thirty-six hours) and my mom was finally able to get through to my dad

(those in favour of charging for parking won. It is a victory for the environment as well as the Genovian Historical Society,

who felt that many of our narrower streets would not be able to withstand the rumble of recreational vehicles that would

ensue if we allowed free parking).

Anyway, my dad fully said that I did not have to go to the contessa's party. Not only that, but he said he had never heard anything so ridiculous in his life, that the only feud going on between our family and the royal family of Monaco is Grandmere's. Apparently she and the contessa have been in competition since finishing school, and Grandmere had just wanted to show off her granddaughter, about whom books and movies have been made. Apparently the contessa's only granddaughter is in rehab in Fresno, so you can sort of see where Grandmere was coming from, although, of course, what she'd been trying to do isn't very nice.

So I am free! Free to spend tomorrow night with my only love! I cat-on-the-roofed Michael for nothing! Everything is going

to be all right, despite my lack of lucky underwear, I can feel it in my bones.

I am so happy, I feel like writing a poem. I will shield it from Tina, however, because it is unseemly to gloat over one's own fortunes when the fortunes of another are so exceedingly wretched (Tina found out who Jasmine is: a girl who goes to Trinity, with Dave. Her father is an oil sheikh, too. Jasmine has aquamarine braces and her screenname is Iluvjustin2345).

Poem for Michael

Oh, Michael,

soon we'll be parkin'

in front of Grand Moff Tarkin

Enjoying veggie moo shu

to the beeps of R2D2

And maybe even holding hands

while gazing upon the Tatooine sands

And knowing that our love by far

has more fire power than the Death Star

And though they may blow up our planet

and kill every creature living on it