The Art of Being Emily - Katie MacAlister Page 0,21
the kitchen.
“Oh, him,” Brother said. “Nice boy. Polite. What about him?”
Honest to Pete, Dru, my father would get on a saint's nerves! How I'm going to live down having it blared to everyone in POTW that I'm in the fifth form, I'll never know. Just add it to the big old stack of stuff I have to bear.
Speaking of that, I had to pretend I was practicing to be a mime in French today. I even wrote up a little note for Madame Grayson saying I wasn't allowed to speak. She gave me an odd look, but so far so good. E-mail me that list of throat diseases you said you saw in the encyclopedia, would you?
Dru wrote:
don't think that it's like that. I mean, he did apologize, and the thing with Tabitha was totally a misunderstanding. Vance said he felt sorry for her because she had been dumped by George (the senior with the hunchback). Wouldn't you feel awful if you were dumped by a hunchback? I think Vance was being awfully nice to feel so sorry for her.
Um. OK. If you're comfortable with him taking another girl out when you're stuck at home with a bum leg and nothing to do but watch Survivor with your mom and her boyfriend, well, it's not up to me to point out that HE IS A TWO-TIMING RAT FINK! So I won't. But I'm here for you if you need me.
So let me tell you about what happened at lunch. I was with the gang (Aidan and Peg and Lalla and Holly) and Aidan asks, in this really nonchalant Mr. Coolio way, if I've heard of anyone talking about the Polo Club.
I, of course, immediately go into shock because I know that this is it, after all these endless, long, never-ending days of waiting, he's going to ask me out on a real, honest to Pete date. But I must maintain the Emily cool, so I poke a bit of the ghastly dregs of preformed animal flesh they serve here as food into my mouth, and look like I'm thinking his question over.
“Why, no, I haven't. Is there something über-fabu about the Polo Club?”
He laughed and put his hand on mine and squeezed my fingers. All of them! I almost peed my pants. “Well, on Fridays they have local bands. I thought you might like to have a night out. Everyone will be there—Digger and Fang and Devon and the lot.”
Digger is Lalla's boyfriend. He is the same age as Fang, and he works in a car-repair shop.
“Oooh, yes, do come with us,” Lalla squealed. She's always squealing, but I don't hold that against her. “Digger's cousin's sister's boyfriend is in the band that's playing this week. The Count Dreadfuls. They're very, very rad.”
I think that meant they were cool beans.
“Oh, sure, I'd” –Love. Be on my knees with gratitude. Swoon into your arms— “like to go.”
“Great,” Aidan said, pulling his hand from mine to pick up a limp French fry. “I'll pick you up round eight, then?”
“Sure,” I said again. Yes, yes, no bonus points for verbal skills, but I defy anyone to be able to trip the tongue fantastic with Aidan holding her hand.
So now I have to use the next four days to decide what I'm going to wear on this Most Important Date. I really want to wear my slinky red dress, the one that looks like it was painted on, but when I tried it on this afternoon, I found out a horrible thing has happened.
My butt has expanded.
I think it has something to do with the change in hemispheres or being close to the Greenwich time thingy, or maybe it's the ghost (update on the undie ghost—the duct tape worked beautifully, thank you! I dare any ghost to fondle my bras while a web of duct tape is holding the drawer closed). I don't know what it is, but it's a terrible tragedy. So now I have to diet my butt like mad until Friday. Do you still have that issue of Vogue that has the butt exercises? If so, will you scan it and e-mail it to me? I'm doing cheek clenches every chance I get, but it's kind of hard to walk and clench at the same time. I tried when I came downstairs, and Mom asked me if I had to go to the bathroom.
And speaking of that (don't get grossed out, now)...I've been going to Gallbladder now for over a week,