Princess In Training (15 page)

“Seriously,” I said to Doo Pak, trying to help, even though I didn’t have the slightest idea what was so funny. “Michael and I have been going out for over nine months. I go to Albert Einstein High School, which is just down the street, and live with my mother and stepdad down in the Vill—”

“You stop talking now, please,” Doo Pak said to me—very politely, I have to admit. But still. It’s kind of weird to be told to stop talking. Especially when then Doo Pak turned his back on me and started talking to Michael in a very urgent, low voice, and Michael responded in an equally low, but more annoyed than urgent voice.

It is extremely weird to be standing in a room watching two people have an urgent and annoyed conversation that you can’t even eavesdrop on. So, I came in here, to give them some privacy.

I can hear Doo Pak out there whispering very urgently to Michael, who fortunately has stopped whispering his responses, so I can at least hear HIS part of the conversation.

“Doo Pak, I TOLD you who she is,” he just said. “She’s my GIRLFRIEND. Nobody is trying to play a joke on you.”

You know, their bathroom is actually quite clean, for boys. There’s nothing in here I’m actually afraid to touch. I see they’ve exchanged the institutional rubber shower curtain for one with a map of the world on it. That must be to comfort Doo Pak, who clearly misses his native land. This way he can take a shower and gaze at his home country the whole time.

Oooooh, Doo Pak isn’t whispering anymore now, either. They must both think I’m completely DEAF.

“But I don’t understand, Mike,” Doo Pak is saying. MIKE????? “Why would SHE go out with YOU?”

It’s all becoming clearer now. Doo Pak must have recognized me. I have been in the press quite a lot lately, on account of the whole snail thing, and the election, and all. Maybe he can’t believe Michael is actually dating a princess.

I can’t say I blame him. There really isn’t anything in the world quite as dorky as being a princess. No wonder Michael didn’t warn him ahead of time. It must be excruciatingly embarrassing to him to have to admit to his college friends that not only is he dating a high school girl, but she’s also a PRINCESS.

Poor Michael. I never knew people actually TEASED him about the fact that he goes out with a royal. That, on top of the fact that his girlfriend has a bodyguard, is mammary-challenged, and a baby-licker, makes Michael’s devotion to me all the more extraordinary.

Ooooh, they’ve stopped talking. Maybe it’s safe to come out now….

Saturday, September 12, 7 p.m., Café (212)

I have to write this fast, while Michael is up paying for the food. Fortunately, there’s a horrendously long line at the cash register—this place is PACKED—so it should take him a while.

Anyway, I found out the reason Doo Pak thought Michael was pulling his leg about me being his girlfriend. And it has nothing to do with me being a princess. It has to do with Doo Pak thinking I’m too PRETTY for Michael.

I am not even kidding. Doo Pak told me so himself when I came out of the bathroom. He looked totally ashamed of himself. And he said, without Michael even hitting him first or anything, “I am very sorry I did not believe you when you said you were Mike’s girlfriend. You see,” he went on, in the same apologetic tone, “you are much too pretty to be dating Mike. He is—what do you call it? Oh, yes—a nerd. Like me. And nerds like us don’t get pretty girlfriends. So I thought he was pranking me. Please accept my very humble apologies for my mistake.”

I looked from Michael to Doo Pak to see if they were, um, pranking me, but I could tell from Doo Pak’s red, embarrassed face and Michael’s even redder, more embarrassed face that Doo Pak was telling the truth: He thinks I’m too pretty to go out with Michael!!!!! SERIOUSLY!!!!!!

They must have very different standards for prettiness in South Korea than they have here in the U.S.

Also, apparently, where Doo Pak is from, boys who play with computers all day just don’t get girlfriends. At all.

Maybe this is why they are always drawing them. You know, through anime and manga.

But, as I explained to Doo Pak, being a nerd in America is actually quite stylish, and most sensible girls WANT to date a nerd, as opposed to a jock or a playa.

Doo Pak didn’t look as if he dared believe me, but I pointed out that Bill Gates, who is in fact the King of the Nerds, is married. And that seemed to cinch it for him. He shook my hand and asked very excitedly whether I had any female friends I might bring over someday for him and the rest of the boys on the floor to meet.

I told him that I would certainly try.

Then Doo Pak excused himself to go to the computer store to buy the latest version of Myst, and Michael said irritably that he wished they would let freshmen have single rooms in the dorm, instead of forcing them to share with a roommate.

Which reminds me about something I noticed in their bathroom right before I left it. Something that completely didn’t register until JUST NOW. SOMETHING THAT MAY BURN ITSELF PERMANENTLY INTO THE SOFT TISSUE OF MY BRAIN:

THERE IS A BOX OF CONDOMS IN MICHAEL AND DOO PAK’S MEDICINE CABINET!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Seriously. I SAW it. Oh, my God, I TOTALLY SAW IT.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN???? I mean, clearly DOO PAK isn’t Doing It with anyone. I mean, he basically ADMITTED he’s never had a girlfriend.

So whose condoms ARE those?????

Oops, “Mike” is back—

Sunday, September 13, 1 a.m., limo back to the Plaza

OH, MY GOD. OH, MY GOD OH, MY GOD OH, MY GOD. I just have to breathe. Really. Like they made me do in yoga that one time I went. In. Out. In. Out.

Okay. I can do this. I can write this. I can just set it down on paper like I do every other little thing that happens to me, and then it will be all right. It HAS to be all right. It just HAS to.

We did it.

We had The Talk.

AND MICHAEL EXPECTS US TO HAVE SEX…

…SOMEDAY.

There. I wrote it.

So, why don’t I feel any better??????

Oh, God, what am I going to DO???? How could it turn out that Lana is right? Lana has never been right about ANYTHING!!! I remember she told us if you sneezed and held your nose at the same time, your eardrums would explode. And what about the great “If you take a shower while you have your period, you could bleed to death” rumor she started? Even last year, she had a couple of people going with the whole Bayer + Diet Coke = hole in your stomach.

The thing is, none of those turned out to be true.

Why did THIS one have to be the one she was telling the truth about?????

College boys DO expect their girlfriends to Do It. At least, eventually. I mean, Michael was very sweet and understanding and almost as embarrassed as I was about it. It’s not like, you know, he’s going to dump me if we don’t Do It tomorrow, or whatever.

But he’s DEFINITELY interested in Doing It.

Someday.

AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

I should have known, of course. Because real men—even two-dimensional ones like the X-Men’s Wolverine, and the Beast from Beauty and the Beast and even Hellboy—ALL want to Do It. They may, you know, be polite about it. I mean, Wolverine might engage in witty repartee with Jean Grey while he lets Cyclops slobber all over her.

And the Beast might whirl Belle around that ballroom as if there is nothing on his mind but doing the box step.

But there is no getting around the fact that ultimately, deep down inside, ALL GUYS WANT TO DO IT.

I don’t know why I thought Michael might be different. I mean, I have seen Real Genius and Revenge of the Nerds. I should know perfectly well that even smart boys like sex. Or would like it, if they could find someone willing to have it with them.

And it’s not like either of us belong to a religion where it’s, like, against the law to Do It before you get married, or whatever. Well, I mean, Michael’s Jewish, but he’s not THAT Jewish. He eats BLTs all the time.

Still. I mean, SEX. That is a BIG step.

Which is what I said to Michael when we were making out in his room after dinner tonight. Not like, you know, he Made a Grab or anything. He’s never done that—although now I know he’s WANTED to. It’s just, you know, that someone’s always around. Except for tonight, because Lars was totally glued to the TV in the lounge with the rest of the sports freaks. And Doo Pak had gone to the library to see if he could find any girls who might be looking for a nerd-for-the-night.

But we came in from dinner and Michael put on some retro Roxy Music and pulled me onto his bed and we were kissing and stuff, and all I could think was, THERE ARE CONDOMS IN HIS MEDICINE CABINET and COLLEGE BOYS EXPECT THEIR GIRLFRIENDS TO DO IT and WENDELL JENKINS and CORN PRINCESS and I couldn’t concentrate on kissing and finally I just pulled away from him and went, “I AM NOT READY TO HAVE SEX.”

Which I have to say seemed to surprise him very much.

Not the part about me not being ready, but the part about even mentioning it.

Still, he seemed to get over it pretty quickly because after blinking a few times he just went, “Okay,” and went straight back to kissing me.

But this wasn’t very reassuring, because I couldn’t tell if he’d really heard me or not. And besides, Tina had said Michael and I really needed to have The Talk about this, and I figured if she could talk to Boris about it, I should be able to talk to Michael.

So, I pushed him away again and said, “Michael, we need to talk,” and he looked at me all confused and went, “About what?”

And I said—EVEN THOUGH IT WAS THE HARDEST THING I’VE EVER DONE, EVEN HARDER THAN THE TIME I HAD TO ADDRESS THE GENOVIAN PARLIAMENT ON THE PARKING METER ISSUE—“The condoms in your medicine cabinet.”

And he said, “The what?” and his eyes seemed all swirly and unfocused. Then he seemed to remember and went, “Oh, those. Yeah. Everybody got them. As we were moving in. In that welcome pack they handed everyone at check-in.”

And then his eyes seemed to get VERY focused—like laser beams—and he pointed them at me and went, “But even if I’d bought them, what’s the big deal? Is it wrong that I care about you and would want to protect you in the event we do make love?”

Which, of course, made me feel all melty inside, and it was VERY hard to remember that we were supposed to be having The Talk and not making out, especially when it occurred to me that:

As good as Michael’s neck smells, the rest of him might smell EVEN BETTER.

Which is all the more reason why I knew we had to hurry up and have The Talk.

“No,” I said, moving his hand away from mine, because I knew it would be even harder to concentrate on having The Talk if he was touching me. “I think that’s a good thing. It’s just that—”

And then it all came spilling out. What Lana had said in the jet line. Wendell Jenkins. What Lana said in the shower (not the part about it backing up, though. That was too gross.). Corn princess. The fact that I love him but I’m not sure I’m ready to Do It yet (I said I wasn’t sure, but of course, I AM sure. I just, you know, didn’t want to sound too harsh). The fact that condoms break (if it happened on Friends, it could happen in real life). My mother’s excessive fertility. EVERYTHING.

Because, you know, when you’re having The Talk, you have to put it ALL out there, or what’s the point?

Well, almost all of it, anyway. I kind of left out the part about how I’m not so jazzed about the whole nudity thing. Well, MY nudity. His I’d be totally fine with. Plus, you know, on TV sex looks kind of…well, difficult. What if I mess it up? Or turn out to be not good at it? He might dump me.

Only, you know. I didn’t mention any of that, or anything.

Michael listened to the whole speech with a very serious look on his face. He even at one point got up to turn the music down. It was only when I got to the part about not being sure I was ready to Do It yet that he finally said something, and that was, in a very dry tone, “Well, that’s not actually a big surprise to me, Mia.”

Which was a surprise to ME, anyway.

But when I went, “Really?” he said, “Well, you made it fairly obvious where things stood when you invited all of your girlfriends, and not me, over the minute you found out you had a hotel room all to yourself for the weekend.”

HELLO. This is so not true. First of all, Lilly and those guys invited THEMSELVES over. And secondly—

Well, okay, he was right about this part.

“Michael,” I said, feeling completely horrible. “I’m so, so sorry. I never even—I mean, I didn’t even—”

I felt so awful, I couldn’t even VERBALIZE it. I felt like a total jerk. Kind of like how I felt at dinner, when Michael was talking about his Sociology in Science Fiction class, and how in Orwell’s 1984, the Lottery is used as a way to control the masses, giving them false hope that they might one day be able to leave their dead-end jobs, and how in Fahrenheit 451, Montag’s wife is totally unsympathetic to his problems with setting books on fire for a living and how all she ever does is talk on the phone with her friends about some fictional TV show called the White Clown. I couldn’t help remembering that all Lilly and Tina and I ever talk about half the time is Charmed.

But, hello, how can you NOT talk about that show?

But maybe that’s all part of the government’s strategy to keep us from noticing what they’re up to with the clear-cutting of the national forests and the passing of laws that keep teens from being able to seek reproductive health care without their parents’ consent….

Besides, sometimes I think Michael won’t ever stop talking about the shows he likes, like 24 and, lately, 60 Minutes.

Anyway, I did my best to make it up to Michael about the whole not-inviting-him-over-to-the-hotel thing. I put my hand on his and gazed deeply into his eyes and said, “Michael, I really am sorry. Not just about that, either. But the whole…well, everything.”

But instead of saying he forgave me or anything like that, Michael just went, “Fine. The question is, when ARE you going to be ready?”

And I was like, “Ready for what?”

And he said, “It.”

It took me a minute to figure out what he meant.

And then, when it finally dawned on me, I turned bright red.