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Arms and legs that may feel cool to the touch
Feeling very tired, restless, or irritable
Light-headedness that is relieved by lying down
Of course, I generally experience all of these symptoms after spending any amount of time with Grandmère.
Still, I’m drinking all the bottled water in the limo, just to be on the safe side.
Wednesday, September 8, the loft
Michael wants to do a whole bunch of New Yorky things before he leaves on Friday. Tonight we’re eating at his favorite burger place, Corner Bistro, in the West Village. He swears they make the best hamburgers in the city—outside of Johnny Rockets.
Except that Michael won’t go to Johnny Rockets because he doesn’t believe in food chains, as he says they are contributing to the homogenization of America, and that as chain stores force out locally owned restaurants and businesses, communities will lose everything that once made them unique, and America will become just one big strip mall, with every single community consisting of nothing but Wal-Marts, McDonald’s, a Jiffy Lube, and an Applebee’s. Instead of being a melting pot, America will be mayonnaise.
Still, I happen to know Michael’s not above sneaking out for a St. Louis and a black-and-white from time to time.
Of course, being a vegetarian, I can’t actually join him in his quest for One Last Perfect Burger before leaving for the Far East. I’ll just have a salad. And some fries.
Mom is cool with me going out on a school night because she knows it’s Michael’s last week being in the same hemisphere as me. Mr. G tried to say something about my Precalc homework—I guess he and Ms. Hong must talk in the teachers’ lounge, or whatever—but Mom just gave him A Look, and he shut up. I’m lucky I have such cool parents.
Well, except for Dad. I can’t believe he said no to my brilliant Build Your Own Robotics Lab idea. It’s his loss, I guess. I’m not going to tell Michael about it. I mean, that I actually asked. I’m not sure, even if my dad HAD agreed to build his own robotics lab, that Michael would have wanted to work there, on account of the whole Wanting-to-Get-Away-from-Me-on-Account-of-the-No-Sex thing.
And I’m DEFINITELY not telling him about the hotel key Grandmère gave me. If Michael found out I had a hotel suite all to myself, he’d totally want to—
OH.
MY.
GOD.
Wednesday, September 8, Corner Bistro
I have to write fast. Michael just went up to the counter for more napkins. I don’t know where our waitress disappeared to. This place is a zoo. Someone must have spilled the beans about the burgers in some guidebook. A Big Apple double-decker tour bus just pulled up and puked about a hundred tourists into the restaurant.
Anyway, right as Michael arrived to pick me up, it hit me. What Grandmère was REALLY doing, giving me that key: Use the rooms to stage a very private and very romantic good-bye? Grandmère HAD to be implying what I think she was implying.
Grandmère has given me her suite at the Ritz for
SEX!!!!
Seriously! Grandmère’s giving me her suite at the Ritz so I can use it to “say good-bye” to Michael. In the kind of privacy we could never find anywhere else, what with neither of us having our own place.
In other words, my grandmother has given me her own version of the Precious Gift: THE most precious gift any teenager could ask for:
MY GRANDMOTHER HAS GIVEN ME MY OWN SEX PLACE!!!!!
I know it seems unbelievable. But it’s true. There’s no other explanation for it. Grandmère wants me to have sex with my boyfriend the night before he leaves for Japan.
Only why would my own grandmother be encouraging me to give away my Precious Gift when I am still just a teen? Grandmothers are supposed to be old-fashioned and want their grandchildren to wait until marriage before consummating their relationships. Grandmothers don’t believe in trying the pants on before you buy them. Grandmothers all say the same thing: “He isn’t going to buy the cow if he can get the milk for free.” Grandmothers are supposed to want what’s best for their offspring’s offspring.
And could Grandmère really think having good-bye sex with my boyfriend in her abandoned suite at the Ritz is what’s BEST for me?
Unless…
OH MY GOD. This just hit me: What if Grandmère is trying to help me keep Michael from going to Japan????
Seriously. Because what guy, given the choice between sex and no sex, would choose no sex? I mean, Michael is basically moving to Japan because of the whole no-sex thing.
