by Meg Cabot
And she CAN’T possibly love writing as much as I do.
Oh, sure, maybe she’s better at it. But is writing as important to her as BREATHING, the way it is to me? I sincerely doubt it. She’s probably home right now, and her mother’s going, “Oh, Lauren, this came in the mail for you today,” and she’s opening her PERSONALIZED letter from Sixteen magazine and going through her contract and being all, “Ho-hum, another story of mine is getting published. As if I care. All I really want is to make the cheerleading squad and for Brian to ask me out.”
See, I care MORE about writing than I do about cheerleading. Or Brian.
Well, okay, not more than I care about Michael. Or Fat Louie. But close.
So now stupid, Brian-loving Lauren is going around, being all, “La, la, la, I just won Sixteen magazine’s fiction contest, I wonder what’s on TV tonight,” and not even caring that her story is about to be read by a million people, not to mention the fact that she’s going to get to spend the day shadowing a real live editor and see what it’s like in the busy, fast-paced world of hard-hitting teen journalism—
Unless Lilly won.
OH MY GOD. WHAT IF LILLY WON ????????????????????????
Oh, dear Lord in Heaven. Please don’t let Lilly have won Sixteen magazine’s fiction contest. I know it’s wrong to pray for things like that, but I am begging you, Lord, if you exist, which I’m not sure you do because you let them cancel Joan of Arcadia and send that mean rejection letter to me, DO NOT LET LILLY HAVE WON SIXTEEN MAGAZINE’S FICTION CONTEST!!!!!!!
Oh my God. Lilly’s online. She’s IMing me!
WOMYNRULE: POG, did you hear from 16 mag 2day?
Oh, God.
FTLOUIE: Um. Yes. Did you?
WOMYNRULE: Yes. I got the lamest rejection letter. FIVE of them, to be exact. You can tell they didn’t even READ my stuff.
Thank you, God. I believe in you now. I believe, I believe, I believe. I will never fall asleep during mass in the Royal Genovian Chapel again, I swear. Even though I definitely don’t agree with you about that whole original sin thing because that was NOT Eve’s fault, that talking snake tricked her and, oh yeah, I think women should be allowed to be priests, and priests should be allowed to get married and have kids because, hello, they’d make way better parents than a lot of people, such as that lady who left her baby in the car outside the convenience mart with the motor running while she played video poker and someone stole her car and then threw the baby out the window (the baby was okay because he was in a protective car seat that bounced, which is why I made Mom and Mr. G buy that brand for Rocky even though he screams like his skin is on fire every time they try to stick him in it).
Still. I believe. I believe. I believe.
FTLOUIE: Same here. Well, I mean, I got one letter. But mine was a rejection, too.
WOMYNRULE: Well, don’t take it too personally, POG. This is probably only the first of many rejections you’ll be receiving over the years. I mean, if you really want to be a writer. Don’t forget, almost every Great Book that exists today was rejected by some editor somewhere. Except maybe, like, the Bible. Anyway, I wonder who won.
FTLOUIE: Probably some stupid girl named Lauren who would rather be on the cheerleading squad or have a guy named Brian ask her out and couldn’t care less that she’s soon to be a published author.
WOMYNRULE: Um…okay. Are you feeling all right, Mia? You’re not taking this rejection thing too seriously, are you? I mean, it’s only Sixteen magazine, not The New Yorker.
FTLOUIE: I’m fine. But I’m probably right. About Lauren. Don’t you think?
WOMYNRULE: Uh, yeah, sure. But listen, all of this has given me a totally great idea.
Okay, when Lilly says she’s got a totally great idea, it so never is. A great idea, I mean. Her last great idea was that I run for student council president, and look how that turned out. And don’t even get me started about the time in the first grade when she threw my Strawberry Shortcake doll onto the roof of the Moscovitzes’ country house outside Albany to see if squirrels would be attracted to her Very Berry scent and gnaw on her vinyl face.
WOMYNRULE: Are you still there?
FTLOUIE: I’m here. What’s your idea? And no, you are not throwing Rocky onto any rooftops, no matter how interested you are in what the squirrels might do to him.
WOMYNRULE: What are you talking about? Why would I throw Rocky onto a roof? My idea is that we start our OWN magazine.
FTLOUIE: What?
WOMYNRULE: I’m serious. We start our own magazine. Not a stupid one about French kissing and Hayden Christensen’s abs, like Sixteen magazine, but a literary magazine, like Salon.com. Only not online. And for teens. This will kill two birds with one stone. One, we can get published. And two, we can sell copies and make back the five grand we need to rent Alice Tully Hall and keep Amber Cheeseman from killing us.
FTLOUIE: But, Lilly. To start our own magazine we need money. You know. To pay for printing and stuff. And we don’t have any money. That is the problem. Remember?
God. I may only be getting a C minus in Economics, but even I know that to start a business, you need some capital. I mean, I’ve seen The Apprentice, for God’s sake.
Also, I sort of like seeing Hayden Christensen’s abs in Sixteen every month. I mean, it makes my subscription worth it.
WOMYNRULE: Not if we get Ms. Martinez to be our advisor and she lets us use the school photocopier.
Ms. M! I couldn’t believe Lilly would bring up the M word with me. Ms. Martinez, my Honors English teacher, and I do NOT see eye to eye where my writing career is concerned. I mean, she’s loosened up a little since the whole incident at the beginning of the school year when she gave me a B.
But not by much.
I know, for instance, that Ms. M would NOT see “No More Corn!” for the compelling psychological character study and moving social commentary it is. She would probably say it was melodramatic and filled with clichés.
Which is why I wasn’t planning on showing it to her until Sixteen published it. Except I guess that’s never going to happen now.
FTLOUIE: Lilly, I don’t want to burst your bubble, but I highly doubt we’re going to be able to raise five grand from selling a teen literary magazine. I mean, our peers barely have time to read required stuff like O Pioneers, let alone copies of some student-written collection of short stories and poems. I think we need some more feasible way to generate cash than depending on sales of a magazine we haven’t even written yet.
WOMYNRULE: What do you suggest then? Candle selling?
AAAAAAHHHHHHH! Because you know in addition to the strawberry-shaped candle, there are ones shaped like bananas and pineapples. Also, birds. STATE birds. Like, for Indiana, there is a cardinal candle, the cardinal being the Hoosier state’s bird.
Worse—and I hesitate to write this—there is an actual replica of Noah’s Ark, with two of all the animals (even unicorns). In CANDLE form.
Even I could not make up something that revolting.
FTLOUIE: Of course not. I just think we need to put a little more thought into the matter before we rush into—
SKINNERBX: Hey, Thermopolis. How’s it going?
MICHAEL!!!! MICHAEL IS IMing ME!!!!!!!
FTLOUIE: Sorry, Lilly, gotta go.
WOMYNRULE: Why? Is my brother IMing you?
FTLOUIE: Yeah…
WOMYNRULE: Oh. I know what HE wants.
FTLOUIE: Lilly, I TOLD you, we’re WAITING to have sex—
WOMYNRULE: That’s not what I meant, you tool. I meant—Oh, never mind. Just e me after you’ve talked to him. I’m serious about this magazine thing, POG. It’s the only way you’re going to be able to see your name in print—besides on Us Weekly’s—Celebrities: They’re Just Like Us! pages.
FTLOUIE: Wait—you know why Michael’s IMing me? How do you know? What’s going on? Tell me, Lilly—
WOMYNRULE: terminated
SKINNERBX: Mia? You there?
FTLOUIE: Michael! Yes, I’m here
. I’m sorry. I’m just having the worst day. My government is out of money and Sixteen rejected “No More Corn!”!!!!!!
SKINNERBX: Wait—the government of Genovia is out of money? I didn’t see anything about that on Netscape. How did THAT happen?
This is why my boyfriend is so wonderful. Even when he doesn’t understand a single thing that is going on in my life, he’s still, you know, way concerned for me.
FTLOUIE: I meant the student government. We’re in the red for five grand. And Sixteen rejected me.
SKINNERBX: Sixteen rejected “No More Corn!”? How could they? That story rocks!
You see? You see why I love him?
FTLOUIE: Thanks. But I guess it didn’t rock enough for them to publish it.
SKINNERBX: Then they’re fools. And what’s this about being five grand in the red?
Briefly, I explained to Michael about the non-returnable recycling bins and the fact that I am going to be drawn and quartered by Amber Cheeseman as soon as she hears about her commencement taking place in Hell’s Kitchen instead of Lincoln Center.
SKINNERBX: Come on. It can’t be that bad. You have plenty of time to raise the cash.
Normally my boyfriend is the most astute of men. That is why he goes to an Ivy League university where he takes a course load that would prove a mental challenge even to Stephen Hawking, that genius in the wheelchair who figured out mini black holes—as well as how to get his nurse to fall in love with him—let alone your average college student.
But sometimes…
Well, sometimes, he just doesn’t GET it.
FTLOUIE: Have you ever seen Amber Cheeseman, Michael? She may have a 4.0 and sound like a chipmunk when she talks, but she can throw a two-hundred-pound man over her shoulder in a split second, and her forearms are as big as Koko the Gorilla’s.
SKINNERBX: Hey, I know. You could try selling candles. We did that to raise money for the Computer Club one year!
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!! NOT YOU, TOO, MICHAEL!!!!!!!!!!
SKINNERBX: They have these candles shaped like strawberries. Everybody in my mom and dad’s therapy groups bought one. They smell like real strawberries.
AAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!
FTLOUIE: Great! Thanks for the tip!
Change the subject. NOW.
FTLOUIE: So, how was YOUR day?
SKINNERBX: Not bad. We watched THX 1138 in class and discussed its influence on later dystopic films from the same era, such as Logan’s Run, in which, like THX, a young man attempts to flee the stifling confines of the only world he knows. Which reminds me, what are you doing this weekend?
Oooh, fun! A date! Just what I need to cheer myself up.
FTLOUIE: Going out with you.
SKINNERBX: That’s what I was hoping you’d say. Only how about staying in instead of going out? My mom and dad are going out of town for a conference, and Maya’s got to have her feet scraped, so they asked me if I could come home for the weekend to stay with Lilly—you know, on account of what happened last time they left her alone.
Did I ever. Because the last time the Drs. Moscovitz let Lilly out of their sight, when they went to their country house in Albany for the weekend and allowed Lilly to stay in the apartment alone because she had a report due on Alexander Hamilton and needed Internet access, of which there is none at their country house, and Michael had finals, and the Moscovitzes’ housekeeper, Maya, had to go back to the Dominican Republic to bail her nephew out of jail again, so neither of them could stay with her, Lilly invited her foot fetishist stalker, Norman, over to interview him for a segment she was doing on Lilly Tells It Like It Is titled, “Why Are Only Weirdos Attracted to Me?”
Well, Norman took umbrage at being called a weirdo, even though that’s what he is. He insisted that a healthy appreciation for the foot is actually extremely sane. Then when Lilly was busy getting them Cokes in the kitchen, he snuck into her mom’s room and stole her favorite pair of Manolo Blahniks!
But Lilly saw the stiletto heel sticking out of Norman’s anorak pocket and made him give it back. Norman was so mad about the whole thing that now he’s started his own website, IHateLillyMoscovitz.com, that has message boards and stuff that all the people who hate Lilly and her show can come and post things on (and it turns out there are a surprising number of people who hate Lilly and her TV show. Plus, there are some people who don’t even know who Lilly is but they joined just because they hate everything).
I have to say, after all that, I’m kind of surprised the Drs. Moscovitz would leave her without parental supervision, even with Michael there.
FTLOUIE: Fun! I’ll totally come over! What are we going to do? Watch a movie marathon?
Only, please, not a screening of one of the hideous movies he has to watch for that sci-fi film class he’s taking. He’s already forced me to see Brazil, one of the most depressing movies of all time. Can Blade Runner, another giant bummer of a movie, be far behind?
FTLOUIE: Oooh, how about we watch the high school seasons of Buffyon DVD? I just love the prom episode, when she gets the twinkly parasol…
SKINNERBX: Actually, I was kind of thinking of having a party.
Wait. A what? Did he say…PARTY?
FTLOUIE: A party?
SKINNERBX: Yeah. You know. A party. An occasion on which people assemble for social interaction and entertainment? We can’t really have parties here in the dorm because no one’s room is big enough to fit more than, like, eight people. But three times that many can fit in my parents’ apartment. So I figured, why not?
Why not? WHY NOT? Because we are not party people, Michael. We are stay-at-home-and-watch-videos people. Doesn’t he remember what happened last time we had a party? Or, more accurately, the last time I had a party?
And I could tell he wasn’t talking about Cheetos and Seven Minutes in Heaven, either. He was talking about a COLLEGE party. Everyone knows what happens at COLLEGE parties. I mean, I have seen Animal House (because it, along with Caddyshack, is one of Mr. G’s favorite movies of all time, and every time it’s on he HAS to watch it, even if it’s on one of those channels where they cut all the dirty parts out, which leaves it with practically no plot).
FTLOUIE: I am not, under any circumstances, wearing a toga.
SKINNERBX: Not that kind of party, you goof. Just a normal one, you know, with music and food. Next week’s midterms, and everybody needs to blow off a little steam beforehand. And Doo Pak has never been invited to a real American party before, you know.
When I heard this startling fact about Michael’s roommate, my hard, party-hating heart melted a little. Never been invited to a real American party before! That was just shocking! Of COURSE we had to have a party, if only to show Doo Pak what real American hospitality is like. Maybe I could make a vegetarian dip.
SKINNERBX: And remember Paul? Well, he’s back in the city, and so are Felix and Trevor, so they’re going to come over.
My heart stopped melting. It’s not that I don’t like Paul, Felix, and Trevor, all members of Michael’s now-defunct band, Skinner Box. It’s just that I happen to know that, while Paul, the keyboardist, is back from Bennington, where he goes to school, because of spring break, Felix, the drummer, just got out of rehab (not that there’s anything wrong with that, really, I’m glad he got help, but, um, hello, rehab at eighteen? Scary.). And Trevor, the guitar player, is back because he got kicked out of UCLA for something so scandalous he won’t even tell people what it was.
These are just not the kind of friends who, in my opinion, you want to come over when your parents aren’t home. Because they might “accidentally” light the place on fire. That’s all I’m saying.
SKINNERBX: And I thought I’d invite a bunch of other people from the dorm.
A bunch of other people from the dorm?
My heart stopped melting even more. Because I know what that means: Girls.
Because there are girls in Michael’s dorm. I have seen them in the hallways when I’ve gone to visit him
there. They wear a lot of black clothing, including berets—BERETS!—and quote lines from The Vagina Monologues and never read Us Weekly, even when they’re in a doctor’s office. I know because I once mentioned seeing Jessica Simpson without her makeup on in this one issue and they all just looked at me blankly. They’re just like those girls from Legally Blonde who were very mean to Elle when she got to law school because they thought that just because she’s blond and likes clothes, she must be stupid.
I myself have encountered this kind of prejudice from these girls, since, being blond and a princess, they just automatically assume I must be stupid. I so know what poor Princess Diana must have dealt with every single day.
I do not think I could handle being at a party with girls like this. Because girls like this know how to act at parties. They know how to smoke and drink beer.
I hate smoking. And beer smells just like that skunk that Papaw hit with the station wagon that time we were coming home from the Indiana state fair.
What is Michael thinking? I mean, a party. This is so not him.