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.

Then again, college is a time for self-exploration and finding out who you really are and what you want to do with your life.

Oh my God! What if he’s into partying now???? Partying is a very large part of the college experience. At least, according to all those movies on the Lifetime Channel in which either Kellie Martin or Tiffani-Amber Thiessen star as coeds campaigning to shut down the fraternity house at which their friend or roommate was date-raped and/or choked to death on her own vomit.

Which isn’t the kind of party Michael’s talking about. Right?

Wait. Michael’s parents wouldn’t LET him have a party like that. Even if he wanted to. Which I’m sure he doesn’t. Because Michael can’t stand fraternities, since he says he can’t help but feel suspicious of any heterosexual male who would pay to belong to a club that females are not permitted to join.

Speaking of the Drs. Moscovitz:

FTLOUIE: Michael, do your parents know about this? This party, I mean?

SKINNERBX: Of course. What do you think, I’d do this without asking them? The doormen would completely rat me out, you know.

Oh. Right. The doormen. The doormen in the Moscovitzes’ building know all and see all. Like Yoda.

And they babble about it like C3PO.

Still. The Drs. Moscovitz are okay with this? Michael having a college party in their apartment when they aren’t home…with Lilly there?

It’s just so unlike them.

Wow. I totally can’t believe this. Having a party with no parents around…that is a really big step. It’s like…grown up.

SKINNERBX: So you’ll come, right? The guys were trying to tell me there was no way you’d want to. On account of the whole princess thing.

!

FTLOUIE: The princess thing? What did they mean by that?

SKINNERBX: Just, you know. I mean, it’s not like you’re much of a party girl.

Not much of a party girl? What does that even mean? Of course I’m not a party girl. I mean, Michael is not exactly a party guy—

At least, he didn’t used to be. Before he went to college.

Oh, God. Maybe it would behoove me to indicate that I am not adverse to partying. Just the date-rape and vomit part.

FTLOUIE: I am TOO a party girl. I mean, given the right circumstances. I mean, I like to party just as much as the next girl.

I do, too. This isn’t even a lie. I’ve partied. Maybe not in recent memory. But I’m sure I’ve partied. Like at my birthday party just last year.

And okay, it ended in disaster when my best friend got caught making out with a busboy in the closet.

But technically, it was still a party. Which makes me a party girl.

And okay, maybe not a party girl like Paris Hilton is a party girl. I mean, I like Red Bull and all. Well, not really, since I drank one can from my dad’s minibar in his suite at the Plaza and it made me stay up until four in the morning dancing to the disco channel on digital cable.

But you know. Who wants to be like Paris, anyway? She can’t even keep track of her dog’s whereabouts half the time. I mean, you have to find a BALANCE with the party thing. You can’t party ALL the time. Or you might forget where you left your chihuahua. Or someone might release an embarrassing video of you, um, partying.