Which I did, immediately. I wanted a cat of my own that badly.

And yet, as my birthday rolled around, I had my doubts my mother would live up to her end of the bargain. For one thing,

even at the age of six I knew my mom wasn't the most responsible person. Why else was our electricity always being turned off? And about half the time I showed up at school wearing a skirt AND trousers, because my mother let me decide what I wanted to wear. So I wasn't sure she'd remember about the kitten - or that, if she did remember, she'd know where to get one.

So as you can imagine, when the morning of my sixth birthday rolled around, I wasn't holding out much hope.

But when my mother came into my bedroom holding this tiny ball of yellow and white fur and plopped it on to my chest, and I looked into Louie's (he didn't become Fat Louie until about twenty-something pounds later) great big blue eyes (this was

before they turned green), I knew a joy such as I had never known before in my life and never expected to feel again.

That is, until last night.

I am totally serious.

Last night was the best night of my ENTIRE life. After that whole fiasco with Sebastiano and the photos, I thought I would never ever feel anything like gratitude to Grandmere EVER again.

But she was SO RIGHT to make me go to that dance. I am SO GLAD I went back to Albert Einstein, the best, the loveliest school, in the whole country, if not the whole world!!!!!!!

OK, here's what happened:

Lars and I pulled up in front of the school. There were twinkly white lights in all the windows that I guess were supposed to represent icicles or whatever.

I was sure I was going to throw up and I mentioned this to Lars. He said I couldn't possibly throw up because to his certain knowledge I hadn't eaten anything since the Entemann's cake way before lunch, and that was probably all digested by now. With that piece of encouraging information, he escorted me up the steps and into the school.

There were masses of people teeming around the coat check in the front entrance. Lars checked our coats while I stood there waiting for someone to come up and ask me what I was doing there without a date. All that happened, however, was that Lilly-and-Boris and Tina-and-Dave descended upon me, and started acting all nice and said how happy they were that I'd come (Tina told me later that she'd already explained to everyone that Kenny and I had broken up, although she hadn't told them why, THANK GOD).

So, fortified by my friends, I went into the gym, which was decorated all wintery with cut-out paper snowflakes, one of those disco balls, and fake snow everywhere, which I must say looked a lot whiter and cleaner than the snow that was starting to

pile up on the ground outside.

There were tons of people there. I saw Lana and Josh (ugh), Justin Baxendale with his usual flock of adoring fans, and Shameeka and Ling Su and a bunch of other people. Even Kenny was there, though when he saw me he went bright red

and turned around and started talking to this girl from our Bio class. Oh well.

Everyone was there, except the one person I'd been most dreading. Or hoping to see. I didn't know which.

Then I saw Judith Gershner. She had changed out of her overalls and looked quite pretty in this red Laura Ashleyish dress.

But she wasn't dancing with Michael. She was dancing with some boy I'd never seen before.

So I looked around for Lilly and finally spotted her using one of the payphones. I went up to her and was like, 'Where's your brother?'

Lilly hung up the phone. 'How should I know?' she demanded. 'It's not my turn to babysit him.'

I went - oddly comforted by her demeanour, which simply proved that no matter how much other things change, Lilly always stayed the same - 'Well, Judith Gershner is here, so I just figured—'

'For God's sake,' Lilly said. 'How many times do I have to tell you? Michael and Judith are not going out.'

I went, 'Oh, right. Then why have they spent every waking moment together for the past two weeks?'

'Because they were working on that stupid computer program for the Carnival,' she said. 'Besides, Judith Gershner already

has a boyfriend.' Lilly grabbed me by the shoulders and turned me around so I could see Judith on the dance floor. 'He goes

to Trinity.'

I looked at Judith Gershner as she slow-danced with a boy who looked a lot like Kenny, only older and not as uncoordinated.

'Oh,' I said.

'Oh is right,' Lilly said. 'I don't know what is wrong with you today, but I can't deal with you when you're acting like such a freak. Sit down right here' - she pulled out a chair -'and don't you dare get up. I want to know where to find you when I

need to.'

I didn't even ask Lilly why she might need to find me. I just sat down. I felt like I couldn't stand up any more. I was that tired.

It wasn't that I was disappointed. I mean, I didn't want to see Michael. At least, part of me didn't.

Another part of me really wanted to see him and ask him just what he'd meant by that poem.

But I was sort of afraid of the answer.

Because it might not be the one I was hoping it would be.

After a while, Lars and Wahim came and sat down next to me. I felt like a complete tool. I mean, there I was, sitting at a

dance with two bodyguards, who were deep in a discussion about the advantages versus the disadvantages of rubber bullets. Nobody was asking me to dance. Nobody would, either.

Why was I even staying? I had done what Grandmere said. I had shown up. I had proved to everyone that I wasn't a coward. Why couldn't I leave? I mean, if I wanted to?