December 7, 1998

Stacy had her party and it was pretty fun! We played Spin the Bottle and I didn't get to French kiss anyone, but I regular kissed almost every person there. [I forgot how clearly I used to distinguish between a French kiss and a "regular" kiss.]

Stacy spun the bottle and it landed on Mark, who is Shauna's boyfriend now. But it was the third time she had gotten him and so they had to French! Then James landed on Gina three times and they had to French.

James was so pissed off that Stacy had kissed Mark! [Even though he had just kissed Gina. Sounds fair.] And Shauna was pissed that Mark kissed Stacy, too, but she is only thinking about dumping him. I hope they don't break up.

Anyway, the party was fun for me, too, because I played Twister with Jacob!

[Twister: Facilitator of acrobatic flirtation since 1966. Early Twister detractors apparently accused Milton Bradley of selling "sex in a box." Perhaps there was some truth in that.]

After school today, Stacy and I went over Gina's house. Stacy was crying because James dumped her. She was unreasonably sad. She was curled up in a ball on Gina's couch, crying her eyes out, and I was trying to comfort her. I called James from Gina's house and he said he absolutely would not go out with Stacy again. I don't really care all that much. [Interesting that I felt entitled to define Stacy's sadness after a breakup as "unreasonable," especially given my own reaction to breaking up with Zach.]

I decided I really love James. Not as a boyfriend, of course, but he is such a sweetheart! I told him how nervous I had been about going to the party. I said, "I think I'm just, like... bewildered by everything." I thought that sounded so corny! But he said, "Yeah, like everything's happening too fast." And I couldn't believe it, because that is just what I feel like.

James really listens to me. At the party, Scott called me a slut and that bothered me. I sat on the couch and sulked, and nobody noticed and that made me sulk even more.

But then James came over and put his arm around me and told me that I could vent on him, so I did and I felt much better. I told him that I'm going to stop acting so outgoing so boys will not call me a slut.

He thought that over for a minute and then said, "Emily?" I said, "What." He said, "Remember in 5th grade, how I used to tease you about your boobs being so big?" I said, "Not really," even though I did remember. Back then, I was too stupid to appreciate my boobs. He said, "Well, I'm really, really sorry."