I can’t even believe this. I mean, the kiss isn’t even in the script. Grandmère clearly just added it because—I don’t even know why. It doesn’t ADD anything to it. It’s just this stupid kiss at the end between Rosagunde and Gustav.
I doubt it’s even historically accurate.
But then, all of the townspeople and the king of Italy gathering around after Rosagunde killed Alboin and singing about how happy they are that he’s dead probably isn’t historically accurate, either.
Still. Grandmère KNOWS my heart belongs to another man—even if right now we might be sort of on the skids.
Still. What does she think she’s doing, asking me to kiss someone else?
“For God’s sake, Amelia,” she said, when I went up to her—QUIETLY, because of course I didn’t want J.P. to know I wasn’t one hundred percent behind the whole kissing thing. I don’t want to betray my boyfriend by kissing another guy—especially a guy he watched me sexy dance with not even a week ago—but I don’t want to hurt J.P.’s feelings, either—and asked if she had lost her mind.
“People expect a kiss between the male and female leads at the end of a musical,” Grandmère snapped. “It’s cruel to disappoint them.”
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“But, Grandmère—”
“And please don’t try to tell me that you feel kissing John Paul is a huge betrayal of your love for That Boy.” (“That Boy” is what Grandmère calls Michael.) “It’s called ACTING, Amelia. Do you think Sir Laurence Olivier minded when his wife, Vivien Leigh, was called upon to kiss Clark Gable in Gone With the Wind? Certainly not. He understood it was ACTING.”
“But—”
“Oh, Amelia, please! I don’t have time for this! I have a million things to do before the performance tomorrow, programs to run up, caterers to meet with. I really don’t care to stand here and argue with you about it. You two are kissing and that’s final. Unless you want me to have a word with a certain chorus member—”
I threw a panicky look in Amber Cheeseman’s direction. I’m stuck. And Grandmère knows it.
Which might be why she was wearing a smug little smile on her face as she stormed off to wake up Señor Eduardo and send him home.
As if all of that weren’t bad enough, though, when I walked out the doors of the hotel just now, and started toward the limo, J.P. stepped out from the shadows and said my name.
“Oh,” I said, all confused. I mean, had he been waiting for me? Well, obviously. Only…why? “What’s wrong? Do you need a ride home? We can drop you off if you want.”
But J.P. was like, “No, I don’t need a ride. I want to talk to you. About the kiss.”
!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Okay. So THAT didn’t freak me out too much.
But I couldn’t show it or anything, because Lilly was in the limo waiting for me, and she totally saw us there on the red carpet, and put the window down and was like, “Come on, you two, I have to get home and collate!”
God, she can be annoying sometimes.
“Look, Mia,” J.P. said, completely ignoring Lilly, as was only fitting. “I know you’re having problems with your boyfriend, and that they’re partly because of me—no, don’t try to deny it. Tina already told me. I was really worried about you, because you just looked so down all day, so I forced it out of her. So, listen. We don’t have to kiss. Once we’re up there during the performance, we can pretty much do what we want, anyway. I mean, it’s not like your grandmother would be able to stop us. So, I just wanted to tell you, if you, you know, don’t want to, we don’t have to. I won’t be offended, or anything. I totally understand.”
OH MY GOD!
Isn’t that the sweetest thing you ever heard in the whole world?????
I mean, it’s just so thoughtful and mature and unlike me of him!
I think that’s why I did what I did next:
Which was stand up on my tiptoes and kiss the Guy Who Hates It When They Put Corn in the Chili on the cheek.
“Thank you, J.P.,” I said.
J.P. looked extremely surprised.
“For what?” he asked in a voice that cracked a little. “All I said was that you don’t have to kiss me if you don’t want to.”