May 4, 2000

It's exactly midnight and I'm sitting in bed at the Ramada Inn in New Jersey. Jenna is in the shower, Laura is playing with her video camera (which she brought to document the class trip), and Melanie is just getting in bed. Today was the first day of the 8th-grade trip to New York City.

I woke up at three in the morning because the bus was leaving at five and I wanted to get there early to get a good seat. On the bus ride, we watched the movies 10 Things I Hate About You and Scream. [Is it just me, or does the latter seems like a particularly terrifying choice for an 8th-grade class trip?] I sat with Steven and Laura at different times throughout the ride, but Steven and I didn't hook up.

When we got to New York, the first thing we did was take the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. I climbed it with Tyler and Louis, so I had semi-bonding time with them. But we didn't climb all the way to the top, because we got bored. Then we all took the ferry to Ellis Island. On Ellis Island, I really had bonding time with Steven. We walked around the whole island together with our arms around each other. I liked being so close to him a lot! And I have like, a billion pictures of the two of us together. [Okay like, seven pictures.]

At night, we went to the World Trade Center. We all took the elevator up to the 107th floor, where there's a whole exhibit on New York City - also an awesome view. [How chilling to think that a little over a year later, this tower would no longer exist.] There is a little picture booth there, and Steven and I went in and got our picture taken together. It came out very cutely!

Then things happened. Also at the top of the tower, there was a little movie thing about the city in this little theater. All the seats in the theater were on a platform that moved with the movie, but only slightly. I watched it once and it was really boring. [Boring! Just like the Statue of Liberty.] As I was walking out of the theater, Hunter, who was also walking out, pulled me aside and said, "Want to go back in? And like, jump up and down to make the platform stop and they'll have to start the movie over again?"

"Yeah, okay," I said when I realized I had nothing better to do. So I went back in with Hunter and a few of his friends and we sat in the very back. I was next to Hunter and a couple of them sat on the other side of me, and also in front of us. Matt was on the other side of Hunter. The movie started and Hunter said, "Emily. Will you play with my balls?" I was pretty sure he was joking, so I laughed and said, "Sure, Hunter." "Okay!" He said, and he seemed surprised that I had agreed to it. I said, "No, I was just kidding." But he was undoing his belt.

I was sitting with my feet up on the back of the seat in front of me. Hunter put his hand that was closest to me on my inner thigh. Matt reached across Hunter's lap and said, "Emily, let me read your palm." I held out my left hand, palm up, but Matt didn't even look at it. He just gripped it and put it down Hunter's boxers. My fingers touched Hunter's dick, and Matt didn't even let go. It wasn't hard or anything, it just felt like a lot of blobby skin.

Then some of the boys started jumping up and down to stop the platform, and the lights came on and the movie stopped. I jumped away from Hunter and got up to leave the theater. As we were leaving, I said, "Hunter, please don't tell anyone." He said he wouldn't. But Matt knows, too.

The only two people I told are Laura and Melanie. I am not going to tell anyone else! I cheated on Steven, and I feel so horrible. On the bus ride to the hotel from the World Trade Center, I was getting annoyed with him, but maybe that was just because of my guilt. I hope, hope, HOPE he never finds out, but I think that might mean I can't go out with him anymore, if there's always going to be that lie between us. I don't even know why I didn't stop Matt and Hunter. Maybe I wanted to prove to myself that I'm not a prude. I don't know.