Well, we're all in the minivan on the way to Josie's party (that's my nickname for her. Cute, eh?). The traffic on Harborview Road is crazy. Josie's all dressed up looking like an angel asleep in her car seat next to me. Mom is in the front seat looking across at Jax every five minutes, both of them with goofy smiles on their faces. They don't seem to be too worried about being late for the ceremony. In fact, Mom never worries about being late to anything. I think she thinks wherever she has to be and whatever she has to do can wait until she gets there. Jax is usually on time to stuff but he tends to get as oblivious as Mom when he's around her. I forgot to mention, the Quartermaine's will be at the christening too. They'll probably be the only ones upset by us being late. But they live on this crazy road too so they're probably not really on time either.

Michael is in the back seat glaring out the window looking like he's about to jam his fist into it any minute. I don't know what the hell his problem is, excuse my French. The other day he blew up at me for no reason. Some nonsense about how Dominic is only being nice to me because that's his job and he wants to kiss Dad's ass, excuse my French, again. It comes out of nowhere, like this explosion of hatred and meanness. Molly would say he lacks empathy, which, when I looked it up, means that he doesn't get that he's hurting people he's supposed to love. He lacks an internal editor, as Molly would say. She says you learn empathy from reading books and generally listening to other people's stories. The more stories you hear, the more viewpoints you're exposed to, the more empathy you build. It's the skill of being able to step into someone else's shoes. I like to think that kindness just happens naturally too, you don't need to read a book to achieve it. Mostly it's just about treating people like you would like to be treated. Everybody should have that idea in their head, right? Michael doesn't. Or he did and it disappeared after the accident. I don't really know about that either, because Jason had an accident too that changed him. I didn't know him before the accident, but it seems to me that who is now is more kind and more empathetic than anyone else I know. He puts up with my mom's drama on a regular basis. That takes a lot of fortitude (another word I picked up from Molly).

So I have no idea if it was the accident that changed Michael or if he was always this way. Whatever the case, I don't like it. It makes me so mad! When he said that crap about Dominic I got so mad I wanted to cry. Like I felt that sting in my eyes and I felt like I'd just been punched in the gut and he wouldn't stop, he kept going on about how I was just a dweeby kid, why would someone like Dominic be interested in hanging out with me unless he wanted something from Dad. I just wanted to wail at him, punch him, take him down, and make him stop being mean to me for no reason at all. I don't believe that about Dominic at all. That can't be right, can it? I consider myself a good judge of people and it doesn't seem to me that Dominic is faking it. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who fakes anything.

Let's see, what else can I write about while traffic is at a standstill out there? The school play? I really liked singing with Molly at karaoke night (don't even ask how two kids ended up in a bar). Molly's mom really liked my voice that night and suggested I try out for the play at school. She said the experience of performing and acting like you're another person for a while really builds character and is a good outlet for your emotions. And she said it looks good on college applications too. She said it's never too early to start thinking about college applications. I'm not worried about college applications yet, but I did think it'd be fun to do something different. So I tried out and got the part! We're doing the musical Twist this year and I got the part of the Artful Dodger. He's this kid criminal who's a pickpocket and is in a gang of pickpockets and betrays his friends.

I wonder if Dominic ever picked pockets when he was growing up. I mean a criminal has to start somewhere. Not that he's a criminal. He works for my dad, who is a coffee importer. It's just that Dominic seems so street-smart that he probably knew of kid criminals even if he wasn't one himself. I guess I could get some insight on what it's like to be someone who avoids responsibility and doesn't think about consequences from my mom. And I could get insight into what it's like to be a street-hardened kid from my dad. But I think Dominic may have a different twist on it (Pun! I made a pun! Twist, get it? LOL) I think Dominic grew up streetwise but still honorable somehow. He probably knew his way around the criminals but I don't see him being a person who could ever hurt anyone innocent. I think he's probably seen a lot of bad stuff, people being mean to each other, hurting each other, like my dad has, but seeing all of that hasn't made him hard and angry, like it's made my dad. I think he gets sad like my dad though. I've never seen Dominic sad but something tells me he may have that in common with my dad. I take that back, I have seen Dominic sad. But he doesn't really show it, you know? He's really good at making the people around him feel good and not bringing anyone down. But I've seen the sadness crop up in him sometimes. Maybe Dad sees that too and that's why he likes him? Anyway, maybe I'll run my lines by Dominic and he can tell me if I sound authentic in the role or not. Not that I really need to sound authentic for a middle school musical. I just like to do my best when I can, you know.