Whatever happened to chivalry? Does it only exist in 80’s movies? I want John Cusack holding a boombox outside my window. I wanna ride off on a lawnmower with Patrick Dempsey. I want Jake from Sixteen Candles waiting outside the church for me. I want Judd Nelson thrusting his fist into the air because he knows he got me. Just once I want my life to be like an 80’s movie, preferably one with a really awesome musical number for no apparent reason. But no, no, John Hughes did not direct my life.
Ironically, we were studying “The Scarlet Letter”, but isn’t that always the way? The books you read in class always seem to have a strong connection with whatever angsty adolescent drama is being recounted. I consider this. Except for “Huckleberry Finn”, ’cause I don’t know any teenage boys who have ever run away with a big, hulking black guy.
Let me just begin by saying that there are two sides to every story. This is my side, the right one.
Let the record show that I, Olive Penderghast, being of sound mind and below average breast size, swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth… starting now.
I used to be anonymous, invisible to the opposite sex. If Google Earth were a guy, he couldn’t find me if I was dressed up as a 10-story building.
I might even lose my virginity to him. I don’t know when it will happen. You know, maybe in five minutes, or tonight, or six months from now, or maybe on the night of our wedding. But the really amazing thing is, it is nobody’s goddamn business.
I want a one hundred dollar gift card deposited into my locker by noon tomorrow. Preferably to the Gap, but I’d also take Amazon.com, or Office Max. Actually, make it Office Max – I have my eye on a label maker. We did not have sex. I let you fondle my chest, and it was a glorious moment for you. Unmatched by anything you have heretofore experienced… including cake.
And here you all are. Waiting for me outside the bedroom door for me to kiss Todd. Listening to me pretend to have sex with Brandon. Paying me to lie for you, and calling me every name in the book. And you know what? It was just like Hester in The Scarlet Letter. Except that’s the one thing movies don’t tell you: how shitty it feels to be an outcast. Warranted or not.
She is the most popular girl in school. It’s partly because she’s pretty and has perfect hair; but mostly because her parents let her have these huge parties every time she catches them “doing it” in the pool.
Which is every week… apparently.
We’ve had 9 classes together since kindergarten… 10 if you count Religion of Other Cultures, which you didn’t, because you called it science-fiction and refused to go.
Forgive me, father, for I have sinned. I think that’s how you’re supposed to start these things. I’m only going on what I’ve seen in the movies. Where do I even start? I’ve been pretending to be a – how would one phrase it in Catholic words? A harlot. It’s not like I’ve actually been doing the things that people are saying I’m doing, but – then again – I’m not denying them, so I’ve just been wondering: is that wrong? It was just that a lot of people had been asking me to do things and I thought it was okay, because it wasn’t real. It was make-believe and no one was getting hurt. But a lot of people hate me now.
Whether I liked it or not, I had a lot of customers. Phil Lord gave me 100 bucks from Best Buy so he could tell people we hooked up behind the library. I got 50 dollars from TJ Max so Eric Ling could say we got it on during Chemistry. Ninety dollars from Panda Express so Brain Dukes could say I showed him mine, but he did NOT show me his.
This girl, named Hester Prynne, has an affair with a minister, is besmirched and made to wear a red A for “adulterer.” But then the town realizes she was too harshly judged, and she’s really a good person, and she dies a saint. A whole bunch of other stuff happens too. If you have a test on it, rent the movie, but make sure it’s the original… not the Demi Moore version where she talks in a fake British accent and takes a lot of baths. To say that one was freely adapted, is a bit of an understatement, guvnor!
