* Photo credit to The Closet *
Amy Sutton actually looks cute on this cover – and paranoid as she clings to her latest boyfriend, uber brain Peter DeHaven, who looks like the male equivalent of the sexy librarian who takes off her glasses and lets down her hair and parades around the non-fiction in only her heels and stockings. I’m getting carried away here. The saucy redhead is Johanna Porter, who might be one of the only realistic, likable characters ever in an SVH story.
Johanna, older sister of Julie Porter / former teenage dropout / ex-waitress, decides to come back to school after finding her dead mom’s journal in which her mother expressed her desire to for her kid to graduate. Why did Johanna drop out? It’s some big to-do about her feeling stupid since she’s the only one in her family not musically inclined. I don’t know. She feels weird about walking the hallowed halls of SVH, but feels better about life when her old friend Peter starts talking to her again…but only about himself, because he’s so fucking awesome that he got early accepted to MIT and he “had won every prize for science there was”—Jesus Christ! Those are some serious credentials. Johanna’s heart does flippity flops when he asks her out to some canyon to get some computer notes from a friend—who asks more questions about Johanna than Peter ever did—but Frenches her on the way back. Did I mention Peter’s dating Amy Sutton? Did I mention it’s never explained why, really? It’s gross.
Johanna is positive that Peter’s going to dump Amy for her, but when she says hi to him in school in front of everyone, he totally blows her off. It makes me want to jump in the book and punch him in his self-righteous junk. Then he runs up to her and apologizes, but keeps talking down to her and acting like she isn’t as smart as he is, even though she does spatial relationship problems for funsies and her teachers are all peeing themselves because, in fact, she’s freaking awesome at math and science. But she tries to give Peter an idea for his moronic computer program and he’s all, “Scoff! I learned that in diapers. Let’s talk about myself some more and meanwhile I can’t even bring myself to ask you one question, not even ‘How are you?’” Then he blows her off some more. Then he apologizes some more. And on and on.
Let me just say that Peter is unbelievably douche-y. He acknowledges to himself that he has zero interest in Amy Sutton but continues to date her. He tells himself that he really cares about Johanna and that he does want to know about her feelings, but he stuffs a note in Johanna’s locker, telling her he can’t see her anymore. I should write a thesis on him but he ain’t worth my time. Johanna quits school again and returns to waitressing after she hears some bitches talking about her, and Peter lets Amy shit talk Johanna in front of everyone. Liz steps up and basically calls Peter totally ball-less and he’s all, “Wah wah, I don’t see what I can do.” Damn, dude, try manning up for once! He makes a feeble attempt to go to the diner where Johanna is working and get her to come back to school / love him, but she tells him to get ta steppin’, which is amazing, considering that these SVH chicks are all about baggin’ dudes.
Johanna has a chat with her fahjah and they bond, and he insists he’ll love her even if she’s a math whiz instead of musical genius. She writes a music program for her dad and baby sis and goes back to school, where she flourishes. Peter approaches her and has the gall to ask her out to celebrate him winning the science fair thanks to the “elementary” suggestion she gave him. I can’t believe this guy. She’s like, “Um, no,” and he’s all contrite: “I messed everything up, didn’t I?” You toat did.
Meanwhile, Jess feels bored with her brother Steven’s relationship with Cara Walker and feels like the time has come to break them up. Why? Because she’s an effing bitch, y’all. She tells Cara that Steven’s cheating on her, and tells Steven that Cara’s cheating on him, and those two let themselves be manipulated by Puppet Master Wakefield. Even Amy Sutton thinks Jess is being a c-rag. AMY SUTTON! Steven and Cara finally stop bitching at each other long enough to realize that Jess is behind it all, and you won’t believe this b.s.: When they confront her, Jess is like, “I was only testing you two. I figured if you really loved each other, you’d never fall for any of that stuff I said.” And they’re all, “She’s right. We’re really the ones at fault here.” Oh my God! REALLY?! I can’t even handle this.
Other Notes:
- Jess starves herself to squeeze into a perfect size-four dress for the PTA dance. So in the re-releases, it’ll be a perfect size-two dress? Oh, cry.
- Mrs. Porter was in a car crash thanks to—you guessed it—a drunk driver. Probably coming from Kelly’s!
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