* Photo credit to The Closet *
So there’s the infamous John Pfeifer. It’s a shame really—he’s one of the cutest dudes I’ve ever seen on an SVH cover. Who knew he’d turn out to be such a bomb-building wack job?
As you may note, the title is White Lies. Now I was under the impression that “white lies” meant fibs that were small and fairly innocuous, not ones that could rip a family apart and cause a lifetime of regret. Then again, this isn’t the first time that an SVH title has been wrong and stupid. That Fatal Night, anyone?
John is oh-so-upset because his good friend (and secret love of his life), sophomore Jennifer Mitchell, is seeing deadbeat teenage dropout Rick Andover. Who isn’t? Rick has persuaded young Jennifer, a budding keyboardist, to run away to New York with him to start a band, and John is freaking out so much that he confides in—SHOCK!—Liz Wakefield. When is the school going to officially hire that girl as a guidance counselor? They might as well. Liz is like, “You’ve got to let Jennifer make her own mistakes. You can’t try to control a person’s life, even if it’s for a good reason.” I can’t believe what I’m hearing. It’s like Liz changes her belief system to fit her mood. Who doesn’t she try to control for a “good reason” (i.e., her reasons)?
However, Liz agrees to help John, and they stalk Rick to the music store where he works and catch him stealing a guitar and some money. They immediately call the cops and give them an anonymous tip, and Rick’s thrown in the slammer. Jennifer is panicked because he got arrested on the night they were supposed to run away together, and decides that her father is to blame for Rick being behind bars, so she acts like a little bitch to her family. Actually, what she acts like is a real life high school sophomore. Jennifer spills all her woes to John, and he feels guilty that she thinks her father is the real culprit—but not guilty enough to tell Jennifer that it was him who turned Rick in. He’s too afraid that Jennifer will hate him, especially when her father goes into the hospital for heart bypass surgery and Jennifer refuses to see him! This is tragical.
John finally gets up the balls to tell the truth (with much goading from E.Wakefield) and Jennifer flips out and demands to be taken to the hospital. This girl is more dramatic than Jessica Wakefield starring on a telenovela. Mr. Mitchell is going to live, and Liz goes to the hospital with flowers “from John” for Jennifer and speaks on his behalf, and Jennifer decides that she’d rather fool around with John than Rick any day. Blah, blah blah, waste of time.
As for Jess Wakefield, she’s still seeing A.J. Morgan, but she’s got a bad case of the wandering eye. She can’t help but flirt with other dudes and remind him that she’s smooched enough boys at SVH to know who the best kisser is, resulting in A.J. thinking he’s too boring for Jess. Awk-ward! She’s also bossing him around and patching up fights by telling A.J. what a do-gooder she is. This subplot doesn’t really go anywhere—until Two-Boy Weekend!
Other Notes:
- Jess cons Liz into making dinner again. When does Jess ever cook herself? And how do Ned and Alice not put a stop to this? And why do I always question such things, half expecting an answer?
- A fun fact: Rick Andover tried to join the Droids once upon a time! But he sucked at guitar and smoked too much weed. And the Droids probably acted superior as usual.
- Craving Jessica Wakefield theory on men? How about this one: “My theory about men is you have to make them do what you want. Otherwise, they’ll never think of it themselves.” I wonder if I should be worried, as this is actually making a lot of sense to me.
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