Ms. Ayala if you're nasty.

#35, Secret Admirer

Tagline: "Who is Penny's secret love?" At first, when I read that, I thought it said "secret lover." And I was all, "OH SNAP! There's going to be boob-touching in this book!" But there is not. Alas.

So I think Penny Ayala might be the most well-adjusted and genuinely coolest person at SVH. Evidence?

• If you ignore the pleated pants, ugly watch, man's belt, and shitty red headband, she actually looks all right on the cover. What I mean to say is that I like her shirt. It's an Oxford that appears to have Dolman sleeves, and I am intrigued.
• Instead of sitting around weeping about the fact that she doesn't have a boyfriend, Penny actually *gasp* does something about it. I mean, in this case it's running a personal ad in the Oracle which pretty much guarantees you'll be dating some tertiary character like Aaron Dallas or Tad Johnson. And it's also kind of like issuing an engraved invitation to Elizabeth Wakefield that says Penny Ayala cordially requests the honor of the presence of your nose in her business. Still, points for proactivity!
• "I know I turn boys off," says Penny. "They just don't like serious students, I guess. And frankly, I can't see pretending to be something I'm not just to snag one." Jessica Wakefield, walking past the Oracle office at that exact moment fell down in a dead faint, hearing those words.
• The ad Penny writes for herself reads thusly: "The ideal candidate will have a doctorate in Australian theology, love caves, and speak Urdu. If you're looking for a girl who giggles, don't bother to respond. I'm strictly the guffaw type." Aw. The ghostwriter is trying his hand at irony, and it is working. I want to rescue poor Penny, spirit her away to Brooklyn, dress her in Urban Outfitters, and pierce her nose. FREE PENNY!

So because Penny is smart and thinks for herself, the SVH kids must destroy her, a la Claire Middleton. In this case, a group of guys make up a fictitious dude named Jamie and have him answer Penny's letter. The culprits are Kirk Anderson, Michael Harris, Chad Ticknor and Ron Reese. Um, who are the last two? Do they even go to SVH? Will we ever hear of them again? No. So no matter. Oh, and Neil Freemount is involved, too; you remember Neil, right? He punched his black friend in the stomach because Charlie Cashman told him to? Yeah, Neil's a catch. And he's the one Penny gets, in the end. Penny falls in love with Jamie through his letters, and is utterly destroyed and vulnerable when "he" stands her up. But it's OK. Because in the process of cruelly bullying her, Neil falls in love with Penny, and whatever, every smart girl needs to date one asshole in her life. When Penny's a film studies major at NYU she can make a short film about this experience.

In B-plot news, Lila and Jessica have officially dated every boy at SVH and so they run personal ads to find fresh meat. They compete to find the awesomest date to bring to the upcoming Spring Fling dance.

Here's Lila's ad:

Glamorous, sophisticated, mature high school girl looking for someone with the right stuff. I like fast cars, caviar, and the Caribbean. Don't talk to me about committment--I'm looking for excitement, not a bridge partner. If you can keep up with me, I want you. Kids need not apply.

And here's Jessica's. With extra annotation. I love footnotes.

Are you devastatingly handsome?[1] Are you romantic and wild?[2] Do you like girls who aren't afraid of danger?[3] Are you the type of guy who goes for what he wants?[4] Are you in college?[5] If you answered YES to ALL the questions, drop me a line.

---

[1] Meaning, do you look like this? Or this? Or this?

[2] "Extra points if you are a stalker."

[3] Because there's going to be plenty of it.

[4] It's like she wants to attract a date rapist.

[5] Seriously? You're running this ad in a HIGH SCHOOL NEWSPAPER.

Anyway, Jessica and Lila end up dating the same guy, who's name is John Karger, which sounds to me like a serious serial-killer name. But John turns out to be totally awesome. He's only dating both of them because he is writing a paper on personal ads for his sociology class. He asks Jess and Li both to meet him at the beach and breaks the news to them. They're also wearing matching leopard-print bikinis when this happens.

The leopard print bikini is actually Jessica's second bikini of the book. Her other one is white. And it's a string bikini, of course. Honestly, I think if you went through Jessica's closet and tallied up what fabrics her wardrobe was made of, it would look like this, in the end:

The one where we learn that eating disorders can make you popular.

#4, Power Play

Tagline: "The Wakefield twins have taken sides--against each other!" What I would pay to see that cage match.


Dear Wakefield twins,

Help! A fat girl wants to join the prestigious, snobby sorority at my HIGH SCHOOL. What should I do?

Love,

Ew!

Dear Ew!,

I think it's pretty obvio what you have to do, here. You pretty much have to tell the Fattie that you'll vote for her, if you want her to keep running errands and doing your homework for you. Then, when it comes time to vote, blackball her. You can't have fatties in your sorority. People will think you're fat, too! Don't worry about lying and being mean and stuff. Remember: you're pretty!

And just a word to the wise: if, by some chance, Robin Wilson--er, I mean, "the fat girl," gets all skinny in the course of two weeks and then tries to join your cheerleading squad, you have to do all you can to keep her off of it, too. She might be skinny now, but she was fat once. And now she's hungry, so she might eat you. And then beat you out for the prestigious title of Miss Sweet Valley High, which we will never, ever, after this episode discuss again, because apparently it's not THAT prestigious.

Luv & kisses!
Jess

PS: Remember the time Lila Fowler was a shoplifter because her parents don't love her, but everybody thought I was, because she foisted all of her stolen loot on me? Yeah. I do, too. Good times!

(PPS: Cara, is that you???)

Dear Ew!,

Please don't listen to anything my sister says. You must do everything I tell you, instead, because I am perfect, and always right.

Even if you know your sister is going to blackball the fat girl from the sorority, don't tell her about it. If it comes as a shock to her she'll be too crushed to eat, get skinny, and then she will be popular. Problem solved! I'm a genius, right? Mr. Collins thinks so.

Remember: when all else fails, a sympathetic shoulder pat or two can go a long way to healing a bereft soul.

With fondest regards,
Elizabeth Wakefield.

What they wore:

So Robin Wilson is fat and has to wear a lot of tent dresses. We don't get a lot of information about how they look, but I think we can imply that they are shabby, since one Robin wears early on is described as drab. Also, because of the fact that everybody knows fat people don't get to wear nice clothes. So these tent dresses of Robin's, they're ugly. She even wears one to the school dance. Because apparently when you're overweight the fat goes to your brain and clogs up your neural synapses, so that you can't judge the appropriate formality of occasions. When Robin gets skinny, Pascal's ghostwriter allows her to graduate up to designer jeans, a rainbow top, and a new hairstyle. So I guess all's well that end's well. As a sign of Robin's newfound popularity, the Chemistry Club names it's new formula the Robin Reaction. Which would have been the kiss of death for you, forever, at my school.

So as part of the Pi Beta hazing, Jessica the Evil Whorebitch makes the fat girl wear a bikini to the beach. "Do you have a bikini, Robin?"Elizabeth asks gently. "Well, it's a two-piece that's too small, so it looks like a bikini." Oh, Robin.

Here are the things Lila Fowlers shoplifts for Jessica: a sapphire-blue silk scarf, a pair of "carefully detailed" butterfly earrings dangling on a delicate gold chains, a gold bracelet, and a gold ring "magnificently crafted, with an Egyptian pharoah's head carved on it." As opposed to, you know, a German pharoah. #1, that's a lot of gold, and #2, below is a picture of what Lila would have looked like wearing all her flashy loot:

Elizabeth the Ace Reporter finally figures out that Lila is shoplifting because she notices her dressing more and more wildly, wearing elaborate jewelry and extremely flashy clothes. One such outfit includes "bright green skintight pants and a loose striped blouse that looked as though it could accomodate two people." Which doesn't really sound so telling to me. I mean, by that same logic, Dana Larsen of the Droids is a cat burglar and Claudia Kishi, a child murderer. Watch out Stoneybrook! There's a killer in your midst!