Aloha, Baby-sitters! The End
So, Drunk History aired a Hawaii-themed episode which was significantly more interesting and respectful than the “edutainment” in this book, in spite of being what it says on the tin.
Also, I was thinking-this book seems incredibly light on actual plot, by which I mean a storyline for each girl which actually develops over multiple chapters. I thought maybe it was because there’s just too goddamn many people needing chapters now in the series, but European Adventure had more actual plot (terrible plot, but still plot.) Lerangis really phoned this one in.
Also, two random BSC notes from my life:
The other night I saw an old Law and Order I’d never seen featuring both Kristy’s mom and Dr. Johanssen from the videos. Dr. J’s part was smaller, but Ann Dowd got some big scenes-they were both women who’d been victims in an adoption scam.
Also, I play a game on my ipad called “High School Story” and my students have egg babies right now. So far, my in-game Nerd boyfriend and I have a child named Eggs Benedict Cumberbatch and we live in a tree house and have our very own Gulfstream jet, so it’s about exactly as relevant as the Modern Living class was.
Finally, I think I got some of the pictures to work in part 2, albeit at odd sizes.
Chapter 17
Mallory turns the notebook into a book of LIES by claiming she was sitting for Margo and Claire who were so grumpy and hard to manage she just HAD to take them to the park with the sprinklers, because it was also 1000 degrees infinity hot. Actually, they were perfectly happy playing tag in the Pike yard, but Mal shamelessly orders them to the park, despite them complaining they are having fun on their own and literally begging to stay home. This is disturbing, but weird in that it actually acknowledges a sitter forcing the kids into some stupid activity for the sitter’s own needs/ego, as opposed to all the other times they browbeat kids into stuff for allegedly altruistic reasons.
Continuing a path of rare (but ultimately futile) honest self-analysis, Mal admits she had “unfinished business” that was totes more important than the kids’ wants-she’s been lurking creepily around the park with all her sitting charges and by herself hoping for a rematch with Margaret Wellfleet. “I know, I know. Stalkingpeople in playgrounds is not exactly a normal thing for an eleven-year-old girl to do.” Then, taking a swift turn into BSC-logic, Mal wanders if ol’ Margaret Wellfleet is a “figment of [her] imagination” because she hasn’t bumped into her at the park yet.
So Mal coerces the girls to the park and they settle into playing, Claire on the swings and Margo building an elaborate sand castle with the toys Mal brought, which at least allows Margo to order Mal to bring her water back and forth from. . .somewhere. IDK.
Anyway, she spots Margaret Wellfleet on a bench with a magazine OMG OMG OMG but she can’t decide if she should be conciliatory, or loud like Kristy, or possibly just empty the water bucket over her head. But being Mal, she does none of the above and trudges back to the sandpit where a three-year-old boy has just swiped one of Margo’s shovels. She politely asks him to give it back and he refuses, and Margo-perhaps because having no traits except barfing a lot she has learned to settle-is actually pretty savvy for a seven-year-old, keeping an eye on the kid until his three-year-old attention span sputters off and she can snag the shovel back after he wanders off again. Mal compliments her response (it’s actually nice to see a sitter giving positive reinforcement to actual good behavior) and Margo awesomely responds “More water, peasant!” Hee.
When Mal returns with the water, the three-year-old is back, shrieking he wants the shovel, and Margo very pleasantly offers him a different one and invites him to help, but stands her ground on the shovel she is using. He begins kicking sand and Mal boasts “My good BSC instincts were clicking in. I figured I’d let him pour the water. Get him involved in some fun aspect of castle-building. Distract him.”
But then! His mom swoops down from the other side of the park! And his mom is gasp! Margaret Wellfleet, in the sense where gasp!=obviously. She tells him that is not acceptable behavior and he howls that She! Is! Unseptable! She screams back that only bad boys talk like that, and “yanks” him away.
I’ve got to say, this seems pretty inconsistent with the woman who insisted letting a tantrum run its course was humiliating to the child, so I don’t know if she’s supposed to be wickedly hypocritical, or just a bad parent all around. Like, it would have made a lot more sense if she’d tried reasoning with him or something for awhile and THEN snapped, whereas now she just seems like an unhinged lady who gets a kick out of harassing middle-schoolers. Which maybe is the point, that anyone who doesn’t obviously and immediately worship the Revealed Gospel of K. Ron is totally horrible evil wrong, not just someone who thinks it’s not a crisis needing an intervention if a kid would rather read than be in a goddamn talent show. Mal is filled with delight at seeing Margaret Wellfleet’s kid having a tantrum, although she also claims she felt sooooo bad for him and is sure her superior BSC methods could have distracted and calmed him down. Colin escapes his mother’s hold and runs around shrieking “I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU! YOU’RE A BAD BAD MOMMY! THIS IS A STUPID PLAYGROUND!” Change "mommy" to "sitter," and "playground" to "town," and you may have every BSC snarker with you, kiddo.
A six-year-old comes up and tells Colin he’s being a baby, and Margaret Wellfleet yells at her. (On the other hand, having named her kids Isabelle and Colin is devastatingly hip for the Brook.) Mal thinks that it is “amazing” Margaret Wellfleet has two kids, because she thought she was just some lady who hung around the park spying and judging people. (The Ghost of Mallory Yet to Come.) Although really, why would she be hanging out at the playground midday without her kids? A six-year-old can run around on the playground without you, but in my experience, a three-year-old wants/needs you pretty close at hand, not leisurely reading.
Mal considers how best to snarkily one-up Margaret Wellfleet, but decides confronting her now would be too mean, but she feels “ten feet tall” when Margaret Wellfleet meets her eyes and recognizes her as the twerpy kid she tried to pwn last week.
Chapter 18
Mary Anne calls herself a “dunce” in the Journal of the Damned. Because she thought it would be “really interesting” to see the inside of a “typical” Hawaiian home. Grant me patience.
She practices saying “Good morning!” in Hawaii, but it is actually “Merry Christmas.” Oh, languages other than English! They are hilarious. Mr. Reynolds thanks Mary Anne for baby-sitting on her vacation, and she has the slightest bit of self-awareness when she stops from chirping she wants to meet a “typical Hawaiian family,” realizing it would be weird and icky if someone rolled down Burnt Hill Road to meet a “a typical suburban white family.”
Anyway, she’s been doing her guidebook schtick and tells us native Hawaiians are only eleven percent of the Oahu population and preens about how lucky she is to be able to observe such rare specimens. (Okay, she didn’t say specimens, but she meant it.) She muses “Reynolds” doesn’t sound Hawaiian and wonders if they changed it from something else, but is luckily too shy to ask. Mr. Reynolds, incidentally, is wearing a t-shirt with a huge map of Oahu on it, which I’m sure is what native Hawaiians living in Hawaii where every day. Just like I’m currently wearing a Cubs cap, a t-shirt with the CTA map, and earrings shaped like the head of Abe Lincoln. Likewise, Mrs. Reynolds is wearing a muumuu (italics in the original), and I actually have no idea how likely that would be for day to day wear for a youngish mom running errands or whatever-“muumuus” were what my nana called the homemade housedresses she wore.
Mary Anne looks around and is disappointed that the kids are eating Cheerios, wearing Disney and I <3 NY t-shirts, and cartoons are on in the background, because she gets enough of that shit in Stoneybrook and she came here for EXOTICA thank you very much. I’m busy thinking “Raymond Reynolds” is a mouthful of a baby name.
They give MA instructions and mention the kids’ grandfather might be home before they are, and show her a picture, because, idk, they don’t trust the kids to identify him? Really this is so we can understand that Gramps is white. MA kind of rudely asks in disbelief “that’s your dad?” and Mr. Reynolds laughs it off, claiming he gets that all the time. MA thinks, in that teenspeak argot Lerangis grooves on, that she feels like a heel. Mr. Reynolds shows off a wedding pic of his dad in his GI uniform and says they were married after the war.
The job goes by in, amazingly, a mere two sentences. Even more shockingly, MA plays video games with the older kids rather than forcing them to give a hula recital or something.
Mrs. Reynolds gushes about how amazing MA is and asks if she could sit again the next day, since Gramps decided to stay in LA. Lerangis continues to BLOW MY MIND by Mary Anne thinking one sitting job on vacation is enough, but while she’s fretting about how to say this, she notices some military medals on the wall by the pictures, and has a K.Ron meddling flash of how he probably has great stories about the war and hey! Claudia should come sit for them, because that would make her feel better. . .for some reason. Also, Claud is out of money, because these “business women” are crap at managing their money on these trips. So MA basically volunteers Claudia and they take her back to the hotel, where everyone is milling around in a tense circle while Mr. Kingbridge talks on the phone, because they’ve just gotten the word of Stacey’s helicopter crashing. Mary Anne cries, obviously.
Chapter 19
Claudia entry about how Stacey is still missing and the search parties were called off on account of night time. She struggles to spell that they are all awake in solidarity, as if being awake at eleven on vacation is otherwise unthinkable for middle schoolers.
They watch the pilot of the other helicopter being interviewed on the news, and see Robert looking like he was crying in the background. I have no idea why they haven’t swooped over to collect that set of kids, but that’s the first of many, many nonsensical things about this whole incident.
Abby mascots that Stacey probably found the only electrical outlet in the forest, and Claudia whistles in the dark they should listen for a hair dryer. Jessi proves to be a complete dumbass by saying Stacey could use her hair dryer to scare away the Death Marchers, some kind of nighttime wandering ghost that you die if you see them.
Seriously. Who the fuck would say that under those circumstances? Why would anyone think that was witty or appropriate? And you just know if anyone told the girls Stacey was in their prayers they’d probably consider that worse.
Abby at least mutters words to this effect, and then tries to boost the mood by cheerfully asking what everyone’s plans are for tomorrow after celebrating the big, sure to happen, rescue, but Claudia finds this even more stressful, so they all go to bed. MA asks if Claudia was going with Jessi’s group to a Japanese temple, but Claudia says she’s trying to avoid Japanese stuff. She’s brushing her teeth, so of course we get to have some “Awotoofay” talk. Anyway, MA coerces her into sitting for the Reynolds, claiming she’d get “a lot out of it,” and Claudia is amused MA is channeling Kristy in being a bossy control freak. But she agrees, because she thinks it will be easier to avoid stressing about Stacey if she’s busy wrangling three kids.
No news in the morning, and again Lerangis zips through the actual sitting job in a sentence. She puts the baby down for a nap and allows the older kids to play by themselves (what is this MADNESS) and then notices the medals and army uniform pics and a letter of commendation from President Truman, and freaks the fuck out, saying her own heart turned purple (um) and accusing Mary Anne of setting her up for SABATOGE. I mean, MA did set her up, but I’m not sure what Claudia thinks is going to happen. She seems to think Gramps Reynolds is going to come beat her up or at least yell at her for Pearl Harbor, not that she will feel awkward and uncomfortable. She actually considers wearing a bag over her head and telling him the kids forced her to. Yeah.
So Gramps arrives, and hugs the kids, and asks about the “young lady from Connecticut” and Claudia honest-to-God says “Thank goodness no guns were mounted on the walls.” Oh, come on. I’ve been pretty sympathetic to her feeling guilty and confused, but that’s just beyond and bizarre.
He introduces himself (and she honest-to-God checks for a weapon before shaking his hand) and the kids brag about him being a war hero, which seems kind of contrived for them to immediately announce (although I think he was at a reunion, so maybe it was on his mind? IDK, it’s not what I would have said at age five or eight introducing my papa.) He chuckles and says he lived through it, which is heroic enough, and offers Claudia a soda. While he goes to the kitchen, she tries to make sense of him seeing her standing there being Japanese and not shooting her, and she thinks his eyesight must be bad. Sigh.
He comes back and tries to make pleasant small talk about the sights she’s seen and if she wants to move there yet, and she says she hated visiting Pearl Harbor, and he looks puzzled. IDK, I mean her demeanor is probably all over the place, but I don’t quite get why people in this books seem to think Pearl Harbor is generally a laugh riot. I mean, don’t most people feel at least a little somber when they go to a memorial site? But anyway, Claudia confides that “All those bombs. All those wasted lives. On a Sunday morning, when no one expected it. I mean, how can anyone forget that, or forgive it? It - it just made me feel so ashamed. You know, to be Japanese,” and is a little stunned she actually said it out loud, to a “survivor of the disaster.” (Although he just said he was assigned for Pearl Harbor clean-up duty after the bomb.)
Gramps thinks for a moment, and then tells her about how his seventeenth-century Scottish great-grandfather burnt down another man’s house in a feud over money and was kicked out of town and died a penniless outlaw named Black-Hearted Duncan, but now he can go back to that town and hang out with the descendent of the other dude in the feud, because the story has passed into colorful local legend, or something. This is a pretty roundabout way of explaining to Claudia that she shouldn’t feel guilty about what her ancestors did, let alone a whole country, when she doesn’t even know what her grandparents thought about the war anyway-it’s too big a burden for her to take on, and no one has the right to impose it on her, which suddenly makes her think of the internment camps. And then he says the atomic bombs make Pearl Harbor look small, and they both think deep thoughts.
Gramps says one of the things he like about Hawaii is that it is pretty tolerant and a live-and-let-live culture, which is. . .let’s say complicated, especially coming from a white dude. He’s been pretty sweet to her, but this resolution is kind of limp, and has some weird implications below the surface about authority and white people (and authors) telling people of color to feel and I don’t even know, really. Mr. Reynolds Jr comes to return Claudia to the hotel, and tells her cryptically that they have just gotten some kind of news about Stacey, but he left before finding out what it was, because that makes sense. Lerangis is going to milk this fake tension all the way to end of the next chapter.
Chapter 20
Which begins with Dawn. Of course it does. Dawn writes obnoxiously and officiously that unlike everyone else, SHE can’t just wait around and SHE has a special project that might involve twisting a few arms.
She wants to go back to what Jessi deems “the garbage beach,” further calling Dawn weird, which is not enough to make up for how annoying and weird Jessi has been this whole book. Anyway, Dawn has gotten biodegradable garbage bags from Mrs. Reynolds, and basically harasses Abby and Jessi into joining her. Abby says “How. . .ecologically correct,” and Dawn snaps she hates that phrase. Is it a phrase? I don’t even. (I mean, I kind of hate the phrase “politically correct,” because in my experience 90% of the people who complain about political correctness mostly hate that there might be consequences for being rude, ignorant, or prejudiced, but I don’t even know if “ecologically correct” is a thing.) Mary Anne is crying too much to come. Well-played, MA. Logan is violating their stupid Together But Independent thing to comfort her. Yeah, that was a plot thread.
So they go to the beach, everyone except St. Dawn of Compost grumbles about how much there is, but when saintly Dawn picks up an old bike tire, lo, the children run out of the very waves to learn her ecological wisdom and join the trash detail. Mrs. Bernhardt makes everyone giggle when she finds a bathing suit by suggesting someone must have sashayed home naked. They also find “a chicken skeleton, a few clumps of dog hair, a Grateful Dead cassette, a steering wheel, a California Angels baseball cap, and a stethoscope (don’t ask me).” Jessi isa “trash magnet.” The kids (Danny, Pohaikealoha (Pohai, and I think Danny’s sister), Yukio, and Jeanette) squabble over who found the most litter and Pohai turns them into a team called the Anti-Litter Bugs, and Dawn deems her the K. Ron of the group.
For all the whining about HOW MUCH GARBAGE there was, it only takes them an hour to clean up all of it. Of course, in that hour Jessi filled three bags “right away,” so who even knows. Pohai wishes it could always be clean and Dawn puts her in charge of it, regally handing over the garbage bags and giving them orders for fundraisers to hold and stuff.
There’s an interesting picture-one girl, who I assume is Pohai, I’m 90% sure was drawn from a Kristy model. Abby has freakishly taut abs and no sign of sunburn. One of the boys is not only taller than Abby and Dawn, but has a bit of a belly on him, which wasn’t freaked out about in the text. Also, Abby appears to be holding a stuffed penguin wearing a ski hat.
They go back to the hotel as Dawn pontificates about how she believes we can all make a difference, and then snottily says “I hoped Pohai and her friends would stay committed,” because that’s a fair burden to put on kids who wouldn’t even be expected to wipe up their own milk in Stoneybrook.
Oh, and they found Stacey.
Chapter 21
Stacey dramatically writes that she has, in fact, survived, and is not a ghost possessing the journal or a zombie who can only eat sugarfree brains. She claims to be about to tell Mal the real, exclusive story, including how Robert almost died of a broken heart, at which point he writes “I wouldn’t go that far.” How charming.
Anyway, we’re back to shortly after the crash, failing to get the attention of a helicopter flying overhead. The pilot, Mr. Fredericks, says that they should walk away from the sun to the Kaupo Gap and eventually they’ll hit a town. Eventually meaning about 15 miles. Stacey complains about her lightweight “aerobic” shoes, although considering her general sartorial taste, she should be relieved they aren’t cowboy boots or jellies. She tells Mr. Fredericks about being diabetic and says she has emergency supplies for about a day, and he assures her that she’ll be back in a hotel by the next evening.
Inevitably, Stacey makes it about how she’s a New Yorker who never does anything more vigorous than wander through Central Park (because no one in New York walks anywhere except in the park), whereas the Brook kids are “part mountain goat” scampering and frolicking and having a delightful time. They stop for the night and she grumbles off to do her injection privately so as not to gross out “Pukey Pete.” The other girls brought juice boxes and gorp, neither of which I’d think would be great for brittle diabetic Stacey’s stability, but no mention of that is made, or what her emergency food is.
The next morning she’s already pretty out of it, and after they get picked up by a driver, passes out and wakes up in the hospital hooked up to an IV.
It’s all very romantic that Robert is the first thing she sees when she opens her eyes, and then it turns out everyone from both helicopters has been crowded into her room watching her, which is pretty creepy. Everyone, even the gym teacher and the pilots, thinks the mushy bedside scene is sooooo romantic, except Pete, proving he is once again one of the few people in the Brook who occasionally bumps into normal human behavior.
A brief time later Stacey is released from the hospital, which seems as good a time as any to stop and talk about some of this nonsense. First of all, I am not a lawyer (I just spend way too much time with them) and I really have trouble believing you could sign a general permission slip that would cover something like a helicopter excursion-let alone whatever kind of cheapass place it must be to be part of that $500 package. Like, I’m pretty sure an adult booking a helicopter trip would have to sign some waivers specific to that right then. Then, notice how no reference whatsoever has been made to calling the McGills? The allegedly super-overprotective McGills? Notice how apparently a parent is totally irrelevant to a thirteen-year-old being released from a hospital? (Yeah, they could almost certainly ADMIT her either as emergent or in loco parentis, but I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t just blithely release her like that.) You know, especially since she’s a super fragile brittle diabetic who could die from an M&M? (Of course, they were also fine with either knowing Abby was lying about her age, or thinking it was fine for her to be in the kind of shady production that wouldn’t care about getting parental consent to film a child.) Also, considering how the other pilot turned around and Mr. Fredericks kept right on truckin’, I really have trouble believing there’s not some major, major fucking liability for someone here. At least they’d better be paying for Stacey’s out of state, out of network ER visit. God, this is stupid.
Anyway, they all fly back to Honolulu, and “Snuggling against [Robert] in that plane, I felt comfortable and warm.” She apologizes for being a “pill,” he apologizes for ignoring her, Pete regrets being seated in proximity to this melodrama and PDA.
They get a minivan back to the hotel, and suddenly Jessi’s face appears in the window and she’s shrieking like a demon. Okay. She does some faux-whiny bit about the BSC not respecting how sore and blistered she is, but then says she doesn’t care. I’ve wrecked my feet with blisters many times and I’m not sure hugging was majorly affected, but whatever.
Another bizarre pic-Stacey is being lifted off the ground by Claudia and Abby, and making a face like she might be stoned on painkillers. Mary Anne is staring with disapproval and loathing at Stacey’s feet (which are still in her sneakers, which seems both uncomfortable but also hiding any grossness, so idk what MA’s deal is) and Dawn and especially Jessi are making exaggerated pouty faces. Not in a duckface way, just in a weird way.
Chapter 22
Jessi, because “obsessively document everything for poor, poor Mallory,” is what passes for plot in this book. Stacey’s back! With only a sunburned neck and blistered feet, because I guess Jessi isn’t interested in the whole dangerously low blood sugar part. But it’s totes awesome that Robert pushed her around in a wheelchair! Also, Stacey is amusing herself telling overblown accounts of the adventure, adding in stuff like smoke signals and mysterious footprints entering into a cave and a one-eyed hermit and a Lava Beast to other SMS students and random people who recognize her picture from the TV. Nothing ever comes of her increasingly ridiculous fibbing, and I have no idea why it’s there.
They spent the day at the Polynesian Cultural Center. Jessi compares it to a theme park, which rubs me the wrong way a little, but does kind of seem how it’s advertised. MA makes tree bark cloth, Dawn pounds poi, Jessi (of course) dances the hula in a grass skirt, because of course Jessi is so super special gifted her ballet naturally translates into hula, which isn’t a complex and ritualized language or anything. Remember how she became “practically fluent” after a week in Mexico? Also, she claims she did the hula in a Tahitian exhibit, although my admittedly brief Wikipedia diving suggests that although most Polynesian cultures have similar dances, the hula is specific to Hawaii; the Tahitian dance would be the ‘aparima or the o’tea, maybe. I wouldn’t have noticed it if she hadn’t specifically said she did the hula in the Tahitian exhibit. Alan Gray laughed at her and she wanted to strangle him. That seems like a proportionate reaction.
They go to a luau dinner, which Dawn threatens to “boycott.” It would be nice if that meant she would go quietly sit in the van, but instead she just eats from the vegetarian buffet and whines a lot. They see a revue that includes an exploding volcano, and all Jessi has to say is “cool.” Although I guess she’s already the leading expert on staged volcanoes. . .
All the sitters stay up until midnight “gabbing,” including not only Logan and Robert, for evidence of more stellar supervision by SMS staff who made them ride separately on the buses from the plane, but apparently are just fine with coed-hotel-room-hanging-out till all hours.
The next day, Jessi gets bitten at by a goose. I feel you, Goose.
Dawn tries to give Logan a surf lesson, and he keeps falling off, while Alan and Pete sing “Every-body’s gone suuuurfin’, over Logan’s head . . .” which isn’t exactly high satire, but is at least in the same zip code as a joke.
They eat shaved ice and Jessi makes a big deal about Dawn getting hers with azuki beans, like omg, why doesn’t she just get Brussell sprouts, even though azuki beans are 1) a very popular shave ice flavor, 2) used in a lot of Asian desserts and 3) most often prepared sweetened anyway, so I don’t know if Dawn is being a dumbass for thinking her shaved ice with beans has no sugar or syrup in it, or Jessi for being so melodramatic about how freethinking Dawn is being. Or both. Probably both.
Blah blah blah, banana plantation tour (which I’m sure was pretty sanitized, but still), air show, “A climb to the temple where the ancient Hawaiians made ritual human sacrifices to the gods (for some reason, we all looked at Alan Gray).” There’s that thoughtfulness and cultural sensitivity I expect.
Jessi has taken an entire thirteenth roll of film (haha, remember when you had to pay for all that?) and filled another half spiral notebook. And then she writes a weirdly whiny bit about how the trip should be starting now, not ending, because Stacey and Robert aren’t fighting, Claudia isn’t “brooding” (um) and Dawn could go find more trash to collect. It strikes me as icky yet again that there are never any conversations between Claudia and Jessi, or Abby, about race-related issues, because God forbid a conversation like that not be directed and mediated by and for white people.
Blah blah, “don’t worry, Mal,” Jessi is coming home, but a part of her will always be in Hawaii. Can I pick what part?
Chapter 23
Sweet, sweet home stretch. Logan, being a Classy Dude, opens his entry with saying he might as well write in this thing because you gotta fill up ten hours on an airplane somehow.
He goes on to say that she shouldn’t believe Dawn about him sucking at surfing, because. . .and I quote, “I was a real pound master.”
He claims this is surf slang; I don’t know, and I’m not looking beyond one page of Google-who knows what I would find there, Ken Doll. “Mary Anne thought it meant someone who took a real pounding. She says that definition fits better.” Uh-huh. Look, people, I don’t make this stuff up.
Blah blah, the stupid Together But Independent experiment, because they couldn’t, you know, just make a point of doing some things with their individual friends and some things together; they had to create some elaborate system where Logan felt like he was “breaking the rules” if he talked with her, and Kristy wasn’t there with the riding crop.
Apparently on this one flight the kids were actually planning to sit in their assigned seats instead of running around like baboons, and Logan trades his window seat to spare MA from having to sit next to Alan Gray the whole time. Before they board, Mr. Wong and Ms. Bernhardt come around with a big box of leis, so Logan gets leid after all. I’m not particularly allergic, but the idea of being on a plane for ten hours with everyone wearing wilting leis in the recirculated air makes me want to gag. Wouldn’t poor Abby be in hell?
They agree TBI sucks, and Logan vows to be a macho man and never again let his friends tell him how much time to spend with his girlfriend. Unless it’s Kristy. They agree to stick together and engage in obnoxious PDA on the next trip.
“I hear the social studies classes are visiting the Stoneybrook Dump in September.”
“Save me a seat,” Mary Anne said with a big grin.
In a couple that was generally cute and not creepy, I would actually find that exchange adorable. But since it’s Ken Doll the Controller and Mary Anne the Passive-Aggressive Mouse, meh. Ditto when Logan says the best part of the trip was falling asleep together on the bus on the way back to the Brook.
Picture of the fakest lei ever.
Epilogue! We made it!
Jessi’s dad had to carry from the bus to the car. I hope she remembers that next time she whines about how omg they treat her like such a baby. She claims her obsessive project was fun, but next time she wants a secretary.
Mary Anne reports Scott Reynolds actually wrote down the number on her stupid t-shirt and called BSC HQ, and wonders if they should send Kristy to sit on her family vacation. Because obviously the Brewer-Thomas bunch will stay in the same hotel.
Abby advises sunscreen, and not that Day-Nite crap-her skin is coming off in “chunks,” although certainly not in any of the illustrations. But maybe she can channel her gross appearance into a guest spot on the X-Files! Wow, that’s pretty much a time-appropriate reference. How’d Lerangis sneak that in?
Claudia had a nice talk with her parents, although the fact that she thinks its noteworthy they didn’t laugh at her is kind of messed-up. Her dad says it’s normal to have complicated feelings about WWII, and he has both a cousin who was injured fighting for the US and a close friend who was in an internment camp. Mrs. Kishi says all her life Mimi refused to talk about the war at all, and Claudia has a relatively thoughtful, grown-up insight about how some things you just never know.
Sweet, sweet Dawn packs an enormous amount of obnoxiousness in a single paragraph-that the trip was awesome because her CA friends will be jealous, that she will totally go again because it will be totally cheaper to travel from the West Coast, that the kids better be keeping “my little beach” clean, and that they should totally clean up Brenner Field, except oops! She’ll be gone before any work happens. It’s a pretty impressive amount of bullshit per capita.
Maureen cries when they see Stacey-Ed dragged his ass out of NYC, although there still doesn’t seem to have been an actual fucking phone call at any point. I would say it shows growth that Maureen and Ed didn’t have some epic fight about it being Maureen’s fault for letting Stacey go, and why if Ed is so goddamn important at work he can’t charter a company jet out to Hawaii or something, but I’m pretty sure that’s just bad writing.
Heh, heh, Stacey shows them her “blisters.” In a few years, that could be a different kind of family bonding experience. Also, she refrains from telling them all the melodramatic crap she made up, so I guess that only existed so she could “joke” her parents couldn’t handle fire-breathing monkeys.
Jessi writes an afterword, in which she says in addition to flaunting in excruciating detail how much fun they had without her, they’ll also probably rehash this endlessly while Mal sits there quietly excluded. BFF kiss kiss!
And because Mal has a sad, sad life, she is totes grateful for this, and only refrains from writing Thank You a billion times because Dawn would send her to Green School. Also, she wants to book Jessi for a baby-sitting job for the Wellfleets. REVENGE! Of course we will never see them again.
So that’s a wrap! I’m thinking tentatively of either Mallory’s Christmas Wish or Kristy and the Copycat, which I don’t think I’ve read as an adult, definitely not post-Slam Book. But any suggestions will be appreciated!
Also, I think I’ve got the knack of how to do pictures from the e-book, so I’m going to try to go pop them into the previous part now.
Also, I was thinking-this book seems incredibly light on actual plot, by which I mean a storyline for each girl which actually develops over multiple chapters. I thought maybe it was because there’s just too goddamn many people needing chapters now in the series, but European Adventure had more actual plot (terrible plot, but still plot.) Lerangis really phoned this one in.
Also, two random BSC notes from my life:
The other night I saw an old Law and Order I’d never seen featuring both Kristy’s mom and Dr. Johanssen from the videos. Dr. J’s part was smaller, but Ann Dowd got some big scenes-they were both women who’d been victims in an adoption scam.
Also, I play a game on my ipad called “High School Story” and my students have egg babies right now. So far, my in-game Nerd boyfriend and I have a child named Eggs Benedict Cumberbatch and we live in a tree house and have our very own Gulfstream jet, so it’s about exactly as relevant as the Modern Living class was.
Finally, I think I got some of the pictures to work in part 2, albeit at odd sizes.
Chapter 17
Mallory turns the notebook into a book of LIES by claiming she was sitting for Margo and Claire who were so grumpy and hard to manage she just HAD to take them to the park with the sprinklers, because it was also 1000 degrees infinity hot. Actually, they were perfectly happy playing tag in the Pike yard, but Mal shamelessly orders them to the park, despite them complaining they are having fun on their own and literally begging to stay home. This is disturbing, but weird in that it actually acknowledges a sitter forcing the kids into some stupid activity for the sitter’s own needs/ego, as opposed to all the other times they browbeat kids into stuff for allegedly altruistic reasons.
Continuing a path of rare (but ultimately futile) honest self-analysis, Mal admits she had “unfinished business” that was totes more important than the kids’ wants-she’s been lurking creepily around the park with all her sitting charges and by herself hoping for a rematch with Margaret Wellfleet. “I know, I know. Stalkingpeople in playgrounds is not exactly a normal thing for an eleven-year-old girl to do.” Then, taking a swift turn into BSC-logic, Mal wanders if ol’ Margaret Wellfleet is a “figment of [her] imagination” because she hasn’t bumped into her at the park yet.
So Mal coerces the girls to the park and they settle into playing, Claire on the swings and Margo building an elaborate sand castle with the toys Mal brought, which at least allows Margo to order Mal to bring her water back and forth from. . .somewhere. IDK.
Anyway, she spots Margaret Wellfleet on a bench with a magazine OMG OMG OMG but she can’t decide if she should be conciliatory, or loud like Kristy, or possibly just empty the water bucket over her head. But being Mal, she does none of the above and trudges back to the sandpit where a three-year-old boy has just swiped one of Margo’s shovels. She politely asks him to give it back and he refuses, and Margo-perhaps because having no traits except barfing a lot she has learned to settle-is actually pretty savvy for a seven-year-old, keeping an eye on the kid until his three-year-old attention span sputters off and she can snag the shovel back after he wanders off again. Mal compliments her response (it’s actually nice to see a sitter giving positive reinforcement to actual good behavior) and Margo awesomely responds “More water, peasant!” Hee.
When Mal returns with the water, the three-year-old is back, shrieking he wants the shovel, and Margo very pleasantly offers him a different one and invites him to help, but stands her ground on the shovel she is using. He begins kicking sand and Mal boasts “My good BSC instincts were clicking in. I figured I’d let him pour the water. Get him involved in some fun aspect of castle-building. Distract him.”
But then! His mom swoops down from the other side of the park! And his mom is gasp! Margaret Wellfleet, in the sense where gasp!=obviously. She tells him that is not acceptable behavior and he howls that She! Is! Unseptable! She screams back that only bad boys talk like that, and “yanks” him away.
I’ve got to say, this seems pretty inconsistent with the woman who insisted letting a tantrum run its course was humiliating to the child, so I don’t know if she’s supposed to be wickedly hypocritical, or just a bad parent all around. Like, it would have made a lot more sense if she’d tried reasoning with him or something for awhile and THEN snapped, whereas now she just seems like an unhinged lady who gets a kick out of harassing middle-schoolers. Which maybe is the point, that anyone who doesn’t obviously and immediately worship the Revealed Gospel of K. Ron is totally horrible evil wrong, not just someone who thinks it’s not a crisis needing an intervention if a kid would rather read than be in a goddamn talent show. Mal is filled with delight at seeing Margaret Wellfleet’s kid having a tantrum, although she also claims she felt sooooo bad for him and is sure her superior BSC methods could have distracted and calmed him down. Colin escapes his mother’s hold and runs around shrieking “I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU! YOU’RE A BAD BAD MOMMY! THIS IS A STUPID PLAYGROUND!” Change "mommy" to "sitter," and "playground" to "town," and you may have every BSC snarker with you, kiddo.
A six-year-old comes up and tells Colin he’s being a baby, and Margaret Wellfleet yells at her. (On the other hand, having named her kids Isabelle and Colin is devastatingly hip for the Brook.) Mal thinks that it is “amazing” Margaret Wellfleet has two kids, because she thought she was just some lady who hung around the park spying and judging people. (The Ghost of Mallory Yet to Come.) Although really, why would she be hanging out at the playground midday without her kids? A six-year-old can run around on the playground without you, but in my experience, a three-year-old wants/needs you pretty close at hand, not leisurely reading.
Mal considers how best to snarkily one-up Margaret Wellfleet, but decides confronting her now would be too mean, but she feels “ten feet tall” when Margaret Wellfleet meets her eyes and recognizes her as the twerpy kid she tried to pwn last week.
Chapter 18
Mary Anne calls herself a “dunce” in the Journal of the Damned. Because she thought it would be “really interesting” to see the inside of a “typical” Hawaiian home. Grant me patience.
She practices saying “Good morning!” in Hawaii, but it is actually “Merry Christmas.” Oh, languages other than English! They are hilarious. Mr. Reynolds thanks Mary Anne for baby-sitting on her vacation, and she has the slightest bit of self-awareness when she stops from chirping she wants to meet a “typical Hawaiian family,” realizing it would be weird and icky if someone rolled down Burnt Hill Road to meet a “a typical suburban white family.”
Anyway, she’s been doing her guidebook schtick and tells us native Hawaiians are only eleven percent of the Oahu population and preens about how lucky she is to be able to observe such rare specimens. (Okay, she didn’t say specimens, but she meant it.) She muses “Reynolds” doesn’t sound Hawaiian and wonders if they changed it from something else, but is luckily too shy to ask. Mr. Reynolds, incidentally, is wearing a t-shirt with a huge map of Oahu on it, which I’m sure is what native Hawaiians living in Hawaii where every day. Just like I’m currently wearing a Cubs cap, a t-shirt with the CTA map, and earrings shaped like the head of Abe Lincoln. Likewise, Mrs. Reynolds is wearing a muumuu (italics in the original), and I actually have no idea how likely that would be for day to day wear for a youngish mom running errands or whatever-“muumuus” were what my nana called the homemade housedresses she wore.
Mary Anne looks around and is disappointed that the kids are eating Cheerios, wearing Disney and I <3 NY t-shirts, and cartoons are on in the background, because she gets enough of that shit in Stoneybrook and she came here for EXOTICA thank you very much. I’m busy thinking “Raymond Reynolds” is a mouthful of a baby name.
They give MA instructions and mention the kids’ grandfather might be home before they are, and show her a picture, because, idk, they don’t trust the kids to identify him? Really this is so we can understand that Gramps is white. MA kind of rudely asks in disbelief “that’s your dad?” and Mr. Reynolds laughs it off, claiming he gets that all the time. MA thinks, in that teenspeak argot Lerangis grooves on, that she feels like a heel. Mr. Reynolds shows off a wedding pic of his dad in his GI uniform and says they were married after the war.
The job goes by in, amazingly, a mere two sentences. Even more shockingly, MA plays video games with the older kids rather than forcing them to give a hula recital or something.
Mrs. Reynolds gushes about how amazing MA is and asks if she could sit again the next day, since Gramps decided to stay in LA. Lerangis continues to BLOW MY MIND by Mary Anne thinking one sitting job on vacation is enough, but while she’s fretting about how to say this, she notices some military medals on the wall by the pictures, and has a K.Ron meddling flash of how he probably has great stories about the war and hey! Claudia should come sit for them, because that would make her feel better. . .for some reason. Also, Claud is out of money, because these “business women” are crap at managing their money on these trips. So MA basically volunteers Claudia and they take her back to the hotel, where everyone is milling around in a tense circle while Mr. Kingbridge talks on the phone, because they’ve just gotten the word of Stacey’s helicopter crashing. Mary Anne cries, obviously.
Chapter 19
Claudia entry about how Stacey is still missing and the search parties were called off on account of night time. She struggles to spell that they are all awake in solidarity, as if being awake at eleven on vacation is otherwise unthinkable for middle schoolers.
They watch the pilot of the other helicopter being interviewed on the news, and see Robert looking like he was crying in the background. I have no idea why they haven’t swooped over to collect that set of kids, but that’s the first of many, many nonsensical things about this whole incident.
Abby mascots that Stacey probably found the only electrical outlet in the forest, and Claudia whistles in the dark they should listen for a hair dryer. Jessi proves to be a complete dumbass by saying Stacey could use her hair dryer to scare away the Death Marchers, some kind of nighttime wandering ghost that you die if you see them.
Seriously. Who the fuck would say that under those circumstances? Why would anyone think that was witty or appropriate? And you just know if anyone told the girls Stacey was in their prayers they’d probably consider that worse.
Abby at least mutters words to this effect, and then tries to boost the mood by cheerfully asking what everyone’s plans are for tomorrow after celebrating the big, sure to happen, rescue, but Claudia finds this even more stressful, so they all go to bed. MA asks if Claudia was going with Jessi’s group to a Japanese temple, but Claudia says she’s trying to avoid Japanese stuff. She’s brushing her teeth, so of course we get to have some “Awotoofay” talk. Anyway, MA coerces her into sitting for the Reynolds, claiming she’d get “a lot out of it,” and Claudia is amused MA is channeling Kristy in being a bossy control freak. But she agrees, because she thinks it will be easier to avoid stressing about Stacey if she’s busy wrangling three kids.
No news in the morning, and again Lerangis zips through the actual sitting job in a sentence. She puts the baby down for a nap and allows the older kids to play by themselves (what is this MADNESS) and then notices the medals and army uniform pics and a letter of commendation from President Truman, and freaks the fuck out, saying her own heart turned purple (um) and accusing Mary Anne of setting her up for SABATOGE. I mean, MA did set her up, but I’m not sure what Claudia thinks is going to happen. She seems to think Gramps Reynolds is going to come beat her up or at least yell at her for Pearl Harbor, not that she will feel awkward and uncomfortable. She actually considers wearing a bag over her head and telling him the kids forced her to. Yeah.
So Gramps arrives, and hugs the kids, and asks about the “young lady from Connecticut” and Claudia honest-to-God says “Thank goodness no guns were mounted on the walls.” Oh, come on. I’ve been pretty sympathetic to her feeling guilty and confused, but that’s just beyond and bizarre.
He introduces himself (and she honest-to-God checks for a weapon before shaking his hand) and the kids brag about him being a war hero, which seems kind of contrived for them to immediately announce (although I think he was at a reunion, so maybe it was on his mind? IDK, it’s not what I would have said at age five or eight introducing my papa.) He chuckles and says he lived through it, which is heroic enough, and offers Claudia a soda. While he goes to the kitchen, she tries to make sense of him seeing her standing there being Japanese and not shooting her, and she thinks his eyesight must be bad. Sigh.
He comes back and tries to make pleasant small talk about the sights she’s seen and if she wants to move there yet, and she says she hated visiting Pearl Harbor, and he looks puzzled. IDK, I mean her demeanor is probably all over the place, but I don’t quite get why people in this books seem to think Pearl Harbor is generally a laugh riot. I mean, don’t most people feel at least a little somber when they go to a memorial site? But anyway, Claudia confides that “All those bombs. All those wasted lives. On a Sunday morning, when no one expected it. I mean, how can anyone forget that, or forgive it? It - it just made me feel so ashamed. You know, to be Japanese,” and is a little stunned she actually said it out loud, to a “survivor of the disaster.” (Although he just said he was assigned for Pearl Harbor clean-up duty after the bomb.)
Gramps thinks for a moment, and then tells her about how his seventeenth-century Scottish great-grandfather burnt down another man’s house in a feud over money and was kicked out of town and died a penniless outlaw named Black-Hearted Duncan, but now he can go back to that town and hang out with the descendent of the other dude in the feud, because the story has passed into colorful local legend, or something. This is a pretty roundabout way of explaining to Claudia that she shouldn’t feel guilty about what her ancestors did, let alone a whole country, when she doesn’t even know what her grandparents thought about the war anyway-it’s too big a burden for her to take on, and no one has the right to impose it on her, which suddenly makes her think of the internment camps. And then he says the atomic bombs make Pearl Harbor look small, and they both think deep thoughts.
Gramps says one of the things he like about Hawaii is that it is pretty tolerant and a live-and-let-live culture, which is. . .let’s say complicated, especially coming from a white dude. He’s been pretty sweet to her, but this resolution is kind of limp, and has some weird implications below the surface about authority and white people (and authors) telling people of color to feel and I don’t even know, really. Mr. Reynolds Jr comes to return Claudia to the hotel, and tells her cryptically that they have just gotten some kind of news about Stacey, but he left before finding out what it was, because that makes sense. Lerangis is going to milk this fake tension all the way to end of the next chapter.
Chapter 20
Which begins with Dawn. Of course it does. Dawn writes obnoxiously and officiously that unlike everyone else, SHE can’t just wait around and SHE has a special project that might involve twisting a few arms.
She wants to go back to what Jessi deems “the garbage beach,” further calling Dawn weird, which is not enough to make up for how annoying and weird Jessi has been this whole book. Anyway, Dawn has gotten biodegradable garbage bags from Mrs. Reynolds, and basically harasses Abby and Jessi into joining her. Abby says “How. . .ecologically correct,” and Dawn snaps she hates that phrase. Is it a phrase? I don’t even. (I mean, I kind of hate the phrase “politically correct,” because in my experience 90% of the people who complain about political correctness mostly hate that there might be consequences for being rude, ignorant, or prejudiced, but I don’t even know if “ecologically correct” is a thing.) Mary Anne is crying too much to come. Well-played, MA. Logan is violating their stupid Together But Independent thing to comfort her. Yeah, that was a plot thread.
So they go to the beach, everyone except St. Dawn of Compost grumbles about how much there is, but when saintly Dawn picks up an old bike tire, lo, the children run out of the very waves to learn her ecological wisdom and join the trash detail. Mrs. Bernhardt makes everyone giggle when she finds a bathing suit by suggesting someone must have sashayed home naked. They also find “a chicken skeleton, a few clumps of dog hair, a Grateful Dead cassette, a steering wheel, a California Angels baseball cap, and a stethoscope (don’t ask me).” Jessi isa “trash magnet.” The kids (Danny, Pohaikealoha (Pohai, and I think Danny’s sister), Yukio, and Jeanette) squabble over who found the most litter and Pohai turns them into a team called the Anti-Litter Bugs, and Dawn deems her the K. Ron of the group.
For all the whining about HOW MUCH GARBAGE there was, it only takes them an hour to clean up all of it. Of course, in that hour Jessi filled three bags “right away,” so who even knows. Pohai wishes it could always be clean and Dawn puts her in charge of it, regally handing over the garbage bags and giving them orders for fundraisers to hold and stuff.
There’s an interesting picture-one girl, who I assume is Pohai, I’m 90% sure was drawn from a Kristy model. Abby has freakishly taut abs and no sign of sunburn. One of the boys is not only taller than Abby and Dawn, but has a bit of a belly on him, which wasn’t freaked out about in the text. Also, Abby appears to be holding a stuffed penguin wearing a ski hat.
They go back to the hotel as Dawn pontificates about how she believes we can all make a difference, and then snottily says “I hoped Pohai and her friends would stay committed,” because that’s a fair burden to put on kids who wouldn’t even be expected to wipe up their own milk in Stoneybrook.
Oh, and they found Stacey.
Chapter 21
Stacey dramatically writes that she has, in fact, survived, and is not a ghost possessing the journal or a zombie who can only eat sugarfree brains. She claims to be about to tell Mal the real, exclusive story, including how Robert almost died of a broken heart, at which point he writes “I wouldn’t go that far.” How charming.
Anyway, we’re back to shortly after the crash, failing to get the attention of a helicopter flying overhead. The pilot, Mr. Fredericks, says that they should walk away from the sun to the Kaupo Gap and eventually they’ll hit a town. Eventually meaning about 15 miles. Stacey complains about her lightweight “aerobic” shoes, although considering her general sartorial taste, she should be relieved they aren’t cowboy boots or jellies. She tells Mr. Fredericks about being diabetic and says she has emergency supplies for about a day, and he assures her that she’ll be back in a hotel by the next evening.
Inevitably, Stacey makes it about how she’s a New Yorker who never does anything more vigorous than wander through Central Park (because no one in New York walks anywhere except in the park), whereas the Brook kids are “part mountain goat” scampering and frolicking and having a delightful time. They stop for the night and she grumbles off to do her injection privately so as not to gross out “Pukey Pete.” The other girls brought juice boxes and gorp, neither of which I’d think would be great for brittle diabetic Stacey’s stability, but no mention of that is made, or what her emergency food is.
The next morning she’s already pretty out of it, and after they get picked up by a driver, passes out and wakes up in the hospital hooked up to an IV.
It’s all very romantic that Robert is the first thing she sees when she opens her eyes, and then it turns out everyone from both helicopters has been crowded into her room watching her, which is pretty creepy. Everyone, even the gym teacher and the pilots, thinks the mushy bedside scene is sooooo romantic, except Pete, proving he is once again one of the few people in the Brook who occasionally bumps into normal human behavior.
A brief time later Stacey is released from the hospital, which seems as good a time as any to stop and talk about some of this nonsense. First of all, I am not a lawyer (I just spend way too much time with them) and I really have trouble believing you could sign a general permission slip that would cover something like a helicopter excursion-let alone whatever kind of cheapass place it must be to be part of that $500 package. Like, I’m pretty sure an adult booking a helicopter trip would have to sign some waivers specific to that right then. Then, notice how no reference whatsoever has been made to calling the McGills? The allegedly super-overprotective McGills? Notice how apparently a parent is totally irrelevant to a thirteen-year-old being released from a hospital? (Yeah, they could almost certainly ADMIT her either as emergent or in loco parentis, but I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t just blithely release her like that.) You know, especially since she’s a super fragile brittle diabetic who could die from an M&M? (Of course, they were also fine with either knowing Abby was lying about her age, or thinking it was fine for her to be in the kind of shady production that wouldn’t care about getting parental consent to film a child.) Also, considering how the other pilot turned around and Mr. Fredericks kept right on truckin’, I really have trouble believing there’s not some major, major fucking liability for someone here. At least they’d better be paying for Stacey’s out of state, out of network ER visit. God, this is stupid.
Anyway, they all fly back to Honolulu, and “Snuggling against [Robert] in that plane, I felt comfortable and warm.” She apologizes for being a “pill,” he apologizes for ignoring her, Pete regrets being seated in proximity to this melodrama and PDA.
They get a minivan back to the hotel, and suddenly Jessi’s face appears in the window and she’s shrieking like a demon. Okay. She does some faux-whiny bit about the BSC not respecting how sore and blistered she is, but then says she doesn’t care. I’ve wrecked my feet with blisters many times and I’m not sure hugging was majorly affected, but whatever.
Another bizarre pic-Stacey is being lifted off the ground by Claudia and Abby, and making a face like she might be stoned on painkillers. Mary Anne is staring with disapproval and loathing at Stacey’s feet (which are still in her sneakers, which seems both uncomfortable but also hiding any grossness, so idk what MA’s deal is) and Dawn and especially Jessi are making exaggerated pouty faces. Not in a duckface way, just in a weird way.
Chapter 22
Jessi, because “obsessively document everything for poor, poor Mallory,” is what passes for plot in this book. Stacey’s back! With only a sunburned neck and blistered feet, because I guess Jessi isn’t interested in the whole dangerously low blood sugar part. But it’s totes awesome that Robert pushed her around in a wheelchair! Also, Stacey is amusing herself telling overblown accounts of the adventure, adding in stuff like smoke signals and mysterious footprints entering into a cave and a one-eyed hermit and a Lava Beast to other SMS students and random people who recognize her picture from the TV. Nothing ever comes of her increasingly ridiculous fibbing, and I have no idea why it’s there.
They spent the day at the Polynesian Cultural Center. Jessi compares it to a theme park, which rubs me the wrong way a little, but does kind of seem how it’s advertised. MA makes tree bark cloth, Dawn pounds poi, Jessi (of course) dances the hula in a grass skirt, because of course Jessi is so super special gifted her ballet naturally translates into hula, which isn’t a complex and ritualized language or anything. Remember how she became “practically fluent” after a week in Mexico? Also, she claims she did the hula in a Tahitian exhibit, although my admittedly brief Wikipedia diving suggests that although most Polynesian cultures have similar dances, the hula is specific to Hawaii; the Tahitian dance would be the ‘aparima or the o’tea, maybe. I wouldn’t have noticed it if she hadn’t specifically said she did the hula in the Tahitian exhibit. Alan Gray laughed at her and she wanted to strangle him. That seems like a proportionate reaction.
They go to a luau dinner, which Dawn threatens to “boycott.” It would be nice if that meant she would go quietly sit in the van, but instead she just eats from the vegetarian buffet and whines a lot. They see a revue that includes an exploding volcano, and all Jessi has to say is “cool.” Although I guess she’s already the leading expert on staged volcanoes. . .
All the sitters stay up until midnight “gabbing,” including not only Logan and Robert, for evidence of more stellar supervision by SMS staff who made them ride separately on the buses from the plane, but apparently are just fine with coed-hotel-room-hanging-out till all hours.
The next day, Jessi gets bitten at by a goose. I feel you, Goose.
Dawn tries to give Logan a surf lesson, and he keeps falling off, while Alan and Pete sing “Every-body’s gone suuuurfin’, over Logan’s head . . .” which isn’t exactly high satire, but is at least in the same zip code as a joke.
They eat shaved ice and Jessi makes a big deal about Dawn getting hers with azuki beans, like omg, why doesn’t she just get Brussell sprouts, even though azuki beans are 1) a very popular shave ice flavor, 2) used in a lot of Asian desserts and 3) most often prepared sweetened anyway, so I don’t know if Dawn is being a dumbass for thinking her shaved ice with beans has no sugar or syrup in it, or Jessi for being so melodramatic about how freethinking Dawn is being. Or both. Probably both.
Blah blah blah, banana plantation tour (which I’m sure was pretty sanitized, but still), air show, “A climb to the temple where the ancient Hawaiians made ritual human sacrifices to the gods (for some reason, we all looked at Alan Gray).” There’s that thoughtfulness and cultural sensitivity I expect.
Jessi has taken an entire thirteenth roll of film (haha, remember when you had to pay for all that?) and filled another half spiral notebook. And then she writes a weirdly whiny bit about how the trip should be starting now, not ending, because Stacey and Robert aren’t fighting, Claudia isn’t “brooding” (um) and Dawn could go find more trash to collect. It strikes me as icky yet again that there are never any conversations between Claudia and Jessi, or Abby, about race-related issues, because God forbid a conversation like that not be directed and mediated by and for white people.
Blah blah, “don’t worry, Mal,” Jessi is coming home, but a part of her will always be in Hawaii. Can I pick what part?
Chapter 23
Sweet, sweet home stretch. Logan, being a Classy Dude, opens his entry with saying he might as well write in this thing because you gotta fill up ten hours on an airplane somehow.
He goes on to say that she shouldn’t believe Dawn about him sucking at surfing, because. . .and I quote, “I was a real pound master.”
He claims this is surf slang; I don’t know, and I’m not looking beyond one page of Google-who knows what I would find there, Ken Doll. “Mary Anne thought it meant someone who took a real pounding. She says that definition fits better.” Uh-huh. Look, people, I don’t make this stuff up.
Blah blah, the stupid Together But Independent experiment, because they couldn’t, you know, just make a point of doing some things with their individual friends and some things together; they had to create some elaborate system where Logan felt like he was “breaking the rules” if he talked with her, and Kristy wasn’t there with the riding crop.
Apparently on this one flight the kids were actually planning to sit in their assigned seats instead of running around like baboons, and Logan trades his window seat to spare MA from having to sit next to Alan Gray the whole time. Before they board, Mr. Wong and Ms. Bernhardt come around with a big box of leis, so Logan gets leid after all. I’m not particularly allergic, but the idea of being on a plane for ten hours with everyone wearing wilting leis in the recirculated air makes me want to gag. Wouldn’t poor Abby be in hell?
They agree TBI sucks, and Logan vows to be a macho man and never again let his friends tell him how much time to spend with his girlfriend. Unless it’s Kristy. They agree to stick together and engage in obnoxious PDA on the next trip.
“I hear the social studies classes are visiting the Stoneybrook Dump in September.”
“Save me a seat,” Mary Anne said with a big grin.
In a couple that was generally cute and not creepy, I would actually find that exchange adorable. But since it’s Ken Doll the Controller and Mary Anne the Passive-Aggressive Mouse, meh. Ditto when Logan says the best part of the trip was falling asleep together on the bus on the way back to the Brook.
Picture of the fakest lei ever.
Epilogue! We made it!
Jessi’s dad had to carry from the bus to the car. I hope she remembers that next time she whines about how omg they treat her like such a baby. She claims her obsessive project was fun, but next time she wants a secretary.
Mary Anne reports Scott Reynolds actually wrote down the number on her stupid t-shirt and called BSC HQ, and wonders if they should send Kristy to sit on her family vacation. Because obviously the Brewer-Thomas bunch will stay in the same hotel.
Abby advises sunscreen, and not that Day-Nite crap-her skin is coming off in “chunks,” although certainly not in any of the illustrations. But maybe she can channel her gross appearance into a guest spot on the X-Files! Wow, that’s pretty much a time-appropriate reference. How’d Lerangis sneak that in?
Claudia had a nice talk with her parents, although the fact that she thinks its noteworthy they didn’t laugh at her is kind of messed-up. Her dad says it’s normal to have complicated feelings about WWII, and he has both a cousin who was injured fighting for the US and a close friend who was in an internment camp. Mrs. Kishi says all her life Mimi refused to talk about the war at all, and Claudia has a relatively thoughtful, grown-up insight about how some things you just never know.
Sweet, sweet Dawn packs an enormous amount of obnoxiousness in a single paragraph-that the trip was awesome because her CA friends will be jealous, that she will totally go again because it will be totally cheaper to travel from the West Coast, that the kids better be keeping “my little beach” clean, and that they should totally clean up Brenner Field, except oops! She’ll be gone before any work happens. It’s a pretty impressive amount of bullshit per capita.
Maureen cries when they see Stacey-Ed dragged his ass out of NYC, although there still doesn’t seem to have been an actual fucking phone call at any point. I would say it shows growth that Maureen and Ed didn’t have some epic fight about it being Maureen’s fault for letting Stacey go, and why if Ed is so goddamn important at work he can’t charter a company jet out to Hawaii or something, but I’m pretty sure that’s just bad writing.
Heh, heh, Stacey shows them her “blisters.” In a few years, that could be a different kind of family bonding experience. Also, she refrains from telling them all the melodramatic crap she made up, so I guess that only existed so she could “joke” her parents couldn’t handle fire-breathing monkeys.
Jessi writes an afterword, in which she says in addition to flaunting in excruciating detail how much fun they had without her, they’ll also probably rehash this endlessly while Mal sits there quietly excluded. BFF kiss kiss!
And because Mal has a sad, sad life, she is totes grateful for this, and only refrains from writing Thank You a billion times because Dawn would send her to Green School. Also, she wants to book Jessi for a baby-sitting job for the Wellfleets. REVENGE! Of course we will never see them again.
So that’s a wrap! I’m thinking tentatively of either Mallory’s Christmas Wish or Kristy and the Copycat, which I don’t think I’ve read as an adult, definitely not post-Slam Book. But any suggestions will be appreciated!
Also, I think I’ve got the knack of how to do pictures from the e-book, so I’m going to try to go pop them into the previous part now.