Super Star: Enid’s Story

* Photo credit to The Closet *

DECEMBER 1990

Why must Enid Rollins’ face remind me that of woodland creature? I don’t like her hair pulled back – I demand the return of the fro!

It’s hundredth Christmas for the sixteen year olds at SVH, and Enid Rollins is in an awesome mood: she gets to see her dad for Christmas Eve and Todd Wilkins is going to Utah for the holidays so she gets her BFF Liz Wakefield alllll to herself. Can life possibly get better?

Well, yes, frankly; Enid’s home life actually sucks. She hates on her mom for pitting her against her dad, whom Enid defends even though he’s an alcoholic. Then she goes to meet her pops for Christmas Eve and he’s drunk in the hotel bar before noon. Noyce! And when she gets upsets, he’s like, “You should know that there’s nothing wrong with having a couple. Besides, I remember you used to do a little drinking yourself.” Ah, Daddy, you’re a peach. Then Enid goes home and is like, “Mom, this is all your fault!!!1” Girl, plz. Wake up and smell Grandpa’s cough medicine on Daddy’s bref.

But none of that matters, because “having Elizabeth Wakefield for a best friend made up for a whole lot of unhappiness.” Except for the fact Liz is a bitch: Enid goes to the annual high school skating party with her secret crush Jeffrey French, the boy Liz dumped for Todd, and Liz suddenly decides she’s in love with Jeffrey again because 1) Todd’s away and 2) Enid wants him. And Jeffrey obviously still pines for Liz, because who could ever get over the pain of losing a Wakefield? So Liz bakes cookies “just for [him]” and brings them over to his house like the sociopathic tease she pretends not to be, and for once Enid actually gets pissed at Liz and thinks all sorts of rational thoughts, such as “why Elizabeth would want to encourage Jeffrey when she claimed to love Todd.” DUHSVILLE.

Along comes Brian Saunders to distract Enid for the mess that is her life. He’s a good-looking guy (natch) from her druggie past who is sweet, completely charming, and actually romantically interested in Enid, thus he’s just the thing she needs to get over Jeffrey and her drunk dad. Even though he swears he’s a changed man who’s cleaned up his act, he takes them to a smoky, beer-soaked party where he gets wasted in two seconds flat. She’s pissed at him, but she’s even more pissed at Jeffrey for still being obsessed with Liz, so she goes with him to Miller’s Point, where…THEY TOTALLY GET BAKED! Yes, a main character swigs bourbon and tokes up on “the finest Columbian weed,” and it’s super awesome. They babble like jackasses and it’s basically the most realistic thing I’ve ever seen in an SVH book. Here, an excerpt as they try to remember the twelve days of Christmas:

He held the bottle aloft to a toast. “On the first day of Christmas, my toor love said to me—”
“Toor love?” Enic cut in, smiling. “That’s not right.”
“It’s true love,” Brian said in a serious voice, enunciating carefully. “True love. That’s very important in this life.”
Enid struggled to sit up straight and began to sing. “On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me, a partridge in a bear tree.”
“No!” Brian started laughing. “Wait a second. It’s not—”
“Bear tree.” Enid giggled. “Don’t you know what a bear tree is? It’s a tree with bears in it.”
“OK, OK,” Brian said. “On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me, two—two—what is it?”
Enid shrugged. “I don’t know. Oh! Turtle, I mean turldoves. Turtledoves.” …
“That’s wrong,” Brian said, a big smile on his face. “It’s turtledives. That’s like a cannonball.”

Dammit, now I want to be high with Brian Saunders. Thanks, SVH! But wait! Put down the drugs, you guys – there are consequences afoot!

Who should see them smoke-boxing the shit out of that car but Jessica Wakefield and her date, some guy she met an hour before and dragged up to Miller’s Point? (She’s so easy, man.) Jess gets giddy at the prospect of gossip so she makes her date go to George Warren and Robin Wilson’s Christmas party so she can announce to everyone that Enid’s obliterated – and then is shocked to discover that everyone’s actually pissed at her for leaving Enid there. Then she’s all contrite. Pff.

So Brian drives around drunk like everyone who imbibes in Sweet Valley does and ends up in a car wreck to no one’s surprise, because anyone who drinks or smokes must prepare for horrific repercussions! No one’s allowed to get stoned, eat a bag of Oreos, and safely fall asleep in front of “Family Guy” with cookie crumbs all over their chest in these books. But Enid’s worried father arrives on the scene just in time to drag Enid and Brian out of the car before it explodes. Pff some more. This is an event so momentous that Brian and Enid’s dad both agree to give up the sauce and go into rehab, and it makes Jeffrey French realize that he wants Enid, not Liz, after all.

But there’s so much gheyness around Jeffrey’s decision, because it’s, of course, dependant on Liz, who decides she’s not into Jeffrey after all when she gets a phone call from Todd and realizes that she’s in love with Todd. (How many times can you keep “realizing” you’re in love with the same person without taking that as a bad sign? Apparently, a lot.) And then Liz gives her permission for Jeffrey to date Enid. I hate Liz. Anyway, he wants to take the relationship slow, and so does Enid, and they smooch at midnight on New Year’s Eve, and then…we never hear of Enid and Jeffrey being romantic in any way ever again.

Other Notes:

• Ee! Bruce Patman arrogantly steps out of a parted crowd to kiss Jess under the mistletoe and it’s SO HAWT!
• So Jeffrey French goes to the hospital for a “laughter-filled hour” with his ex-girlfriend Liz, her twin sister Jess who was hitting on him throughout the book, and Lila Fowler, who also was hot for Jeffrey in the day, to see Enid, who wanted him then and now. Big pimpin’ up in here!
• Enid goes missing with a bad boy and where’s the first frakking place her parents go to look? KELLY’S! I’m shocked and surprised!
• Enid gives her dad a keychain with her face on it for Christmas. No wonder he drinks.