Sweet Valley Twins #69: Won't Someone Help Anna?
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This one was requested in the request thread. I was in the middle of recapping Sweet Valley Kids Super Snooper #2 (I only mention this because I love the phrase “Super Snooper,” as you shall see in that recap) when this one arrived in the mail. I immediately dropped everything because this one has secret deaf parents. Which is, of course, awesome. In order accomplish this, you must realize that means Sweet Valley Middle never ever conducts parent-teacher conferences or has a PTA. Nor do Cammi’s parents ever go near/speak to/interact with their neighbors. Oh, Sweet Valley, not only do the parents and teachers neglect their kids, they neglect everyone. Way to go!
I love the cover. Don't you? There's Anna looking sad, wondering if someone will help her. And there's Cammi at the left thinking, “Maybe I will, maybe I won't, you deaf bitch.”
Jessica is in the principal’s office (she has to be excused for a dentist appointment. A likely story!). The principal, Mr. Clark, is yelling at some poor girl. His secretary explains that the girl is new—and she is deaf. So he’s yelling? That’s like saying, “The new girl is blind so we’re going to have a light show for her.” The new girl’s name is Anna Reynolds, and she’s not heroically deaf apparently. She’s just regular fucking deaf.
Liz appears (she’s different from Jessica! Did you know?). Outside the principal’s office, they are met by Cammi Adams, who works with Liz on the Sixers so she’s a nerd. Liz wants Cammi to do a profile on the new girl. Cammi is freaked out there is going to be a deaf girl at their school. The twins wonder if she thinks she might catch the deaf.
After school, Jessica complains that she’s in “excruciating” pain because of her dentist appointment (a likely story!). Steven and his girlfriend, Cathy Connors, are planning a beach party for that weekend. Jessica is jealous. High school is so exciting—there’s always parties. I’d laugh at her, but this is Sweet Valley. Truer words were never spoken. Cathy is apparently very nice, because she invites the twins and their friends to come along. Jessica is psyched. Steven is not.
The next day, Mr. Bowman is teaching the class spelling when there is a knock at the classroom door. Mr. Clark enters and introduces Anna to the class. Jessica is surprised. Anna is beautiful--she’s Asian and stylish. She doesn’t look deaf. (What do deaf people look like? Like those monkeys that cover their ears in see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil?) If she weren’t deaf, Anna might’ve been a Unicorn. This is why she’s regular fucking deaf. Regina would’ve been made a Unicorn in an instant.
Anna says hello to everyone. Jessica is surprised she can speak. Oh boy. Liz and her nerd friends invite Anna to sit with them at lunch. Anna talks and is friendly. Except sometimes the girls forget to look at her when they speak, so she can’t read their lips and thus doesn’t follow the conversation. Then Anna shows them some sign language (ASL) and the girls react dorkily. The sign for a monkey looks like a monkey! Imagine!
Cammi watches the proceedings with distaste. She thinks the girls are only being nice to Anna because she’s new, but once the novelty of her presence wears off, they’ll get sick of her impairments. She walks home grouchily and is met at the door by her dog, Ludwig (I wonder where that name came from?! So subtle). She talks to her sister, Cara, about a secret she’s keeping. None of Cammi’s friends know her parents are deaf. Cara, who must be more mature than Cammi even though she’s younger, is like, “Whatever, all my friends know.”
We get some “comic” relief about the twins, Steven and Cathy preparing for their party. Steven starts a fire. Ned comes home and is unconcerned. Whatever kids, try not to burn the house down. Ho-hum.
Liz is in the living room with the TV sound turned off. She’s trying to read lips. Surprise! It’s hard. Wow, Liz has no life. Jessica tells her that they were talking in the Unicorner today and she thinks only “normal” people should be allowed to go to Sweet Valley Middle. Fuck you, Disabilities Act. Clearly Jessica Wakefield knows better. Liz strong arms Jess into meeting Anna at Casey’s the next day to prove Anna isn’t weird.
Jessica, of course, makes fellow Unicorns Lila and Ellen come with her. They can’t go anywhere alone. Anna impresses them by knowing who the Unicorns are and that Janet is the president, etc. She is the only one of the girls eating healthy food (why do they even have healthy food at an ice cream parlor?) instead of huge sundaes. Anna explains that she wants to be an aerobics instructor when she grows up (very lofty goal, Anna) and she’s getting a jump on it. Jessica asks how she can do aerobics when she can’t hear music. Anna explains she can hear the beat through the floor, and suggests they start an aerobics club at Sweet Valley Middle. An aerobics club? In sixth grade I would’ve never done aerobics. I guess they start their eating disorders early in Sweet Valley .
Cammi is hiding from Liz. But that Liz has a nose like a bloodhound because she finds her in the girl's bathroom. Liz invites Cammi to the party on Friday. Cammi can't go, because her parents are having their driveway fixed (how'd they break it? That's what I want to know.) and she has to be there to communicate with the workmen—since her parents have trouble with that. She lies and says she has to babysit her sister; Liz implores her to come anyway (yeah! Ditch that sister! Let her fend for herself!).
At the party, Jessica is bummed Rick Hunter (what happened to Aaron Dallas?) hasn't asked her to dance. He has called her names though. Cathy says that means he likes her. Wow, I must have one hell of a crush on Jessica if that's the case. Cathy urges Jessica to ask Rick to dance. She does. How modern.
While everyone else is dancing, Cammi is at home playing board games with her secret deaf parents. The TDD goes off. There's no purpose to this except to let us know it's there. The secret deaf parents have weird devices in their house, like an alarm clock that shakes their bed instead of beeping. Finally, Cammi gets up the nerve to call Anna's house about the interview. But Anna is out dancing at the party. The secret deaf parents ask why Cammi didn't go, and are upset to learn it was on their behalf. They don't want Cammi to miss out.
Back at the party, Jessica recounts everything she's eaten to Lila and says she's going to explode. (I know what she means. I feel like such a heffer. I had two bowls of special K, three pieces of turkey bacon, a handful of popcorn, five peanut butter M&M's, and like, three pieces of licorice.) Lila sensibly suggest she try not to explode, or she'll ruin her new shirt. Lila is full of good advice. Jessica decides to get some exercise by going for a walk. And you though I was joking about the eating disorders starting young!
But her walk goes terribly awry! That'll teach her to exercise! She spots Cathy kissing a guy! Jessica thinks it is Jake. Cathy's cheating on Steven—with a 7th grader. Ouch. Jess immediately runs to find Liz. Hilariously, after Jess tells Liz she saw Cathy kissing Jake, Liz asks what that means. I think it means they were kissing, Liz, try to keep up. Jessica wants to tell Steven so he can dump Cathy, but Liz won't allow it because she likes to be the boss of everyone.
The next day, Cammi goes over to Anna's house to interview her for the Sixers. She is surprised that Anna isn't ashamed to watch TV with closed captioning, and proudly points out her own TDD. She wishes everyone had one. Ah, the days before the intarwebs. Anna also tells her about a boy she met at the Wakefield's party. Everything seems to be going great for Anna, except Cammi notices a quiz on her desk with an F letter grade. Cammi thought the quiz was easy.
At school, the Unicorns can tell something is up with Jessica. They make her spill her secret. She tells them she saw Jake kissing an older girl, but swears them to secrecy since Steven doesn't know.
Cammi turns in her article to Liz. But Liz thinks it's crappy, which means it really must be bad. Cammi says she's too busy to do it again, and Liz wonders what is up with her. (Secret deaf parents, perhaps?) After the Sixers meeting, Amy and Liz go to Anna's aerobics class. They see Mr. Clark speaking sternly to her out front, but Anna brushes it off as nothing. The girls sweat to the oldies.
Afterwards, the boy's basketball team uses the gym. Jake, Rick and friends talk about him kissing a high school girl at the party. Apparently the rumor is all over school. Jessica demands to know which of the Unicorns blabbed. It turns out they all did—except Mandy, who says she tried to tell but couldn't find anyone who didn't already know. I love Mandy.
Jessica has a little talk with Jake, asking him how serious he is about Cathy. He tells her he honestly doesn't know what she's talking about.
Elizabeth goes to Cammi's house to see what's up with her. Of course she sees their weird phone and wonders what it is. Cammi lies and says her dad is an inventor (or Batman). Cammi tries a wide variety of excuses (her sister has the chickenpox, her mother will be mad if she finds Liz there) but none of them deter St. Elizabeth, Our Lady of Not Taking Hints. Eventually, Cammi's mom shows up and invites Liz to dinner.
Cammi is shocked to discover that Liz actually likes her parents. She tells Liz her sob story about how once when she was little there was a Parents' Night and everyone gawked at them. Then her father spoke and all the kids laughed. That's it? Wow, what a boring story. They could've at least gone to Switzerland or been kidnapped or something.
A Casa de Wakefield, Jessica is going through the yearbook trying to pick out Cathy's replacement. She likes a girl named Nicole Martin. I wonder if she's any relation to Tricia, or her look-a-likes.
Amy and Liz discuss a quiz at school the next day in the girl's room. It was easy. They hear sobs coming from a stall. It's Anna. She's failed another quiz. Anna explains the problem: she can read the teacher's lips fine, but then they turn and write things on the blackboard and she can't see their lips. I don't know why she doesn't just stand up and say, “Turn around, jackass, I'm fucking deaf over here!” Anna thinks it's her fault for ever thinking she could attend a regular school. Mr. Clark is reconsidering the decision to allow her to attend Sweet Valley Middle. Oh, poor regular deaf Anna.
Steven wants to know what the hell is up with Jessica. Don't we all.
On Saturday, Jessica is dismayed to find out that Anna might be kicked out of school. “What about our aerobics class?” she opines. Yes, that is on the top of my list of concerns too. Won't someone please think of the aerobics classes?
On Monday, Mr. Bowman is writing grammar lessons on the board. Cammi hears a noise, and turns to see that Anna is crying. She realizes she can't read his lips when he's turned around like that. Seriously, this is when someone should stand up and say, “Turn around, jackass, she's fucking deaf over here!” But no. Also, someone could write down what Mr. Bowman was saying for her and hand it to her. Or repeat what he was saying, so she could lip read. Also, no. It seems Anna's only hope is Cammi Adams, who can sign since her parents are secretly deaf.
At her locker, Cammi overhears Ellen and Caroline discussing how Anna is going to get kicked out of school. She feels badly for not doing something in English class.
Jessica and Lila tell Steven about the supposed Cathy and Jake kissing. Steven apparently loses his shit, and vows to beat the crap out of Jake.
Cammi arrives home to find her sister playing with a new friend, Joan. Cara had talked Cammi up to Joan saying wonderful things about her. Cammi jokes that Cara probably told her she was the most popular girl in school. Joan tells Cammi it's more important to be brave than popular. Don't you love it when random children show up and give you life advice? Happens to me all the time. I'm beating the little buggers off with a stick.
Also, because the ghostwriters are incapable of being subtle, Cara explains to Joan that they're trying to teach Ludwig to bark. See, he's a special dog trained to help the secret deaf parents. He responds to sign language commands. But he doesn't bark. He's a secretly mute dog. Cammi says they can't teach an old dog new tricks. Ludwig will never be like other dogs—just like Anna can't be like other girls, see? Except just then Ludwig lets out a “mighty bark.” A regular bark wouldn't have done the trick.
In English class, Mr. Bowman is teaching them about adverbs. Once again, he turns his back to the class. Once again, everyone fails to remind him there's a fucking deaf girl in the class. Just then, Mr. Clark arrives to see how Anna is progressing. You'd think he'd tell Mr. Bowman to turn around. But, no. Mr. Bowman asks Anna a question, but she doesn't know what he's talking about because she can't hear him.
Anna's eyes start to fill with tears. Cammi sighs. She thinks to herself that she has to be brave, like the random child told her to be. So she turns to Anna, and signs.
After class everyone is impressed with Cammi and Anna. Cammi explains that she has no-longer secretly deaf parents. No one mocks her. They all want to learn how to sign so they communicate in class without getting in trouble. Cammi and Anna decide that they are friends and show this by signing “friend” to each other. Then they explain what they've done to everyone else. Liz “clumsily” signs friend as well.
Now I'll tell you a story. When I was in 2nd grade, our teacher, Donna, taught us sign language. It culminated with us signing a song at an assembly and signing along with the words. Anyway, so even as a child when I read this, I knew what the sign for friend was. And I wondering to myself, “How the hell did she do it clumsily?” It's really not a hard sign. But that's our Liz for you, she finds new and exciting ways to fuck things up.
Steven and Jake get into a big fight. Cathy tells Jessica Jake has a black belt and Steven might die. Jessica flips out. She bribes them to stop. Only afterwards, do they tell her that the three of them were pulling a prank on her. It was Steven that Cathy was kissing at the party. (How does Jessica not recognize her own brother? That makes no sense at all.) The “fight” was just a fun way to mess with her head. What a weird B plot.
Cammi throws a birthday party for Anna. I didn't know her birthday was coming up, but I guess it wouldn't be a Sweet Valley book without at least two parties. Francince probably read the draft of this, threw all the papers to the ground and shouted, "THERE MUST BE ANOTHER PARTY, DAMNIT! NOW SOMEONE GET ME A DRINK!" At the party, Anna surprises Cammi by giving her a present. It's a necklace with the sign for friend on it.
Then with half a page left, the ghostwriter realizes “Oh crap! I gotta advertise the next book” and there's a shoehorned lead up to Psychic Sisters. Apparently Jessica can tell when Liz thinks she's insane. That's easy. She's always insane.
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