Table Of Contents: Part V (Snakes: Chapters 80 – 98)
(In this psychodrama, Goodsam and Badsam receive a mysterious package, colorful and dangerous, from their late mother, introducing an important character)
(Nana discusses Samantha’s shortcomings and wonders about Nicole’s
absence. With some resignation but not quite sadness, Samantha contemplates
Nana’s impending death)
(Samantha’s favorite English teacher shows a film depicting her peers grooving out at a local Love-in. She’s envious because she had wanted to attend, and Nana and Pappa wouldn’t allow it. She vows to behave until graduation)
(Samantha laments her upcoming graduation, admitting to feeling scared of the future. In her own voice, her art teacher addresses her, noting her disappointment in Samantha’s failure to apply to art school)
(After Samantha’s graduation from high school, her favorite
teacher gives her a gift, an important book. Although Samantha has been invited
to a “wild” party, she is unable to go because many of her relatives, including
Auntie, have showed up for a surprise party)
(As Samantha prepares to leave for L.A. and her new life, her
grandmother Nana reveals that RFK has been shot and is not expected to live.
Samantha realizes that life going forward will never be the same)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963, #1)
(Samantha is shocked at the news of President Kennedy’s shooting,
not yet knowing the condition of her hero. She’s feeling the last vestige of
“then”)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963, #2)
(After JFK’s death has been announced, the principal dismisses classes early. Samantha and P.J. Bert, a classmate, discuss the corn picking event scheduled for the next day. Under the circumstances, Samantha wishes to skip it)
(Samantha and her grandparents mourn together as they watch events unfold on TV)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963,#4)
(Samantha is shocked when her grandmother forces her, against her will, attend the dreaded field corn picking event)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963, #5)
(Samantha boards the C.A.P. bus and sits next to P.J. Bert. Some important characters, albeit minor ones, are introduced)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963, #6)
(Samantha and P.J. discuss how the world has changed in a blink. After P.J. tells Samantha about once wanting to become a priest, she admits to acting as an altar boy for her cousin. He warns her against posing as a boy)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963, #7) (***Possible Trigger Warning*** – Mild Sexual Content)
(Samantha and P.J. spy on Davey and Laura, two minor characters, as they “make out” in a boiler room. P.J. makes a pass at Samantha; they begin to engage in a “I show mine, you show yours” child’s game, but Samantha refuses to show hers)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963, #8)
(The immediate aftermath of President Kennedy’s assassination in poetic form)
Chapter 86 (Then: November 22, 1963, #9)
(After the boiler room incident, Samantha and P.J. Bert have very little to do with each other)
(Nana and Pappa take Samantha to the airport, where she leaves for her new life in California)
(Back at the 1991 reunion, Nana needles Samantha about going to Hell; Samantha lets it slip that she is actually thinking about going to France. She realizes that soon she is going to need to tell Sheldon about the Fulbright)
(Sheldon finds a photograph of Snake Bodine and asks Samantha about it. Samantha dodges the question, so he asks Nana, who remembers Bodine as someone who had attended Rosie’s [Samantha’s mother] funeral)
(On the airplane to L.A., Samantha dips into the Emily Dickinson collection and discovers “A Narrow Fellow in the Grass,” and it creeps her out, reminding her of a nightmare when she was four years old)
(Samantha remembers being sent to day-night care home and how scary it was for her. The last part takes her back in time, when the daycare owner punished her for wetting the bed. Samantha describes a nightmare about snakes and other slithery creatures. This chapter leads into the story “Snake”)
(At LAX, Samantha meets her family: Mother, Johnny Lawrence, and the two boys, her half-brothers. Samantha notices that something seems to be off about Johnny, Jr.)
(Samantha arrives at her Mother and Johnny’s house, where she discovers a messy house – typical kid chaos. Johnny helps move her into her new room, freshly painted. Samantha gets a glimpse of Johnny, Jr.’s strange behavior)
(Samantha’s mother Rosie says that Sam would be gorgeous if she lost just 20 pounds. Rosie suggests she might be able to cop diet pills from her friend Monique. Dubious, Samantha agrees to get them a try)
(Samantha begins taking the diet
pills provided by Monique Bodine, Rosie’s best friend. Samantha is climbing the
walls. Junior’s strange behavior continues to baffle her)
Chapter 92 (Snake #5) (***Trigger Warning*** Violence against a teenage girl)
(Samantha offers to help Darryl,
a painter Rosie has hired to paint a room. Sam is confused when he makes a pass
at her; when she rejects him, he kicks her in the ribs)
(On Hollywood Boulevard, Rocky
Paris, a sketchy-looking man, approaches Samantha with a proposition: “I can
make you a star”)
(Samantha meets Paulie Quest at
Grauman’s Chinese Theatre)
(Samantha goes on the strangest
date of her life with the suave artist Paulie Quest)
(Samantha takes her last diet
pill, courtesy of Monique Bodine, and discusses her draconian diet. She doesn’t
understand why her mother likes Monique so much, when the woman grosses her out)
(As the party gets into full swing, Samantha is uneasy, especially when she sees her mother kissing another man. Samantha meets Monique’s sons Tom and Rob; the three smoke some joints, Sam becoming very stoned)
(Samantha meets Snake Bodine, Tom and Rob’s father. They engage in some flirty back and forth)
(As Samantha sits with Snake at the picnic table, the scene becomes very sexually charged. Samantha’s mother interrupts and pulls her daughter away)
(Samantha’s mother lectures her
about why she should avoid Snake at all costs. Samantha lets her mother know,
in no uncertain terms, that she will make her own decisions. Samantha dives
into Monique’s swimming pool)
(Samantha and Snake sneak off to
an alcove, where they are interrupted by an interloper.)
(This chapter opens with Dan O’Flaherty
flattened out on the ground, bloodied. Samantha senses shifting alliances in
her family)
(Years later, Samantha feels the
loss of that thwarted encounter with Snake)
(An uneasy Samantha observes the
still angry Sheldon and Father Dan as they eye each other. She then sneaks off
to eat a Bing)
Chapter 98 (Lady Troddenhill #1)
(Samantha reveals how much she
loathes Lady Troddenhill, Sheldon’s treadmill. She sings her song/poem “Fat
Lady Phantasy in B-Minor.” Then she laments her experience with menopause and
weight)
Chapter 98 (Lady Troddenhill #2)
(Samantha, at 50, obsesses about
Death, citing a slender friend who has just died suddenly at 47. Her weight at
an all-time high, Sam imagines what her acquaintances may be thinking when they
run into her. She worries about having to be buried in a piano crate)
Chapter 98 (Lady Troddenhill #3)
(Samantha contrasts herself with Franz Kafka’s Hunger Artist, although she yearns for the extremely thin body as depicted in “A Hunger Artist”. This piece leads into Part VI: Time Warp)