Pop Vultures

Brenda and Dylan are making out in his car by the beach. Brenda pulls back and when Dylan asks what’s wrong, she teenagerishly says everything. Dylan tells her it’s not the end of the world, her parents will get over it. Brenda tells him this has nothing to do with her parents, that’s just the icing on the cake. He says he understands, she had a bad scare, and he doesn’t blame her for being upset. She asks him if he knows how lucky she feels that she met someone like him, and Dylan tells her that he feels lucky too. Brenda smiles and says that when they first started going out, it was so exciting how they flirted and everyone looked at them…and then she fell in love with him. “And I fell in love with you,” says Dylan, and Brenda says that she trusted him enough to have sex when she’d said no before. Dylan asks her what she’s saying, and Brenda tearfully says she just feels like they’ve crossed an imaginary line, and it all feels too much right now, worrying about condoms and birth control pills and seeing a gynaecologist and getting pregnant and what her parents are thinking. He hugs her again and asks if it’s getting too scary, and she says things are happening too fast, and she thinks they need to stop seeing each other, at least for a while. Dylan tells her she’s overreacting, and she needs to stop worrying about what her parents think and figure out what she feels. Brenda says she knows what she’s feeling, but Dylan says she doesn’t – everything she told him so far only adds up to one thing: she’s afraid, and that’s not enough of a reason. Brenda insists that she does know what she’s feeling, and she needs to break up with him. Dylan pounds the steering wheel in a ferment of angst and woe, as Brenda says she’s sorry.

Next morning, Chez Walsh. Brenda marches into Jim and Cindy’s room and says she has an announcement to make: she and Dylan broke up last night. Cindy, upset, tells her she didn’t have to break up with Dylan, and Jim hides his glee, saying that’s not what they were saying. Brenda says she knows, it’s just that things have got more serious than she really wanted, and she guesses that at the moment she’s not ready for a sexual relationship. She walks out and Jim and Cindy exchange looks.

Kelly drives down the road on her mammoth cell phone and asks Brenda if she’s overreacting just a bit. At home, Brenda insists that it’s a lot of things. Kelly says she doesn’t understand, and Brenda tells her she doesn’t have to. She guesses she wanted to be her own person again, at least for a while. Kelly asks how Dylan took it. “Not so well,” says Brenda, and Kelly wisely says that guys never do, it doesn’t matter how cute they are. She asks what she should say to him if she sees him at the beach, and Brenda says to say nothing. She’s sure he hates her right now.

Beach Club. Wailing Guitars of Angst and Woe. Brandon stomps along through the sand to where Dylan is waxing his surfboard. Brandon says it’s incredible: he gets to hang out in the sun all summer long, and he makes more than he did at the Peach Pit. Dylan picks up his board and asks how Nat feels about him leaving, and Brandon says that was the only bummer: he didn’t take it so well. Dylan asks why not, and Brandon says he guesses because he didn’t give him any notice. “You Walshes have a way of dumping on people,” Dylan says coolly. Brandon asks what that’s supposed to mean, and Dylan says Nat’s Brandon’s friend, and he’s got to show him some respect. Brandon says he knows, but if he didn’t start today he would’ve lost this gig. “Big deal,” says Dylan. He tells Brandon that he’s been a member of the Beach Club all his life, and the place is not worth selling your soul for.

School. As Donna and Brenda walk into acting class, Donna asks Brenda what she’s going to do on Saturday nights now. David looks on from the other side of the class. Andrea enters, and Brenda says in surprise that she didn’t know Andrea was taking acting class. Saintly Andrea says that she thought she’d be spending most of the summer at this children’s shelter, but then she realised that she had her mornings free, so here she is – plus she had to spice up her resume, as colleges love diversity, and they like to know that you can have fun. Donna says that she needs to spice up her resume with a quick A, at which point a young man enters, apologising for his lateness. He is not entirely hideous to look at, with floppy dark hair and a kind of squashed but endearing face, and Donna admiringly asks who he is, as Andrea says she thought that Ms Kaputshnik was teaching this class. They all perv on the poor bloke as he launches into a monologue, explaining his family background, his acting ambitions, subsequent failure and entering the teaching profession, finishing by saying that they can call him Mr Suiter, and what he’s just delivered they can call a monologue, and who else would like to give it a try? The students talk and laugh among themselves as he tells them it’s easy, just their life story in one minute or less: “and thank you, dark-haired girl with the beautiful smile, for volunteering.” Brenda looks aghast and says no, as he pulls her to her feet and asks her name.

Beach Club. Over-long scene to summery music as Steve plays volleyball and ladies in bikinis oil themselves up and chat on giant phones. It looks like hell. Steve says to a fellow female player that if he nails this next point, he gets to take her out for lunch, and she foolishly agrees, but as he goes to serve Kelly calls his name and comes running up to him. Annoyed, Steve calls time out, and Kelly asks if he heard: Brenda broke up with Dylan last night. With a heavy clang of foreshadowing, she looks a little too happy to be imparting this news. Steve is shocked, and Kelly asks if he’s seen Dylan, is he OK? Steve tells her to come on: they’ve been going out for months, they were bound to go bust, and he’s sure Dylan’s ecstatic that she’s finally cut him loose. Kelly sarcastically tells him that he’s so romantic and stomps off.

Mr Thomas smiles at a television in his office and then firmly tells Brandon that if he wants to get on with him, he’s got to remember that between 11 and 12 the Young and the Restless is on, and there must be no interruptions. He gives Brandon his uniform and Brandon thanks him, but says that he doesn’t think he’s going to be able to wear it for about a week. Way to mess two employers about in a single week, Brandon! Mr Thomas testily asks if he’s expecting a growth spurt, and Brandon explains that he just can’t dump on his former employer like this, and he can’t understand why Mr Thomas would want someone like that working for him anyway, someone of such little integrity. Way to turn your own failings back on your employer! Brandon is a MASTER of blame deflection. He tells Mr Thomas that he promises to give the job his all if he will just allow him to give Nat the courtesy of a week’s notice. He adds that he’d never leave Mr Thomas without giving him some notice, and he’s got to do the right thing. Mr Thomas tells him he’d better be worth waiting for.

Acting class. Brenda monologues that she moved from Minnesota to Beverly Hills, which was definitely a shock that she finally got over because she met some incredible friends, including a great guy called Dylan who she fell totally in love with – but their relationship got too intense for both of them and they broke up last night. Andrea looks shocked and says she’s always the last to know. Mr Suiter asks how that makes her feel. “Kind of sad,” says Brenda, looking at him like he’s an idiot, which he clearly is. “What else?” he asks. “Kind of alone,” Brenda says, as if she’s talking to a crazy person, and he says terrific, what else? “Confused,” she offers, and he says that’s wonderful. Frustrated, Brenda asks why it’s wonderful, she feels miserable, and Mr Suiter says it’s wonderful because she’s feeling, and that is the most important part of acting. He tells the class to embrace all their feelings, no matter what they are, because they’re what make you 1) human, and 2) more importantly, a good actor. Bloody actors. Andrea raises her hand and asks if they’re going to be graded on this.

Peach Pit. Brandon walks in and Nat greets him in an impressively friendly manner, saying he wasn’t expecting to see him till he was much tanner. It enrages me that Nat is so quick to forgive, as if someone had some something like that to Brandon, you know he would have made them sweat it out for weeks on end. Brandon is sorry for bailing on Nat, and Nat nobly tells him he did what he had to do. Brandon says he was wrong. “Yeah,” says Nat, “but let’s let bygones be bygones, right?” “Wrong,” says Brandon. He explains that he told the guy at the Beach Club that he had to give Nat another week. Nat tells him to hang on: he found someone. Brandon looks surprised, and Nat tells him not to: “this joint ain’t that bad.” Brandon says it’s not that, he just didn’t want to leave Nat hanging, but Nat says he didn’t, and he appreciates it. They hug, and Nat tells him to have a good summer. And thus, Brandon comes out of his bad behaviour unscathed YET AGAIN, and gets to do what he wants without having to be answerable for his actions. Yay, show.

Acting class: Andrea is performing a monologue that is basically a recital of all her academic achievements as Mr Suiter grins and David yawns. The bell rings and everyone piles out into the hallway. Donna says that she’s terrified that tomorrow when she talks about her life she’ll be done in about two seconds. She wonders if she can make something up. At that moment Brenda spots Dylan walking down the hall towards her. She tells Donna and Andrea that she’ll see them later. Brenda and Dylan walk towards each other and say hi, leaning against a wall conveniently adorned with a poster of a baby with the tag line: “If only they came with instructions.” Oh, 90210, quit your tedious moralising and show us more bad behaviour and bikinis.

Dylan, putting on his best James Dean, tells Brenda that he’s feeling bad, and she says she is too. He asks why she’s doing this, and she tells him she needs some time. Dylan sighs and says that he thought that if they ever broke up he would feel this tremendous sense of relief that he could go back to being himself – charming! – but something happened: he fell in love with her and stopped being a loner. He sounds agonised. Brenda sadly says she thinks that’s wonderful, but he thinks it’s terrible. The only person he has in this world to depend on is himself, and he always has to remember that. Brenda tells him that’s not true, and just because she needs some time and a break doesn’t mean that she doesn’t love him or it’s not painful for her too. “Maybe that’s what they mean when they say love hurts,” Dylan says, in a line of such poignancy that it seared itself onto my adolescent brain. Brenda says she got so close it scared her, and she doesn’t want to be scared with him. Dylan says he knows, and time will tell if they’re meant to be together. He asks if he can take her home, and she says she thinks she should walk. “Goodbye, Dylan,” she says. To the sounds of a crooning guitar he walks away and she turns to the camera, her back to him, as he walks under a banner in the hall saying “We’ll miss you.” Just before he turns the corner, he turns back and looks at Brenda, but she doesn’t see. Dylan disappears, and Brenda wipes a tear from her eye. Aw. Aw! This storyline kills me.

Next week: Brandon gets the season’s first Girlfriend of the Week, and Brenda gets her knickers in a twist over Mr Suiter. Like we didn’t see that one coming.