🕑 Added 2015-02-05 02:05:27 +0000 UTC
Here's a scene that almost made the cut. There were two similar 'getting to know you' scenes between Lucia and Mindy, one in a cafeteria that led into Mindy watching Lucia cheer at a football game, the other one was this. At first I was going to cut the other one because this scene introduces Coach Bakula, a very important character, but faced with Sophie's Choice, I decided to introduce Bakula elsewhere in a shorter, sweeter scene. This one was a lot of fun, though, and I liked a lot of his lines and the subtext behind his teaching, but in the end, it's Mindy and Lucia about love, basically just after they've met, and I eventually came off feeling it was just too thematic, too on the nose, let's clip it. But I do still love the last line.
Coach Bakula was Mindy’s favorite teacher by a factor of a million and one, and he wasn’t even a teacher. He was the coach of Millarca High’s seven-time championship football team, but if that weren’t enough to make him small town royalty, he also volunteered to teach English class.
He was handsome in that ageless Hollywood way that seemed to be a constant from year thirty to year sixty, but without the Botox or plastic surgery, just a few wrinkles and some white in his hair and goatee. The business suit he wore everywhere was slightly undone, tie loosened and jacket hung up on the back of his chair. He put the finishing touches on some paperwork as Mindy took her seat.
She didn’t sit in the front row; she wasn’t some kind of freak. She sat in the second row.
Lucia zipped through the door just as the bell rang and Bakula fixed his tie once more. Mindy couldn’t recall Lucia ever passing her before, but the cheerleader did just that on the way to her seat, the hem of her short skirt brushing against Mindy’s desk. Mindy thought she could smell her as she passed; a taste of honeysuckle in the air. Then the legs of Lucia’s desk squeaked on the floor as she sat down.
Bakula eyed her. “If we’re all here.” The coach looked the class over. He never took roll: he knew when someone was missing. “Alright then. Last month, we covered romance in literature, and you will forgive me if we rushed a little. I find happy endings terribly dull. And besides—once you’ve covered The Philadelphia Story, what else is there to say? Enough of happy couples. No more healthy relationships. Let’s be interesting.”
Getting up, Bakula’s piano-player hands came to a bottle of pink vitamin water on the edge of his desk. He unscrewed the cap, languidly, raised the bottle, languidly, and had a drink. His exhale was long and satisfied. Only then did he replace the cap, set the bottle down, and stiffly join his hands together, holding the wrists of either arm. Mindy thought he might have some arthritis.
The students waited patiently throughout. Bakula commonly tested their restraint this way. His lesson plans were meticulously timed, and he doled out his lecture as he saw fit, not according to an arbitrary deadline before lunch.
Satisfied they were listening, he let himself press forward. “We’ll be covering toxic relationships this week.”
That was such a fucked-up thing to do before Valentine’s Day, how could Mindy not love it?
“Quite an interesting subject. The perversion of the natural love between spouse and spouse, friend and friend, sibling and sibling, even parent or child. Instead of bringing happiness or intimacy, it is characterized by danger, darkness, and poor decision-making. Now, does any of that sound familiar? Let me hear some examples.” He noticed a hand come up. “You, there, Mr. Matthews.”
“Frankenstein: Origins! The chick gets blown up at the end!” He exchanged a low-five with his neighbor.
Mindy heard Lucia laughing behind her, with some of the rest of the class.
“Thank you, Mr. Matthews, for bringing up an important distinction. A tragic ending does not make a toxic relationship. For a healthy relationship, the tragedy is that it ends. The tragedy of a toxic relationship is when it keeps going. Anyone else? Yes, Ms. West?”
Mindy turned to see Lucia with her hand up. She brought it down. “The Lannisters in Game of Thrones? Putting aside that they were sending out family photos way before the wedding, any relationship that has you dropping kids off buildings sounds pretty toxic to me.”
Bakula smiled coolly. “Ah, paying attention today, Ms. West? Thank you kindly. I suppose everyone’s phone dies once in a while.” He always sassed the kids who didn’t give a fuck. Usually Mindy liked it. “But perhaps something less obvious—that doesn’t involve incest, for starters?”
Mindy raised her hand. Bakula’s eyes flew to it, and his smile was warm and affectionate. Sometimes, Mindy thought she was his favorite student. “Well, I’m sure we’ve all been anxious to hear from you, Ms. Murphy.”
She put her hand down. “Romeo and Juliet.”
“Mmm.” Steel-gray eyebrows climbed his brow. “Interesting choice. Can you back it up?”
“Six people died because two teenagers had a crush. And one of them was thirteen.”
Lucia’s teeth clicked before she spoke. “That was normal back then.”
Mindy turned away from Bakula again. “Six people dying?”
“A girl getting married at thirteen.”
“Doesn’t mean Shakespeare liked it.”
“So the story would be totally different if she was Romeo’s age?”
“It would be different if she weren’t a teenager.”
“It would be different if he weren’t a teenager?”
Mindy ran her hands through her hair, looking to Bakula for support. He seemed amused. She whirled back to Lucia. “The whole point of the story is that they’re too young to be in love, or get married I mean, because it was probably just a crush and they should’ve listened to their parents—“
“And married people they barely knew?” Lucia interrupted. She clicked her fingers repeatedly.
“What’s his name, what’s his name? Paris! Boom, I’m smart!”
“Paris was a count, he could’ve provided for her—“
“He was even older than Romeo!”
“He didn’t kill her cousin.”
“And she didn’t love him!”
Mindy fell silent, not used to the fixed look in Lucia’s eyes. It was directed right at her.
“How can love be a bad thing?” Lucia finished.
“When it gets you killed.”
“They still ended up together. Everyone believed in heaven back then, right?”
Mindy adjusted her glasses. Sometimes she just breathed like a nerd. “Catholics would’ve believed that as suicides, they’d go to purgatory.”
“What’s that?” Lucia asked, offering up a goofily unknowing smile for the first time in their mini-debate.
Mindy smiled back, not sure why. “It’s a, uh—it’s this afterlife between heaven and hell where people who weren’t good or bad—“
“Lukewarm?” Lucia supplied.
“Yeah. Lukewarm people go there to pay off whatever sins they have left to make up for. It’s not a fun place. More like—hell’s suburbs.”
“Well, I know how bad the suburbs can be.” Lucia’s smile widened when she saw Mindy stifle a laugh. “But… how bad can that be if you’re with the one you love?”
Bakula interrupted the thoughtful silence by rapping on the chalkboard. “As much as I appreciate you girls engaging with the lesson plan, I can only wish you’d been so interested when we read Romeo & Juliet in class two weeks ago. Ms. West, as I recall, your Benvolio was quite monotone.”
“I get bored when my characters don’t get to stab anyone.” Lucia mock-smoked her pen.
Bakula sat back down at his desk. “Well, I think that’s enough discussion for now. Very good analysis, Ms. Murphy, and you as well, Ms. West. Time to digest now, I should think. Mr. MacReady, if you would get the lights? For the rest of the period, we’ll be watching Double Indemnity. Don’t get too excited, it’s cinema, you’ll hate it.”
