ANNIE’S ABORTION

Natalie is not my favourite character on my favourite show, The Facts Of Life (that would be Jo, swoon) but she’s the one I relate to most. Like me, she’s chubby and wants to be a writer. When I’m a teenager like her, I want to be editor of my school paper, like she is. (The shitty suburban public high school I attend will not have a newspaper, only a semi-regular newsletter warning parents of nit outbreaks and drug rings.)

So, Natalie is a good girl, but this one time she does something bad: she invents a story about someone at her school having an abortion just so she can write an edgy story that will get lots of attention. Problem is, someone at her school actually did have an abortion and now that girl, Annie, thinks she’s been busted. Meanwhile the headmaster, Mr Parker, is threatening Natalie with expulsion if she doesn’t reveal her source. Should she reveal she made it all up (humiliating) or give up Annie’s secret (mean)? She decides on the first option and loses her job on the paper but this is fair enough, because she lied and there have to be consequences for that. There are no consequences for Annie, though, which seems outrageous to me.

But what really gets me is that the episode finishes with this line from smug Mr Parker: “I know this school and I know these girls,” he says. “Something like this could never happen here.”

Natalie’s sad, knowing expression creates a pocket of worry in my chest. I am a Christian and only associate with other Christians. If one of them had an abortion, her shame and grief would show all over her face. She would cry all the time and maybe even go a bit mad and start ranting. She might become a drug addict or worse! (I don’t know what is worse, but it’s something our youth leaders refer to a lot: becoming a drug addict or worse. I take them at their word.) Point is, I’d know.

Or in thinking I’d know, I’d be Mr Parker. Who is wrong.