Big Mouth Ugly Girl

Big Mouth Ugly Girl plagiarism

Big Mouth Ugly Girl by Joyce Carol Oates

"Dear Ursula,

I saw you in school yesterday. Not seeing me. Or if you did you looked right through me. (Maybe I'm a ghost?)
Ok- I understand. (I guess) Big Mouth Donaghy isn't cool and Ursula Riggs is one of Rocky Rover's coolest individuals.
(I'm not going to harrass you like some nut, I promise. This is the final time I will write.)
(It's just...I'm so lonely.)
I think people wanted me- or somebody- to be the psychoterrorist. When it didn't turn out they were--are-- dissapointed.
Ursula who were the "witnesses" who reported me? Do you know? I keep asking myself: Did they hate me so much? Did they really really HATE ME SO MUCH? Or-- did they think they were reporting the truth?
Ursula Riggs is cool because: 1) You don't give a damn for them. Their false eyes and smiling mask faces. 2) You are YOU. Everybody respects that.
I never used to be lonely at home, but now I hate them talking to me. They act like I'm sick. They want me to see a shrink. (Sure! "For the record.") Maybe I can get a prescription for Prozac, like mom. She says it "helps her cope."
My dad is away a lot and when he's home he is tired and distracted. He blames me (I know) for jeopardizing the name DONAGHY. I know that dad and mom are ashamed of me though they're careful not to say it to my face.
It's true. Except for Big Mouth non of this trouble would have happened.
My heart is a stone and I like the feeling. I guess they think I'm "depressed". I'm not, I am only now seeing the TRUTH.
I wish you could be my friend Ursula. The girls I used to know I don't trust now. You're different- you're not a "girl" like them.
Even your name- URSULA. It's special.
(Ok, I'm through. I promise I won't write again.)
Your Friend, Matt Donaghy

It was two forty seven am. Matt was hunched over his computer, sweaty and anxious. He'd wasted hours clicking around on the internet looking for people worse off than himself , and now this crazy dorky letter to Ursula Riggs- this was the weirdest behavior yet.
Matt reread his email to Ursula and decided not to click SEND but DELETE.
Are you sure? Y/N
Y. Matt was sure.
If the guys had known, they'd have approved.


mine

Dear Ursula,
Thanks for writing me back. I haven't been feeling too well lately. (maybe I am diseased?) Everyone is treating me like I AM A DISEASE.
Except you. You are the only one who writes me back. Did you know none of my so called "friends" even write me back anymore? I feel all alone except for you. You are special. You know me like my friends never will. Even my family-- they are all willing to believe the worst about me from some strangers. You don't even know me yet-- you know me, you know?
It's funny to think people don't trust me now when I'm the one who does not trust THEM.
My parents are always talking about me when they think I can't hear (or maybe they know I can). They say I am DIFFERENT, whatever that means.
You are DIFFERENT but no one would dare say that to you as a negative thing. That's why you are the coolest girl in school- you are a not a "girl" like them.
Well I am not a "boy" anymore-- my mom says, but she doesn't think I am a man. (I know. I can tell) I don't know what that makes me. (I know I am not a woman.) An alien maybe?
I think if there were aliens on Earth you would be the one who knew how to talk to them. I guess that's why I am talking to you and no one else.
Well I guess I'm through rambling for now. (I'm not but I don't want you to get too bored.)
Your friend Matt Donaghy


Dear Matt:
U r is the alien whisperer :0
Don't be so crazy.

Miracles

We started in a truck. Nolan and me were both born in the same truck going to the same hospital on the exact same day four years apart. I think that if we would’ve had the same dad God would have made us twins. But since we didn’t I am lots older and Nolan is lots smaller.
He’s sleeping on the bed. I like on the floor and watch him. He looks happy when he’s sleeping. I like to pretend he’s normal.
He’s so small though, I’m scared. He’s getting smaller and smaller and he was already small because he’s only nine. Pretty soon he’ll be so small I wont be able to see him without a microscope.
Maybe it’ll stop. I close my eyes really tight and imagine Nolan really big, he’s a huge basketball player. I hope really bad that he will get well. I say a prayer before bed.
Dear God please bring a miracle and save Noley.
The moon comes in the room suddenly through a crack in the blinds and shines on his face. I feel very better. In my dreams he stands up again and he’s taller than me. Maybe he’ll be an astronaut and I’ll look at him through a telescope instead.
Nolan wakes up when the sun wakes up and he cries. He wakes me from sleep. He is all my dreams awake.
“Noley,” I sit up, “it’s ok.” I think he hurts bad sometimes.
I hug him hard. “I’m never going to let go.” If I never let go he could never leave me. I think I can feel him getting smaller the longer I hug him. I hope the miracle works soon but then again it’s never too late when it’s a miracle.
“Let’s go play,” I put him in the wheelchair and wheel him around. I wheel him everywhere because he can’t use his arms anymore.
Today we go to the store, the beach and the park. He likes to see and hear everything. I like to see and hear him.
When I put him to bed at night he clings around my neck and tries to hug me. He can only half do it. I hug him back twice as hard to make up.
His voice trembles when he talks. It’s something that started a little while ago and keeps getting worse. He buries his face into my shoulder and I hold him like I will never let go.
“I don’t want to leave,” he cries.
“I’ll never leave you,” I say,” I’ll stay with you forever.”
“I know. I’ll leave you.”
Sometimes he wakes up in the night and finds my hand wherever it is. He squeezes so tight he feels strong to me. I know he will always find me.

The next day is Monday. Monday is a no fun day because Nolan doesn’t like going to school. He’s in fourth grade. I’m in eighth. I ride the little bus to school with him every morning. It is the bus that only picks up disabled kids.
Nolan used to like school before he lived in the wheelchair. I think it used to make him feel normal. Nolan wants to be normal almost as much as he wants to live. But now he screams every time mom tries to get him to school.
“I don’t need school,” he says, “I’m going to die.” Mom doesn’t know how to deal with him.
I however know how to work him. “Everyone’s going to die.” I kneel down where I am eye level with him in his wheelchair and can look into his clear brown eyes. They are so perfect yet all wrong.
“You wouldn’t want to die stupid would you?” I ask. Which is impossible, he is already not stupid. “You have to learn as much as you can before you die because that is the only knowledge you can use in Heaven.”
“Really?”
“That’s why we’re alive.”
“Well I don’t believe you,” he says. “You’re lying. You’re just trying to get me to school and I don’t wanna go.”
O f course I am lying. I don’t care anything about school. I only care about him.
“Well then do it for me.”
He would do anything for me. I know he would. I would do anything for him and I do everything I can. That’s why he loves me. Mom doesn’t understand this.
“You’re a miracle Darcy,” she says when I help my brother on the bus.
I believe in miracles but I am not one. I cannot even save my brother. She is wrong.

In summer I stay with Nolan all the time. He is smaller now. When he was weak I stay with him in his room. I lay a cot by the bed and close my eyes and see prettier pictures. I never want to leave.
Nolan wants to leave. He talks about the pictures behind his eyes.
“I drive that truck all across the world and swim over the water. I deliver things. Food to starving people and medicine to sick people and toys to poor kids. I make everyone happy.”

When Nolan has trouble breathing he just gasps and coughs. But now he is too weak to cough, he suffocates.
“Mom!” I yell, “mom!”
Mom calls the paramedics. Nolan’s respiratory muscles are failing.
Nolan is very white and when mom is off the phone he is passed out.
When the ambulance arrives paramedics put him on a stretcher and take him away in the ambulance car.
“I want to go with him,” I say as the ambulance siren blares away. A little late now I realize. I feel so bad.
“We’re going right now,” my mother says. She is putting on her coat.
“Go get your shoes.”
“But I told him I’d never leave him,” I whine.
“Darcy, he’s unconscious,
Let’s just pray this isn’t the end.”
Dear God please save my brother.

It is not the end, not the very end.
They have Nolan hooked up to machines in the patient ward. Machines that help him breathe, machines that monitor the machines that breathe and machines that monitor the machines that monitor the machines that breathe.
Nolan is conscious now. He says it doesn’t hurt. But now it’s hard for him to talk and he stumbles over words and even sounds kind of, well, drunk.
Not that I would know.
Grandma’s come to visit, both of them and grandpa too. Then there’s my father’s brother and this really annoying cousin of mine named Becca whom I’ve never met.
“Go take Becca to meet Nolan,” my mother instructs me.
When we go down the hall she looks so bored and so totally uninterested and I want to make her cry.
“Hey Nolan,” I say when we enter his room, “this is our cousin Becca. Can you say hi?”
He tries for me. “H-h-hhi b-b-be-cc-ca.”
She bursts into tears and has to leave. It is just what I wanted. Except then he makes me cry too when he tries to say hi to me.

I read to him. I sing to him sometimes to help him fall asleep. He dreams of trucks and oceans and saving the world. I still dream of him.
He is so scared of death I think. He is scared of being by himself. He is so weak and when I hold him, so small. I try to comfort him but I know nothing of what’s coming for him and I know nothing of what is coming for me either. I am so scared of being by myself.
It astonishes me how little I know and I’m so powerless. My brother has more power than me and he is so weak. He has power though, like to change things. He changes me. And I cannot even change myself.

Still when we close our eyes we are anywhere in the world. When Nolan closes his eyes we are anything in the world. We close our eyes sometimes so hard it hurts. And maybe it is a miracle, that we can close our eyes and make everything okay.
“Do you see what I see Nolan? I see you. I see you and me forever. There is nothing in the world I love more than you. You are all my hopes, all my dreams, all my prayers and every miracle.” I love nothing else in the world.

Christmas music

It's the worst time of the year! to work in retail...

And I don't mean that because of the extra stress of customers that would trample over your dead body if you were lying in front of a flat screen, I mean that solely because of the Christmas music. 
I'm not like the grinch, I have this one Christmas CD I like- it's a choir of actual good singers and it sounds actually good but the songs they play at work...
Well let's just say that when I get to walk through the Young Men's and Junior's department and they are playing Justin Beiber and Nickleback (non Christmas songs! oh God, don't even want to imagine, there just did, @#$%) I actually breathe a sigh of relief... I know. That was hard to admit. But they are really that bad!
A bad Christmas song can happen to anyone. I heard one at work I could have sworn was U2, and a version of 'I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus' that sounded remarkably like Bif Naked. Bono- I have lost all respect for you.
You have to be an amazing singer to pull off the classic Christmas songs- that's just the kind of songs they are. And the not so classic ones? Well even an amazing singer shouldn't touch those lyrics with a ten foot pole.
Example- Santa Baby
Someone is actually flirting with Santa. I think she's actually trying to prostitute herself out for a yacht- and really that's not a lot! clever. I could be oh so good if you would just cross off my Christmas list! How is this work appropriate? And an even better question- why is there a version of a guy singing Santa Baby?  And just when you thought it couldn't get any worse...

Last Christmas I hated this song but the very next year Petsmart AND Macy's played it every hour anyway, next year to save me from tears I hope I don't work in retail...

and then,

In the meadow we can build a snowman and pretend that he's a circus clown...
I wish that I had made that one up, but no, that is the actual lyric. I assume because it rhymes with town although I can't tell you how many times I've built a snowman and thought wouldn't it be cool if I pretended this hunk of snow was a circus clown. Errr, okaaay

Now I'm going to go find refuge in the teen clothing section and they're at minute 77 of their endless two hour loop.
Tonight let's get some and live like we're young!
Ahhh! Is it bad that all I can think of is Santa Baby?
Sigh, good music is just not work appropriate I guess.
 

Bufflight

While we're on the topic here is my Buffy meets Twilight screenplay!

Stephanie Meyer is riding around on her bike, with witch’s hat
Stephanie: Hi, I’m Stephanie Meyer.
she sees Bella walking like a normal girl, laughing, singing lalala,
Stephanie: Kapoof, (she snaps her fingers, points magic wand at Bella)
Bella falls over.
Edward runs over to help her up and almost bites her neck before he can Stephanie points her wand at him, poof. His fangs fall out and he is covered in glitter.
Stephanie goes home and writes
Stephanie: “Dear Diary, today I performed a lot of spells on people, and vampires, It was fun. I’d like to write a story about them.” She scribbles furiously
later, “What do you think I should call it? What?” Bends down, puts ear to diary, “Oh, good idea.”

Holds up sign, Twilight

Stephanie goes around house to house ringing doorbells holding her book, they all slam shut.
Stephanie: I need a new spell.
Later, in woods, churning cauldron,
Stephanie:“Double, Bubble, doily trouble, Everyone in America will wake up tomorrow and think that Twilight is the best book ever written!” 
Boom Crash, Thunder.

Scene
Bella is trying to run away from mob, “ohmygod, it’s Bella, ohmygod, Twilight!”
She trips every other step. 
Bella: Oh, I hate being famous,”
She runs, trips, gets up, runs past sign that says ‘Sunnydale- former home of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, RIP’. Bella runs in.
Edward and his hot sister follow her. They can be seen lurking in the trees.

Xander runs into Edward's sister later.
Xander: Whoa!
 Xander almost runs into her, stops, jumps.
 “You look hot in town, I mean, new in town!”
Edward is watching him mysteriously, Xander shrieks and runs away.

Scene School
Edward is new at Sunnydale high, he watches Xander.
Xander: That Edward thinks he so hot, just cuz everyone thinks he’s hot, like we should all be impressed because his skin glows in the sun,”
Edward: Hey Xander.
Xander: HuH! He knows my name!
Hiiiiii, will you ask your sister out for me?
Edward: Oh, I don’t know, She might be too old for you
Xander: ohh, I’m older than you think.
Edward: that’s what I was going to say!
Xander: How old are you?
Edward: 17
Xander: 17?
Edward: But I’ve been that old for awhile...
Xander: Oh me too, I’m 25...
Edward: 25? wow, and you’re still in high school?
Xander: Eleven years and counting
Edward: Oh, wow, that is longer than me, okay then.

Scene Edward and sister’s house

Xander rings the doorbell, while he is waiting for Edward’s hot sister to come out he finds some disturbing things on the front porch, a magazine subscription to Emo Vampires Weekly and some drawings of Buffy and Bella sleeping.
Xander: Wait a minute...I know these girls, that one’s Buffy, my best friend before she died and that’s that famous girl- with the tipsy topsy disease, why has he got a picture of them sleeping?
Edward is out glistening in the sun when Xander arrives, three miles away. He hears Xander’s mutterings and comes running over to swoop down on top of him in only three seconds.
Edward: Actually it was a gift from Angel, he read about me and was inspired, he really wanted to creep out Buffy big time.
Xander: And this girl? he holds up picture of Bella
Edward: Oh, yeah, that one’s mine.
Xander: And the magazine, is that yours?
Edward: Oh, you weren’t supposed to see that!
Xander: But, but, you can't be a vampire- I saw you, you were in the sun.
Edward: I know, wasn’t I hot?
Xander: So, you’re saying you’re hot because you’re a vampire? Ohh, that makes non sense, non sense makes my brain hurt. Ohh, I need Buffy!
Edward: Wait- the vampire slayer? No, we don’t need her.
Xander: Oh yeah? I’m going to summon her from the dead.
Stephanie Meyer appears in Edward’s ear, she is speaking to him from miles away.
Stephanie: Edward, stop him!
Edward: You know, you should be scared of me, I’m dangerous.”
Edward reaches out to stop Xander but Xander pulls his hair.
Edward: Ow, oh gosh, let go, please, ow, ow!
Xander runs off, Edward is hunched over on the porch saying ow.

Xander runs to get Willow. On the way there Stephanie gets worried so she sends her bad book demons to “take care” of Xander. Bad Book demons look like giant books with legs that walk around and spew out things written in them like “he was interesting and brilliant and mysterious and perfect and beautiful and possibly able to life full sized vans with one hand.” and “his voice was like melting honey,” and “it was hard to believe that someone so beautiful could be real,” and “ohmygod, drool, drool Now!”
Xander was drooling, his run had slowed to a stumble, he couldn’t remember where he was, or why he was there, he went to sleep with the book demons dancing and chanting around him. Edward comes to watch him sleep.
When he wakes up it‘s dark.
Xander:" Wow, that was a good dream, I dreamed Edward was watching me sleep, he’s so dreamy," Xander spots Edward lurking in the trees. "Ahhh!" Xander runs away.
Edward: "You’re scared of me because you don't want to admit how you really feel about me!" Edward yells after him. "You should be scared of me, mumble, I keep telling everyone that and they never listen,"

Xander is running off in direction of the magic shop where Willow is. They are selling Twilight books in the window, Xander buys them all, and a T shirt with Edward’s face on it, and a Twilight bagel.
He walks over to Willow wearing the shirt, already on the last book, eating the bagel.
Xander: Wow, you guys gotta read this.
Willow: Uh Xander? Are you reading Twilight?
Xander:" It’s Breaking Dawn!" Xander spits out bit of bagel at her.
Willow: oh, sorry, uh, why?
Xander: Because master, I mean Edward, is hot!
Willow: Master? Why did you call him master? gasp, Is Edward a vampire?
Xander: The vampire.
Willow: Oh no, I wish Buffy was here to help us.
There’s a picture of Anya on the wall, “Done”

Buffy stumbles in like a zombie.
Buffy: Guys? What’s going on?
Willow: Buffy? Runs over and hugs Buffy, I’m so glad you’re here, you hafta kill Edward, he’s a vampire and he’s taking control of Xander.
Buffy: What? What are you talking about. I don’t even know who Edward is.
Willow: Edward, from Twilight, we thought he was just a giant disco ball but we were wrong, very wrong, he’s a vampire and he’s dangerous, just like he’s been telling us all along, he’s taken control of Xander!
Buffy: What’s twilight?
Xander gasps.
Willow: What? Have you been dead?
Buffy: Yes.
Willow runs over to Xander and grabs the book and brings it to Buffy, she opens it in front of her eyes.
Buffy: "What? I don’t want this!", flails arms, "I was in Heaven, and you pulled me out for this?" She lays her head on the table and cries.
Stephanie descends on them and begins reciting a spell.
Stephanie: Double Double toil, trouble, heard my word, Twilight is da bomb light,
Buffy kicks out her foot and kicks her down.
Stephanie: ahhhh
Buffy: What’s going on?
Stephanie: (moaning from the ground) ohhhh, Edward’s beautiful! His skin matches the color of my love! His chiseled perfection of incandescent waves harps doves singing!
Buffy: This Edward thing- can I kill it?
Xander: No!
looks horrified, clutches Edward shirt to chest.
Willow: He is a vampire
Buffy: Good, where is it?
Stephanie: No one can kill Edward! He is a radiant beam of sparklyness!
Buffy: What is she talking about?
Willow: Radiant beams of sparklyness? Maybe we’ll need these,
she pops out two pairs of sunglasses
Buffy: Great, let’s go.

Willow and Buffy go looking for Edward, and a reluctant Xander drags along after them. They look in trash cans, behind trees, in cars. They pass a house with a Swan on the mailbox, and sneak in, upstairs.
Edward is standing by Bella’s bed watching her sleeping. He is glittery even though it is nighttime and Buffy and Willow need the sunglasses.
Edward: Oh Bella, I want to eat you, no, no, I won't! Oh I want to eat you so bad.
Buffy shoots an arrow at him. Buffy: meant to miss
Willow: Get away from her
Edward: No, it’s not what you think.
Willow: We both heard you say you wanted to eat her
Edward: No, I’m a vegetarian
Willow: Why are you watching her sleep then?
Edward: I’m watching to make sure she doesn’t fall out of bed, she has tipsy topsy disease.
Xander: Oh yeah, I read about that. He’s right Buffy, no harm here, we should just leave, no, we shouldn’t leave, we should stay here and watch Edward watch Bella sleep.
Buffy gives him an incredulous look.
Xander: (crying) I’m a man, I have needs.
Buffy: Willow, get Xander out of here.
Willow gets Xander out of there.
Edward: You know, I should warn you, I’m very dangerous.
Buffy: Oh yeah, yeah, I know
They fight

Xander and Willow are outside.
Xander: But you can't kill Edward, he’s so hot, the world will become a cold place.
Willow: Edward’s not that hot.
Xander: Shhhh! He can hear you!
Willow: He’s all the way inside, how can he hear me?
Xander: (dreamily) Because he’s Edward.
Indeed at that very moment Edward does hear and becomes very distraught and distracted.
Edward: What, no, I AM hot,
he is so distracted he does not notice Buffy stake him.
As Edward is dying he chants, Edward: I am hot, I am, I am , I am,
until he is dust. Willow and Xander rush back in.
Bella wakes up, Bella: Edward?
Buffy: He’s gone.
Bella: Oh thank God, he was really creeping me out.
Stephanie flies in on her broomstick, Stephanie: Edward, Edward!
Willow: You’re too late, Edward is dead.
Xander: Shriek
Stephanie: Noo! Without Edward my books are nothing! Nothing! You have destroyed everything!
She points her wand at Buffy,
Stephanie: Herezy, therezy, by the power of wandzy,
Bella suddenly falls out of the bed due to her disease and lands on top of Stephanie Meyer squishing her to death.
Xander comes out of his trance, Xander: Who was hot, what? I don’t remember.
Spots Bella on the floor, Xander: heyyy, how you doing?
Bella smiles back,
Bella: hi


Later they all are walking around town, Xander and Bella holding hands.
Willow: So we have saved the world again, huh?
Buffy: Yeah what does that make- seven times?
Willow: I thought like nine.
Buffy: Yeah, I’d say the world owes us.
Xander: You know Buffy, before you managed to get Edward he did eat Riley.
Buffy and Willow both shrug, Buffy and Willow: mehhh
Xander: ahh man, I was stupid again wasn’t I?
Buffy and Willow have no comment
Xander: Why do I always have to be the stupid one? You know, who cares that Edward is so hot, it’s a book!
A random passerby hears him,
Random Person: You’re right, we should make it into a movie!
Runs off to make movie.
Buffy, Willow, Bella all stop and glare at Xander, Bella drops his hand.
Buffy: Nice going Xander!
Willow: What were you thinking?
Buffy: Or were you even thinking at all?
They all walk off, disgusted.
Xander is left standing alone, clutching his backpack to his chest, looking worried from side to side.
Xander: You don’t know that, maybe things will be different this time, you don’t know.