Puppy Love
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Mike's locker is stuffed with love letters, and somehow that's the worst thing to happen to him all week. Between Lucy's dramatic readings, Katie's pouncing, and Paulo's theories about his love life, being adored has rarely looked so miserable.
| Puppy Love | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Chapter | 13 of 127 (list of chapters) |
| Published | June 30, 2006 |
| Page count | 4 |
| Major characters | Mike, Lucy, Paulo, David |
| Minor characters | Katie, Daisy, Sue, Amaya, Stacy, Three Weird Girls, John |
| Locations | Roseville Middle School |
| Collected in | Volume One, Omnibus 1 |
| Chapter navigation | |
| ← Catty Remarks | Confrontation → |
| Read chapter | |
Synopsis
Mike finally wrestles his locker open and a pile of love letters spills out at his feet. He insists letters like these are private and their writers' feelings fragile, so Lucy swipes one and treats the hallway to a dramatic reading of "My dear prince." Around the corner, Stacy, the letter's actual author, hears every word of it and starts to tear up.[1]
Mike grumbles that the letter was genuinely sweet, but he'd only have to reject its writer anyway. Then Paulo and David wander over, and Paulo takes the letter pile as fresh proof of his pet theory that Mike is gay. Mike's defense does him no favors: "I'm not interested in girls."[2]
One letter asks Mike to the dance, and his sarcastic acceptance backfires when Katie leaps onto his back. She crows that she's the most popular girl in school and much prettier than "the ugly duckling" standing next to him. Lucy answers the insult with a hose she produces out of nowhere, drenching Katie until her mascara runs. When Paulo announces to the hallway that Mike prefers boys, a crowd of hopeful boys closes in on him instead.[3]
The teasing is what finally tips Mike over the edge. Paulo congratulates him on having more hoes than any pimp he's ever seen. Mike explodes that a real sleazeball would accept all these advances, but he's rejected every single one of them. He rants at the assembled girls to quit bothering him, which leaves Stacy weeping in the background. Paulo notes that Mike is the first gay pimp he's ever met, and David coins him a new name, "Homo McWhiskers." Lucy, for once, just gives him a gentle pat on the back.[4]
Character dynamics
- Mike and Stacy: Stacy comes into the chapter as Mike's anonymous admirer and leaves it the same way, just considerably sadder. She listens in while Lucy ridicules her letter, then catches the full blast of Mike's rant, weeping "So cruel.." as he tells the assembled girls to stop wasting their attention on him. Mike never finds out who wrote the letters, though he did think they were sweet.[1][4]
- Lucy and Katie: The hose fight is their first on-panel clash, and it sets the tone. Katie writes Lucy off as the ugly duckling next to her own popular-girl looks, and Lucy answers with a soaking and the retort "I thought swans had natural beauty, miss mascara!"[3]
Trivia & observations
- All four pages went up on the same day, and the chapter is a redrawn version of an older one. Veronica's commentary under the second page mentions preserving an expression "from the original page" in "this redrawing."[2]
- Veronica's commentary notes that Katie "only really likes Mike because that's a popular thing to do," and adds that she doesn't think Katie is capable of genuine emotion.[3]
- Per Veronica's commentary under the final page, Mike's rant comes from her own dislike of the idea that a boy liked by lots of girls is a "pimp." As far as she was concerned, a pimp was someone who went around controlling girls.[4]
- Veronica also remarks in the first page's commentary that Lucy "would never be caught dead writing a sappy letter like that."[1]
Related chapters
- Prom Preparation: The dance in the letters is the Spring Dance that Daisy was put in charge of planning here. Sue and Amaya already made a joint play for a dance with Mike in this chapter, which is why he shuts Sue down before she can even finish her pitch.
- Confrontation: The teasing gives way to real drama in the next chapter, where Daisy accuses Mike of having actual feelings for Lucy.
- Farewell, Middle School: The dance everyone is angling for finally happens off-panel here, and Mike skips it entirely.
- Local Area: The letters get their payoff years later, when Mike admits to Stacy that he kept them and calls them "really sweet." He also offers a new read on this chapter's mockery: "Lucy was just being jealous back then."
- Rising Temperature: Katie recycles her signature insult on a new target, telling Daisy she might not "be, like, the ugly duckling forever."