Nightmare Hall #11: Last Date (Diane Hoh)

Demi and her best friend/roommate Shannon are discussing the new personal ads in the school newspaper, when she decides to try it for herself. All you do is setup an ad, guys call to leave a message for you and you decide whether to call them back. She’s a writer for the paper and her editor Kevin thinks it’s a great idea. She sets up her ad right before meeting his cute friend Brant.

The ad itself is fairly lame and it kind of makes her sound like a slut. She basically tells guys to call her for a night they’ll never forget. I’m a little surprised she only gets four calls! College guys should be all over that. The first date is a guy named Lance, who takes her to a French movie. This is where it becomes clear that Diane Hoh knows nothing about French.

Lance uses maybe a dozen French expressions and they’re all stuff you can pick up from Sesame Street and crap like that. The movie has subtitles, but he insists on translating for her anyway, even stuff like “oh” and “Jacques”. Then he laughs at her for saying bon voyage because she told him good trip. Oh, hah-hah-hah, I’m laughing my ass off.

Her next date says his name is Lawrence, but it’s actually some random guy named Peter that kept trying to date her. She thinks he’s a loser, but goes on the date anyway. She tries to end it after a movie and he insists they keep going, then accuses her of thinking she’s better than him so Demi ditches him.

The next day she has a fight with her ex-boyfriend Jack. Apparently they were dating, he got too possessive and she suggested they see other people. This is universal code for “let’s break up”, but they actually keep dating. He found out from Shannon that she did the personal ad and he warns her to stop it. Then she has a fight with Kevin’s girlfriend Marge, who also works for the paper and thinks there’s something going on between them.

She caps the day off with a visit from the cops. Peter was found in his garage, with the engine running and passed out. There’s signs that it might be foul play, but they also think it might be a suicide attempt and they ask her a bunch of questions. She’s worried, but not worried enough that she doesn’t make another date.

This time it’s Andrew, a super rich frat boy who only called as a joke with his frat boys, who all turn up at the movie theater to gawk at her. He keeps calling her babe and when she wants to go home after the movie, he drives her to a steakhouse instead. They fight in the parking lot because he wants the date to keep going, calls her a tease and says he knows why she needed to get a date from the personals and he’ll ruin her reputation. Harsh.

Of course Andrew disappears after the date and the cops get even more suspicious. Then she finds out that Lance was hit by a car after their date and wonders if it’s somehow connected to her. No, not at all. She sneaks into his hospital room to ask him questions, but he barely remembers her and remembers nothing about the accident.

She gets another call and sets up another date, but this time she thinks the voice sounds familiar. It turns out to be Brant, Kevin’s friend and they have a great date. At the end of the date, they start kissing and she sees a weird white mist, rising out of the ground and turning into a hand. Brant warns her to get away, but she passes out. Kevin finds her and gets her to the hospital, but Brant disappeared. The odd thing is that no one ever mentions the hand thing again, ever, like it didn’t happen.

Everyone at school starts treating her like a pariah and she turns to Kevin, which pisses off Marge. He finally gets up the balls to ask her out and she turns him down because she’s a curse. She gets a call to meet her at the bell tower a little after midnight and finds Kevin waiting, but then Brant comes out of the shadows. Both guys accuse the other one of killing off the competition and start a fight to the death.

Demi knocks Kevin over the head with a flashlight and then passes out. The cops arrive and it turns out that Kevin was stalking her the whole time. How he had the time with the paper, I have no idea. He was obsessed with her and hated that she was with Brant because he “knew” it was more than a fling for the article. She and Brant kiss and she tells him to “call her”. Ha-ha-ha.

Too many red herrings in this one. Every chapter you’re supposed to suspect someone else: the ex, the roommate, Brant, other dates, other women, a ghost, Kevin, etc. I was kind of hoping it was Brant because he was way to slick and smooth, but it once again had to be the nice, good guy best friend.