Don't Go Home with John is the 90th book in the Sweet Valley High series. This book is about where John Pfeifer almost date rapes Lila Fowler and the impact it has on the heiress.
Lila is excited about the date that she has upcoming with John Pfeifer, the former sports columnist for The Oracle. She thinks that being with an intense and quiet guy like him would be different from the usual wealthy and snobby guys she would usually date. However, Jessica isn't fooled by John's behavior after what he did to her sister. She tries to warn Lila not to go on this date with him after he tried to ruin Liz's reputation at school by plagiarizing her work. However, their one night would impact Lila for a long time.
During a trip to Miller's Point, the local romantic spot in Sweet Valley, John tries to put the moves on Lila, but she does not want to go all the way, and John gets more forceful. Lila took his keys and threw them over the point, while she heads home.
The next day, Lila is unusually quiet and sullen after the pain of last night. Her best friend, Jessica is worried that she would cancel her costume party, but she doesn't.
That night, she is serving punch, and she is petrified and scared that John and his date comes to the party, despite her not inviting him! At that point, Lila brings the party to a screeching halt when she points at him and screams that she had been nearly raped by him!
John outright denies it, and becomes arrogant in his belief that he did nothing to Lila. In one of the most vile examples of victim-shaming ever seen, John even begins to spread it around school that she had wanted it!
During the days that pass, Lila is scorned and ridiculed by John and his friends, which is unusual for the popular heiress who usually scorns those beneath her, but unlike John, she gains allies from all the girls at SVH. She also gains allies from Todd and the others who didn't believe a word he said.
Even Jessica's twin, Liz and her friend, Enid Rollins, who usually did not like Lila (although Elizabeth tolerated her for Jessica's sake), were firmly on her side. Jessica, infuriated at what happened, is determined to make John suffer for what he had done to Lila in the same manner that he did to Liz.
She meets up with Jennifer Mitchell, who had dated John at one time, and she couldn't help Jessica about what he had done. Then she meets up with another girl whom John dated, and she shared her story with Lila.
At first, Elizabeth was gravely torn. but, remembering what he had done to her, by his brazen plagiarizing her writing and nearly imperiling her friendship with Olivia Davidson, she turns against him and throws her lot behind Lila all the way (After the plagiarism incident, John was fired from the paper by Penny Ayala and Mr. Collins, after Jessica exposed his dirty deeds to them).
One night, at the Dairi-Burger, the main hangout for the SVH kids, John was holding forth with his friends, and was still denying he did anything to Lila, when Jessica, Elizabeth, their respective boyfriends, Sam Woodruff and Todd Wilkins, and another girl came in. Upon hearing who she was, John's face fell. One of his athlete friends recognized the girl right off as his younger sister's best friend, whom he considers to be part of his family.
Jessica insisted that John get some help, but he denies it again and again, demanding that the other guys side with him. The girl, whom John used to date, demanded that he find help, and after that, every guy at that table, as well as everyone else in the Dairi-Burger left John in there all alone in the most ultimate show of support for Lila and the ultimate shaming that he deserved.
Trivia[]
- In later books, John continued his disgraceful vendetta against Lila, by terrorizing her; until he was caught in one of his own bombs and is killed.
- This story had the most dramatic impact on the normally haughty Lila and made her become an even more sympathetic character. Later on, during the Earthquake storyline, she and her parents (who had remarried) hosted the Wakefields in Fowler Crest, and this helped in solidifying a bond between Jessica and Lila's families(though Jessica and Lila suffer a brief falling out). Even Elizabeth and Lila thawed their normally chilly relationship and bonded somewhat.