The Virgin Suicides

(Updated)

Probably to distract me from eating too much cake and poking my nose into his love life, my older brother Manster, who was visiting home one time, handed me The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides.

The book wasn’t familiar but the picture of four lovely girls making do like well-bred sardines on a small bed below a crucifix draped by a cream-colored brassiere tickled my interest for the bizarre.

So I flipped through the pages and, like a voyeur across the street with no name, joined the smitten boys in the book in monitoring the lives of the entrancing Lisbon sisters.

The first one to go was weird Cecilia, 13, who slit her wrists and, when it didn’t work, later on threw herself off the window (or was it the roof?) and fell upon the fence to die.

After some time, the rest of them followed -- daring Lux (14), conservative Bonnie (15), vain Mary (16) and science nerd Therese (17). Suicide methods included using a rope, sticking one’s head in a microwave and drowning in sleeping pills.

Because the story was told from a spectator’s point of view, I was frustrated about not knowing what was going on in the minds of the Lisbon sisters. Come on, when you have suicide and five girls on your hands, you’d be itching to know why they did it. But the writer just skirted around the sisters’ house and almost drove me nuts with his constant reference to the general teen suicide trend and stats, without any real answers.

Was it because they were guarded too much by their parents that they’ve lost the excitement to live? But I know of people with ultra-strict parents and yet they survived. What’s more, why ALL of them? They were supposedly beautiful, vibrant girls. Was it genetic then? Or was it just too much of a pressure being isolated in their old house after Cecilia died?

My many questions followed me to the toilet. And as I sat there farting, contemplating and speculating, I finally figured a few theories of my own:

-- Suiciditis is contagious. Cecilia probably got the virus from the boy who killed himself over another girl. And living in such close proximity, the rest of the sisters also got infected.

--Sharing a cramped room drove the sisters mad and triggered the suicides. My sister and I also shared a room until I graduated from high school. Yes, it was fun but I also remember the shouting matches, the “I’m-gonna-kill-you-for-using-my-shirt/dress/sandals-without-permission” or the screams over “this-is-my-side-of-the-room” violations, and even the burden of knowing each other’s secrets and being able to use them for blackmail when one was pissed off.

Good thing though there were just two of us and we have an older brother who sometimes forces us to momentarily cease fire, unite, and gang up on him when he’s being his naturally annoying self. And then there were the parents, constantly refereeing and lecturing about love.

-- The Lisbon sisters discovered the seeming worldwide conspiracy to annihilate and torture all virgins of this time. Probably got it from watching too much TV, which they did since they weren’t allowed to go out that often. Maybe they’re afraid that when they reach their 20s with their hymen still intact, people will start to pressure them or brand them as freaks. So rather than fall into the vindictive hands of the enemy, they decided to end their lives themselves.

Lux tried to solve this problem by sneaking to the roof with the boys and her varied contraceptive collection. But then, probably finding out that being a non-virgin isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be – killed herself anyway.

Uh-huh, maybe these do sound farfetched. But they’re more believable than the one that goes -- the Lisbon sisters killed themselves for loving the same guy.

I’m curious about The Virgin Suicides’ film version, though. I heard it’s long been out in the market and that Kirsten Dunst plays one of the girls -- I’m thinking Lux. Sounds promising. Still, I wonder if or just how Hollywood would make me wanna flush it down the toilet.


-- SunStar Weekend, 06/27/2009