The Last Straw

While Olivia Parker sits glued to the television watching the boy band One Way Street debut their new single at the Pop Music Awards, her little sister Camilla calls from practice with an urgent favor: her science project, a DNA model she has spent twenty hours building, is drying on the back porch, and the weather is turning bad. Olivia promises to bring it inside right away, but she gets distracted by the show, and by the time she remembers, the project is soaked and ruined. Camilla's double helix now looks, as she puts it, like a plate of limp spaghetti, and with the project due the next day she turns it in as-is and gets a D. Olivia apologizes and begs forgiveness, but Camilla refuses. Quoting a first grader named Judge Jennifer, who tries cases on the school playground, Camilla declares that the punishment should fit the crime: since the project took twenty hours, Olivia owes her twenty hours of "Camilla service."

Meanwhile, on her radio program Candid Conversations with Connie, Connie Kendall interviews repairman Red Hollard for her series on Odyssey's unsung heroes. Off the air Red is a riot, but once Connie introduces him as the funniest man in town, he freezes up completely, explaining that it's impossible to be funny on purpose unless you're a paid comedian. As the interview flounders, Connie fills airtime by joking about an unusual name she heard recently, Chlorasyn, saying it sounds like a medicine-flavored mouthwash: "I better gargle with some Chloracin." Then a caller phones in, and it is Chlorasyn herself. Mortified, Connie apologizes on the air, and Red ends his radio career with the heartfelt sign-off, "I never want to do this again."

The next day Chlorasyn visits Whit's End, where Connie apologizes again and offers her ice cream on the house. Chlorasyn reports that kids at school heard the broadcast and gargled at her all day long. She suggests coming on Connie's show to joke about her own name and beat the teasers to the punch. Whit worries this could make things worse, but Connie reluctantly agrees. On the air, though, Chlorasyn springs a trap. First she movingly explains that her name honors her grandparents, Cloris and Mason, a wartime nurse and soldier. Then, when the joke names they planned together come up, she acts shocked and wounded, accusing Connie of cruelly mocking her again on live radio. Callers, who are secretly Chlorasyn's friends, pile on and say Connie should be thrown off the air. Whit steps in, ends the interview, and addresses the listeners himself. He tells the story of a politician who could never live down misspelling "potato" with an extra E, and says Connie's thoughtless joke was her extra E, a mistake she has apologized for repeatedly, while what Chlorasyn did was deliberate sabotage. He asks everyone to forgive all involved and move on.

Back at home, Olivia's twenty hours of service are going badly. Camilla disqualifies the hour Olivia spent scrubbing the shower because it was really their brother Matthew's chore that week, and docks the snack hour because the finger sandwiches had too much mayonnaise. Olivia explodes, pointing out mistakes Camilla has made and been forgiven for, and accuses her sister of refusing to forgive just so she can hold the ruined project over her head forever. When Camilla admits that might be true, Olivia quits the whole arrangement. Both girls become convinced that Whit is on their side: Olivia heard him on the radio urging everyone to forgive Connie, while Camilla has learned that Whit banned a boy named Lucas from Whit's End for a week just for spilling a milkshake, even though he said he was sorry.

The sisters march to Whit's End and fire Bible verses at each other like ammunition, Olivia quoting verses about forgiveness and Camilla quoting verses about punishing the wicked, until Whit interrupts: "The Bible isn't meant to be a boxing glove." After hearing both sides, he clears up the Lucas story. Lucas didn't spill one milkshake by accident; he spilled many on purpose, secretly filming himself tripping and dumping them into people's laps as a prank, and kept doing it even after being told to stop. The real difference between Connie and Lucas, Whit explains, is repentance. Saying sorry is easy, but truly turning away from the wrong and working to make things right is the proof, and that is exactly what Connie did and what Olivia has been trying to do. Camilla realizes she is the one who now needs forgiveness, apologizes for how she treated her sister, and offers to do any chore Olivia names. Olivia just suggests they call it even.

Some days later, Connie hosts a show about favorite vacation spots, but nobody wants to stay on topic. Callers phone in to encourage her about her mistake, Red rambles charmingly without realizing he's live on the air, and Camilla and Olivia each call in, not with vacation stories, but to brag about what a kind and generous sister the other one is.