AN: Lately my sister and I were talking a lot about the characterizations of the kids of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory because I just found the London Cast recording and have been in love and swimming in childhood nostalgia. It's interesting to see how the kids change yet stay similar in every interpretation. In our conversations, my sister might have said how similar the kids are to those in the classic movie The Breakfast Club - there are five, each with a sort of "label" that defines them to everyone in high school but there is something deeper down. Most of these characters (referring to the 4 bad kids) get little if absolutely no development and so I thought it would be interesting to take the concept of the John Huges movie and fuse it was my favorite Roald Dahl story. The title is from the famed theme of the movie "Don't You (Forget About Me)" by the band, Simple Minds.
This of course is a HUGE AU where the kids all live in the same town, go to the same school, and is set in true current day, and the Wonka Tour never happened (fortunately and unfortunately).
Drop Your Defenses
Saturday, March 22nd, 2014
Dear Mr. Turkentine,
We have accepted that we had to spend an entire Saturday here for whatever we did wrong. But we think you're insane for making us write an essay about who we think we are. What do you care? You see us in the simplest of terms, the most convenient of definitions. You see us as a Nice Guy, a Fat Kid, a Princess, an Athlete, and a Technomaniac, correct? That's the way we saw each other before 7:00 am this morning.
Innocent.
That's what Charlie was. A victim of scholastic injustice, convicted of a crime he didn't commit – would never commit.
His moral compass had been tuned strongly from a very young age by his parents who always encouraged him to listen to his conscience and do the right thing; life lessons were as filling to the soul as the dinner they might have lacked on the table, the Bucket family believed.
But what did his compass point to when some (gravely ill with senioritis) guy tried to copy Charlie's chemistry lab work and through some ironic twist of justice, and it was the cheated who appeared to be the cheater? He was the one who was wronged and the teacher wouldn't listen to Charlie's case. It was too late to argue. This happened later Friday afternoon so it left Charlie no time to try and reason with his teacher. The metaphorical gavel had been slammed, a quick sentencing that left the sixteen-year-old with a yellow detention slip in his hand that summoned him to serve his time Saturday morning, 7 am to 3 pm.
When he went home to tell his mother and father what happened, they weren't angered by Charlie's call for detention the next day; they knew he was innocent after he explained the situation although the truth never prevailed. But when he asked about what he should do about it all?
They suggested he just go to detention and get it all behind him.
"It's not worth the trouble now," Mrs. Bucket had advised as she chopped up the cabbage for dinner that night. "Sometimes it's best to give up the fight."
Truly, there was nothing they could do so late in trying to protest against a teacher's unfair ruling.
And that was how, at 6:45 Saturday morning, Charlie Bucket walked up to his high school's library. Nestled in his (thin) coat and favorite sweater (hand-knitted by Grandma Josephine) he shuddered in the early spring wind, thankful that March is (finally) starting to creep the downy head of a lamb into this (so far) lion of a month.
At least it isn't snowing.
At least there are a few gaps in the thick layer of clouds.
At least the air is fragrant with the aroma of chocolate from the factory looming nearby.
It could be worse.
In the Bucket family, you learn to become an optimist; "always look on the bright side of life" might as well been made into a fancy needlepoint sample and hung above the crooked door as the clan's motto. When you're a Bucket, you learn to take life as it comes.
So even if he's going to be spending seven hours here in the library for the so-called "breakfast club" fulfilling the punishment for a transgression that never happened – it could be worse.
He could be picking up trash on the highway as detention with a chain-gang.
His mother could have not spared the bread and margarine to make him a sandwich.
He could have been stuck in the cold, moldy school basement sorting through old textbooks and outdated maps instead of in the comfort of the library for detention.
And hey, he was the first one to walk in.
He had his pick of the seats.