The Dying Girl

In 1958, high school senior Mark Nelson moves to Springfield where he knows no one. He rides a blood red Harley-Davidson RL 45, which he hopes will be a girl catcher. He meets Gigi, a delightful classmate who jumps on his motorcycle and directs him to a romantic overlook where she leaps into his arms. He has never met a happier female, much less one so attracted to him. How can this be happening? Her father clues him in. Gigi is dying, so her parents want her to enjoy as much life as she has left. Mark think her condition is a secret, until Gigi's best girlfriend tells him everyone knows, and all the girls approve of her activities. Mark takes Gigi to the movie GIGI, after which, in a dark alley, she asks him to give her a hypodermic shot...in her hip! A policeman shows up, confronts the couple, and takes Gigi away. Mark has not told Gigi that he enlisted in the Marine Corps before he met her. Failure to report for training will constitute desertion and result in prison time, with life altering consequences. While he is trying to find the right time to break the bad news to her, they accidentally stampede a herd of cattle with his motorcycle and her loud speaker. The rancher detains them at gunpoint, until he discovers one of the culprits is his niece Gigi. Like everyone else who knows her condition, he lets the kids go. Mark's parents want to meet Gigi and they want their son to tell her he is off to the Marines as soon as he graduates. He is afraid they will tell her if he doesn't. She comes to dinner at their house and later goes horseback riding Mark and his parents. Comically, Marks's mother puts Gigi in her son's blue jeans for the ride. Mark tries to keep that pair of jeans unwashed because they are shaped like Gigi's bottom, but his mom washes them, much to his consternation. As Mark seeks out Gigi to tell her he will be leaving to go to boot camp, he finds her kissing another boy. She tells him that it's been fun but her new guy has a Corvette. Shortly thereafter, Gigi goes to the hospital, and Mark winds up in her bed there, which shocks the nurse, but not her parents. In the Marine Corps, Mark meets another Marine who wants to reconnect with Gigi. Mark tell him that she is no doubt dead. Both marines give up on her. But that's not the end of the story.