Brandon convinces Olive to help him and they pretend to have sex at a party. After having a fight with Rhiannon over Olive's new identity as a "dirty skank", Olive decides to counteract the harassment by embracing her new image as the school tramp. She begins to wear more provocative clothing and stitches a red "A" to everything she wears. Boys who usually have had no luck with girls in the past beg Olive to say they have had sex with her in order to increase their own popularity, in exchange for gift cards to various stores, in turn increasing her reputation. Things get worse when Micah, Marianne's 22-year-old boyfriend, contracts chlamydia from sleeping with Mrs. Griffith, the school guidance counsellor, and blames it all on Olive. Olive agrees to lie to cover up the affair so that the marriage of her favorite teacher, Mr. Griffith, would be spared.