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Summary
Part Three, from “She’s not in …” to “...enjoy ourselves”
Content Warning: The below contains references to self-harm and suicide.
One day after work, Charlie heads to Riley’s and finds Blue there. Riley is teaching Blue to play guitar, and he’s also promised to take her for a drive in the morning to see the sights, even though he doesn’t have a car and has to work. Charlie is irritated with him, but she’s also happy that Blue isn’t lonely for the first time in a long while. Blue shares the good news that she has worked out a deal with Leonard to stay at Charlie’s apartment in exchange for doing handywork around the building. Charlie has conflicted emotions, uncertain whether she wants Blue to stay. They all drink together until Blue passes out. When Charlie and Riley are in bed together later, Riley tells Charlie he doesn’t want Blue living with her, and Charlie explodes. She finally tells him all about her past. She tells him about Ellis trying to kill herself, about getting sexually assaulted in the underpass, and living at Seed House until she tried to die to get away. She then challenges Riley to tell his story and to stop using, which he refuses to do. Charlie wakes Blue up and physically drags her out of the house, begging her to quit drinking.
The next day is All Souls and the day of Charlie’s art show. After working a short shift at True Grit, she goes back to her apartment to get ready to go to the gallery, but the place is a mess and Blue is gone. There are pieces of food on the floor, and Blue’s phone is cracked and left behind, a sign something must be wrong. Charlie gets dressed and heads to Riley’s, where she finds Blue smoking crack. Weeping, Blue tells Charlie that Louisa set herself on fire. Charlie has a panic attack and finds Riley in the kitchen having sex with Wendy. Wendy leers at her and Riley turns, his face furious. He slams Charlie against the wall and yells at her that this is the person he truly is and that she should leave.
Charlie blends into the crowd of All Souls revelers, but the sea of faces painted like skulls frightens her. For a moment, she believes she sees Ellis on the street corner, and memories wash over her of what she and Ellis shared. She remembers how Ellis kept some things to herself, like the wolf boy and her family. When she gets home, she finds that her apartment has been completely trashed and sees Wendy’s signature on the wall. Her tender kit is destroyed, her sketch pad is gone, and her photographs are shredded. Charlie drinks the remains of a left-behind whiskey bottle and smashes it against the wall. Instead of cutting herself like Ellis had, deeply in a few places, she wants to cut herself everywhere, so she rolls her body in the shards and ingests some of them. Then she smashes a window with her fist and is only semiconscious as people rush in to try to stop her from cutting herself. Even the men in the room are crying, but Charlie doesn’t know why. Someone bandages her wounds and Charlie tries to open her eyes, but either can’t or won’t let herself.
Charlie wakes up in a car with Tanner and Linus. They tell her they are taking her to a place where she can heal. Linus tells her that Wendy took her money from the apartment, destroyed everything, and beat up Blue. Then Riley and Wendy stole a car and flipped it in a crash. Linus says that Wendy is hurt but Riley is fine. Linus, Tanner, and Charlie, once again mute, arrive at a house in Santa Fe, where they are greeted by an old man named Felix. Felix’s house is filled with black-and-white photos, crosses, and sage bundles. He is a successful artist and sets up a studio for Charlie, who is still emotionally numb and not speaking. Linus shows Charlie a review of the art show, which uses a lot of words and phrases she doesn’t understand, but it seems to be positive about Charlie’s work. Felix gives her some suggestions about her art and encourages her to give it more emotion and passion.
Analysis
The elaborately decorated skull faces that frighten Charlie on All Souls bear an eerie resemblance to Riley’s increasingly ghoulish appearance. The skull faces are intended to remind people that death is everyone’s destiny, regardless of an individual’s wealth, beauty, or talent. Indeed, despite being good-looking and talented, Riley has traded his career in a rock band to sink into drugs and alcohol, bringing death ever nearer. While he projects an aura of confidence, his act has clearly worn thin for most of Tucson’s residents, like the punks and Go players who see him for what he is, a person who allows himself to be controlled by his addictions. The gaunt hollows around his eyes are deepening, the lines on his face are thickening, and his skin is growing thin and saggy. Unlike the All Souls revelers, Riley doesn’t have the will or strength to join the festival, choosing instead to stay home with Wendy, his dealer who encourages his self-destructive behavior. Despite his tremendous talent, Riley is dangerously close to joining Charlie’s father, Ellis, and Louisa as a casualty and statistic.
The picture of Ellis that emerges during the All Souls festival is somewhat different from the one Charlie described when she was in rehab. The first time she introduces Ellis into the narrative, Charlie remembers her as a savior who rescued her from loneliness and ostracism. In the midst of All Souls, Charlie’s memory of Ellis is that of a rebellious teenager who breaks rules but loves her comfortable home and loving, protective parents. This portrayal of Ellis is more complex and vulnerable. She is someone who needs protection from heartbreak and self-destruction, and it is the first time she cries in Charlie’s memory. Despite Ellis’s tough, rebellious exterior, she loves to have her mother stroke her hair, and she is desperate to not disappoint her parents. While Charlie had previously presented Ellis as unique and unlike anyone else in Charlie’s life, here she is one of many people Charlie identifies as willfully destroying themselves. By including Ellis on a list with Louisa, Riley, Blue, Evan, and Charlie’s father, Charlie recognizes that Ellis was imperfect and made self-destructive choices. This eases Charlie’s guilt and responsibility, but it also plunges her into despair as she realizes she can’t save the people she loves from themselves.
At this point in the novel, Charlie is mute and bandaged from a self-destructive act, much like she was at the rehab center, but there are a few key differences that indicate a more promising path forward. Charlie is helpless, in and out of consciousness, and completely dependent upon others for her survival, but instead of being surrounded by fearful teens who dump her at a hospital, she is in the caring hands of Linus and Tanner, a responsible mother and an aspiring EMT, respectively. This time, when Charlie tries to annihilate herself, it is because she recognizes that she has made poor choices about whom to love and how to live. By accepting responsibility for the state of her life, she complicates and facilitates her recovery. At Felix’s house, Charlie is among friends who can offer her long-term practical healing, which seems more relevant to her envisioned life than Casper’s impersonal, clinical advice. Charlie is now surrounded by people who are creatively engaging with their own recovery and can be role models for her as she finds her own path of art and healing.
