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4. Stays the Same; Life is Short
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Everything, Everything, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Coming of Age
Trust and Lies
Family, Abuse, and Bravery
The Value of Experience
Summary
Analysis
As Maddy reads, she hears a rumble outside. She immediately thinks of a spaceship, but when she hears beeping, she tries to tell herself that it’s just a truck that’s lost. However, the engine cuts off and after a minute, Maddy hears a woman say that they’ve made it to their new home. Carla stares at Maddy and Maddy thinks it’s happening again. She includes a diary entry from a decade ago. She wrote then that the family in the house next door moved away, though the little boy resisted. Maddy had a dream that aliens kidnapped the family along with Mom and Carla, but they didn’t take Maddy because they only wanted healthy people. She writes that she didn’t tell Mom the dream. She told Carla, who hugged Maddy.
It’s telling here that Maddy didn’t feel comfortable telling Mom about her dream and told Carla instead. This begins to imply that even though Maddy insists that she and Mom are very close and there’s nothing amiss about their relationship, she does, on some level, feel the need to keep things from Mom and do whatever she can to keep Mom from worrying. Carla, on the other hand, emerges as the adult figure in Maddy’s life who’s safe to be honest and vulnerable around, positioning Carla as a much better mentor for Maddy as Maddy begins to come of age.
Themes
