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90. The Gift
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
The gift is a phone, open to the weather app and showing a weekly forecast of sun. Maddy runs outside and without thinking, climbs onto the roof of Olly’s house. She admires the orrery and marvels that when she was up here five months ago, she was a very different person. Maddy remembers that as a kid, she loved imagining different versions of herself, such as an outdoorsy girl or a skydiving daredevil. Imagining was fun since Maddy already knew who she was. Now, Maddy’s not sure who she’s supposed to be.
At this point, Maddy finds herself at a place where many teens end up: she has to figure out who she is, when the person she thought she was proves to be untenable in the long run. Now there are consequences for trying things, and given her conversations with Olly, Maddy understands that one choice could change everything dramatically.
Themes
Maddy tries to figure out the moment when everything changed. She wonders if it was when Maddy’s dad and brother died, or if it was when her parents were born. She wonders which moment she’d choose to change and if changing that moment would give her the right results. She wonders if she’d still be Maddy, in this house, who fell in love with Olly. Maddy thinks that if she could find the moment, she could fix Mom and understand where she is now. Maddy composes an email to Olly saying that by the time he reads it, he will have forgiven her.
Though thinking about what she might change may or may not be a healthy and meaningful endeavor, it’s also important to keep in mind that Maddy is only able to engage in this thought exercise because she’s had the experiences in the real world that provided her with perspective and a new view of her life.
Themes
