Firegirl

Tom gains a deeper understanding of Jessica in these chapters as he learns the truth about her accident and gets to know her as an individual. This new knowledge expands Tom’s sense of compassion and alters his sense of self, but it also frustrates him. Tom, hurt by Jeff, evaluates both the nature of their friendship and his growing connection to Jessica. Abbott continues to develop themes of speaking out and accepting difference.

Visiting Jessica enables Tom to see her as a person, not that different from himself. Her room is “girly,” comfortable, and “normal.” Tom intuits that Jessica does not have many people to talk to. Although he internally hesitates, wondering why he remains, and when it is okay to leave, Tom’s compassion and his own loneliness keeps him there. While Tom’s internal dialogue is riddled with thoughts about what he should say and how to say things, he does not typically say much to others. Despite his own mental protests, he shares his superhero powers theory—something he has not told anyone else. Jessica shares her feelings about her mother with Tom, and Tom has a longer conversation with Jessica than with any other character thus far. Jessica is isolated by her difference, and Tom is isolated by his introversion and lack of self-esteem.

Discovering Jessica’s humanity changes Tom. He feels “different,” clearly indicating his character growth. The magnitude of Jessica’s experience puts Tom’s life into perspective. Tom does not obsess about Courtney or the Cobra as much. Although his sense of self is developing, Tom still craves the comfortable normalcy he enjoyed before knowing Jessica.

Tom’s theory about small superhero powers reveals that he feels he does not deserve big, impressive powers. That Jessica prefers superpowers that can actually help people suggests that she herself might’ve benefited from such powers in her real-life tragedy. Tom’s understanding of powers is small and reflective of his small worldview and inexperience, whereas Jessica’s reveals her big-picture thinking; it’s not lost on the reader that she developed this thinking through her health difficulties and her struggle to survive.

The concept of using his superpowers to help people frustrates Tom not only because he is introverted, but because he wants to focus on himself. Tom is glad to return to the simplicity of his Courtney fantasies in contrast to the complicated reality of interacting with Jessica, which is the marker of the coming-of-age story when the character regresses and considers staying the same.

Tom only gets excited about the prospect of riding in the Cobra when, feeling that he has done something difficult by stepping outside his comfort zone and being kind to Jessica, he thinks he deserves a reward. Tom’s growing connection to Jessica is complicated by feelings of guilt and resentment that she wants more from him. Tom’s dream, in which he runs away from Jessica when she escapes the burning car shows this fear of obligation, connection, and of becoming as alone as she is. Tom ultimately, however, chooses Jessica’s friendship over Jeff’s. Jeff, Tom thinks, does not care about other people, which Tom perceives in Jeff’s slight with the Cobra and even more so in his cruelty to Jessica. Jeff gives Jessica the derogatory name, firegirl, and his hatred of her seems to coincide with his feelings of abandonment from his family and now from Tom.

In this section, Tom again shows his difficulty in processing emotions. Tom is emotionally overwhelmed by the story of Jessica’s accident: It is too much for even his vast imagination to envision. He feels the tragedy of the loss of what Jessica used to be and is awestruck by the fact that Jessica not only survived but was “going on” and continuing to make a life for herself. Tom is unable to talk about the powerful feelings brought on by both Jessica’s story and Tom’s angry telephone confrontation with Jeff. Instead, Tom experiences physical reactions: He vomits after speaking with Mr. Feeney and spends hours alone in his room after talking to Jeff. Tom’s physical responses to emotional distress illustrate the difficulty he has communicating his feelings.

Finally, Jessica’s personality emerges more in this section. Readers learn about her arduous hospital treatments and see her parents’ struggles to keep things normal. The photograph of Jessica and her parents before the accident reveals Jessica’s possible wish to punish her mother, whom she says she hates, though it also serves as a reminder of what Jessica has lost physically and emotionally. Mr. Feeney does not see keeping the photograph as a positive thing but acknowledges that Jessica “has her ways of dealing with what happened” (97). Jessica’s lie about her sister and her words about her mother show that she still hasn’t confronted some aspects of the accident and that she doesn’t know how to communicate or cope with her feelings, either.