58 pages • 1 hour read
Kathleen GlasgowGirl in Pieces
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2016A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 3, Pages 357-398Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 3, Pages 357-376 Summary
Charlie spends six healing weeks with Tanner, Linus, and Felix. She begins working in a new medium and returns to Tucson to find Blue also on a healthy path.
Felix tells Charlie that sometimes it is important to “just be” (357). Charlie’s body heals. She learns that Linus has children who live with their father. Charlie feels ashamed that she never asked Linus about her life. Linus reads her a positive review of her drawings, though the rest of the exhibit receives a “snarky” write-up (359). Felix tells Charlie that she is skilled but not working in the right medium. He tells her that Devvie will set up a studio room for her to experiment. Linus reveals they will be staying for a while: True Grit has closed. Riley stole “a lot of money” (360).
Charlie contemplates Felix’s words. She remembers Ariel telling her that she had to examine herself and be her own subject. Charlie feels exhausted. She misses Riley, though she knows it is wrong. Longing for the release of cutting, she forces herself to count her scars and account for the damage she has inflicted on her body. She thinks of Louisa and realizes that her journals are the only thing Charlie has left because she had carried them around in her backpack. She reads them straight through the night.
The following day, she goes to her studio thinking about herself and Louisa and begins writing a comic that tells their stories. She takes breaks to walk, reflect, and eat but speaks to no one. After a few days, her project feels done, for now. Through the comic, she has said what Casper wanted her to say. Now, she can speak again. A few days later, she, Linus, and Tanner return to Tucson. Felix’s departing words are “[y]ou be you” (367, italics in original).
On the drive back, Charlie apologizes to Linus and asks why she is helping her. Linus replies that, when she was drinking, she did “horrible things” that she still feels shame for, yet her kids are doing well. She feels some kindness must have helped them; she is paying it forward. She believes that Charlie’s mom is hoping someone is looking out for her daughter. Charlie is doubtful, but Linus says that she will understand some day if she has kids.
The building looks well cared for when Charlie returns. While Charlie was gone, Blue transformed her apartment into a home. She apologizes to Charlie and swears that she is clean and determined to remain so. She asks Charlie if they can help each other so neither ends up like Louisa. They cry and hold each other, “like you’re supposed to” (371).
Three days after True Grit reopens, Charlie returns to work. She learns from Julie that Riley is in rehab and must stay there for a year to avoid jail. He can never work at True Grit again. Julie acknowledges that helping him made things worse. Charlie admits that she helped him buy drugs because she wanted him to love her.
Charlie begins to accept her life. She and Blue join a support group, and Charlie appreciates having a friend and roommate. Though Blue is not ready to talk about her father, he helps support her financially. One day, she brings home a laptop and helps Charlie set up a Facebook account. Charlie receives a friend request from Evan, who reveals that Frank has been arrested, his sex house shut down, and Evan is ninety-two days sober.
Part 3, Pages 377-398 Summary
In the final section of the book, Charlie makes amends and experiences closure with Mikey and Riley. Felix offers her a job as his new assistant.
While searching for order pads in Julie’s office, Charlie stumbles on Riley’s phone number and calls him. She asks if he remembers being with her or if she was “just a freak show for him” (380). The call cuts off before he can answer. Charlie looks at the stapler and thumbtacks on Julie’s desk and accepts that her life will sometimes come down to waiting out bad feelings in ten-minute intervals.
Felix calls True Grit to ask Charlie if she would like to work for him. Devvie is moving on, and Felix needs a new assistant. Charlie feels okay where she is, but she liked the “stillness” in Santa Fe and feels haunted by Riley in Tucson (381). She accepts Felix’s offer.
Four days before she is due to leave, Luis’ benefit concert is held, and Riley wants her to attend. He is being let out of rehab for the day, with monitoring, to perform. At the concert, Charlie sees Mikey for the first time since he left. He tells Charlie that his band’s tour was extended, and they made an album. She apologizes for not answering any of his emails. He reveals that he visited Ellis when the band’s tour stopped in her town. He tells Charlie that when he mentioned her name to Ellis “her whole face it up” and slips her a note (387).
Julie, Blue, Linus, and Charlie have backstage passes. When Riley comes on stage, Charlie is struck by how scared and self-conscious he seems. He is self-effacing, but the crowd is behind him. He looks clean and well-groomed. Charlie notes “with a pang” how much she chose to ignore the state he was in while using (389).
His first song is one he wrote himself. Charlie understands that it is about her, and the song is “his form of communication,” as drawing is for Charlie (390). After performing it, he rushes off stage for a moment to slip a note into her hand. Returning to the stage, he tells the crowd that the lady he wrote the previous song for once gave him a great cover idea, then launches into a rock version of “You’re the One That I Want,” Ellis’ idea. As the crowd gets into it, Blue and Charlie quietly slip away. Blue asks Charlie what the cereal is doing, and Charlie replies, “The cereal is not eating me” (394).
Blue has opened up in Phoenix but is sad that Charlie is leaving. She has decided to start going to meetings with Linus but makes Charlie promise to stay connected, telling her that they have to “hold on to each other” (384). They are family now.
Waiting for her flight to take off, Charlie is nervous, but she no longer has a tender kit. She is choosing to move forward without her “just in case” (396). She takes out the notes Mikey and Riley gave her. Riley’s note says that he remembers and is signed with his real name, which he had previously refused to reveal to Charlie. Mikey’s note is Ellis’ address. As the plane roars down the runway, Charlie closes her eyes and begins composing a letter she will write to Ellis. Charlie is choosing her “next momentous” (398).
Part 3, Pages 357-398 Analysis
In Santa Fe, Charlie begins to heal physically and emotionally. Felix’s ability to value silence accelerates her healing. He does not pressure Charlie to communicate either with words or through her art. He instead encourages her to reflect. She becomes her own subject, as Ariel and the gallery artists both suggested, but on her own terms.
In the quiet of Felix’s compound, Charlie slows down, recalls, and reflects. She makes herself her own subject, but without objectifying herself, another form of disassociation. Rather than making her feel vulnerable and overwhelmed, space, time, and quiet make her feel safe and empowered. Her silence can serve a purpose: It brings her closer to understanding what she wants to communicate. She had forgotten that Louisa’s notebooks were saved from Wendy’s destruction because of a jealous impulse to hoard them for herself. Jealousy may often have negative consequences, but human experiences cannot be filed neatly into boxes. Some experiences are too complex to be fully parsed.
Providing her with an art room in which Charlie can experiment with different mediums allows her to find the art form best suited to the story she wants to tell. Charlie has struggled to tell her story, which Casper asked her to do at the beginning of the novel. Charlie’s communication has often been destructive: She has lashed out physically and verbally. She has turned her anger on herself, paradoxically finding relief by causing herself more pain. Through her art, she figures out what she wants to say, and by experimenting, she discovers that combining images and words—her method and Louisa’s—feels true to their experiences. What has haunted Charlie throughout her life is feeling alone, feeling that no one understands or cares about her, and that she does not matter. Her art and Felix’s gentle guidance show her that telling her story and the stories of people like her has value.
While at Felix’s, Charlie also begins paying attention to others around her, appreciating that others have suffered and survived. By surrounding herself with people who are active in their recovery, she can receive support for her own recovery. She can relate to them, but they are a few steps ahead of her and can guide her on the right path. They have survived trauma and developed productive ways to cope with it.
Charlie fears returning to Tucson because she is afraid of falling into bad habits and patterns again, but she discovers that her negative influences have begun to turn their lives around as well. Riley has been forcibly put into rehab. Blue has pulled herself together with the support of the people in the building. Even Evan, who Charlie feared would die of his drug addiction, is clean. Riley’s crack binge became a catalyst not only for Riley, Blue, and Charlie but also for Julie, who has stopped enabling Riley’s addictions. Unhealthy cycles fuel themselves, but healthy cycles can also fuel themselves.
The benefit concern becomes an opportunity to reconcile with Mikey and Riley, though neither is an active part of Charlie’s recovery. Both are at different stages from Charlie’s, and each has his own life to live. Riley needs to get clean, and Mikey is preoccupied with his band and his wife. Mikey’s last gift for Charlie is Ellis’ address. Knowing that some part of Ellis still remembers and loves her proves healing for Charlie, and she moves forward knowing that she has not completely lost her old friend.
Felix’s job offer provides Charlie a new beginning, but she has learned how to hold onto the parts of her past that nourish her without miring her in despair. At the end of the novel, Charlie chooses to break apart her life so that she can assemble it in a healthier way.
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