48 pages • 1 hour read
Casey McQuistonI Kissed Shara Wheeler
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 21-25Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 21 Summary
The hallway at school is plastered with copies of emails Principal Wheeler wrote to students’ parents. The emails reveal that Principal Wheeler has been involved in admissions scams. Hundreds of emails are displayed reflecting Principal Wheeler’s payoffs, bribes, and under-the-table deals to boost the scores of students taking the ACT at Willowgrove. One of the emails even reveals that Principal Wheeler surreptitiously had one of the teachers raise one of Shara’s grades, which means that Shara is disqualified from valedictorian.
Rory tells Chloe that his stepfather gave him his BMW and that, because his stepfather had never given him a gift before, he was suspicious. Because he was suspicious, he snuck into his stepfather’s office and found that he had purchased the car from his brother in cash because all his brother’s belongings were to be seized after he was caught paying off the principal of his kid’s school for ACT answers.
Rory explains that when he snuck into Principal Wheeler’s office, he saw some of the same types of documents. He photographed them and asked Shara to look at them. Rory reveals that Shara was the one who exposed Principal Wheeler by printing and posting all the emails. Chloe is surprised because she expected Shara to keep the information a secret. Because Chloe realizes that Shara committed a selfless act, she decides to read the note that Shara gave her the night she stopped by her house. In the note, Shara states that she had thrown away her crucifix necklace because it meant too much to her, and she promises to leave Chloe alone.
Chapter 22 Summary
Chloe climbs up to Shara’s window and almost falls off the ladder. Shara catches Chloe’s arms until Chloe’s foot finds the rung of the ladder. Shara helps pull Chloe through the window. Shara confirms that she leaked her dad’s emails. She reveals that she wasn’t sure what she was going to do with the information Rory provided until she heard about what her father was going to do to Chloe. Shara also reveals that because her parents had taken her phone, she didn’t know about the protest graduation. Chloe confesses her feelings for Shara, and they kiss. Shara’s mom calls for Shara to leave for Bible study, and Shara and Chloe escape through the window to go to Chloe’s house.
Chapter 23 Summary
While Shara and Chloe are talking at Chloe’s house, Chloe’s moms unexpectedly return early from their pottery class. Chloe’s moms invite Shara to stay for dinner. As Chloe drives Shara home, she returns her crucifix necklace.
Chapter 24 Summary
Chloe, Shara, and the rest of her friends attend the protest graduation. Chloe wins valedictorian and gives a speech about people who mean a lot to her and have made False Beach feel like home.
Chapter 25 Summary
In Chapter 25, Chloe and her friends attend a bonfire in the cow pasture near campus, which is one of Willowgrove’s oldest senior rites of passage. Graduates bring notes, documents, and other high-school papers they never want to see again and burn them in the fire. The bonfire is Chloe and Shara’s first event as a couple. With Shara’s permission, Chloe burns the notes Shara left for her.
Chapters 21-25 Analysis
These chapters reveal that beneath his self-righteous façade, Principal Wheeler has secrets. He pursues self-interest while preaching virtue. When Chloe realizes that Shara exposed her father, she finds that Shara, too, has willingly taken the fall when it was the right thing to do. Not only has she lost valedictorian, but also her family’s pristine reputation and wealth—and her own, by extension. Chloe and Shara both sacrificed the thing they wanted most—being valedictorian. Their selfless acts of rebellion unite them.
That Shara throws away the crucifix because it meant too much to her reveals several things. First, it suggests that being gay and having faith are not mutually exclusive. The discarded crucifix also suggests that when a person is made to feel ashamed of who they are, they are inclined to sabotage themselves by hiding what they like most about themselves and depriving themselves of what matters. They try to discard what makes them vulnerable out of fear of others’ judgment. Throughout the story, the reader finds that Chloe, too, is inclined to throw away what makes her vulnerable. Rather than being honest with herself about her feelings for Shara, she focused on simplified versions of Shara that made her seem either boring or unkind. Chloe hides her vulnerability behind “power moves” against Shara. Once Shara and Chloe remove their masks and embrace vulnerability, they can be honest with each other and themselves and share the love they both longed for. Likewise, when the students of Willowgrove fight back against unfair rules, they achieve a sense of solidarity and can finally be who they are.
The bonfire at the end of the novel represents the end of an era. Not only have the characters graduated from high school, but they have learned a great deal about themselves. Now that they burn the documents that define their high school experience, they can free themselves of the challenges of living under strict rules and continue to define themselves as they enter the next phase of their lives.
Related Titles
By Casey McQuiston
