One for the Murphys

Carley, the protagonist, is an eighth-grade girl. Her mother raised Carley in Las Vegas. When Carley’s maternal grandfather passed away, leaving his property to Carley’s mother, Carley and her mother moved to Connecticut, where the story takes place.

Carley’s characterization intertwines with her experiences. She believes that she’s streetwise and “tough”: Her single mother taught her to keep emotions locked inside and offered her little tenderness and no sense of stability or security, though the two had fun times together. In addition, her mother encouraged her to show “strength”: She condoned and even encouraged young Carley’s impertinent remarks to teachers, for example, and would laugh at Carley when she cried. Consequently, Carley displays a quick wit, stubbornness, and a tendency to talk back. Carley loves books; she reads frequently and enjoys the library. She also loves basketball. In Las Vegas, she was on a basketball team and went to school; however, after the move to Connecticut, her mother didn’t enroll her in school, saying that she’d learn more directly from “living life” (23).

Carley feels that her mother chose poorly in marrying a new husband, Dennis. The backstory reveals that one night Dennis blamed Carley when her mother fell in the kitchen. When Carley insulted him, Dennis, enraged, went after Carley with the intention of beating her, and her mother held her by the foot so that she couldn’t get away. Dennis kicked Carley several times; she stayed in the hospital briefly, but her physical injuries were minor. Her mother’s injuries from Dennis, however, were severe and she required months in the hospital (initially under heavy sedation) and then physical rehabilitation. To summarize Carley’s backstory, experiences like “shopping” for clothes in donation bins and waiting outside casino doors for her mother to play slot machines culminated in a move to a new state devoid of school or peers and living with a new stepfather who had a dangerous temper and uncontrolled behavior.

As a result of her experiences and upbringing, at the start of the story, Carley resists touch, won’t allow herself to cry, and occasionally uses self-soothing strategies, such as counting to herself and analyzing words and letters, to distract her mind when emotions threaten to overcome her. Most notably, she disparages and derides Mrs. Murphy’s care and tenderness toward her three sons. Soon after arriving, Carley thinks of Mrs. Murphy as so weak that she’s like a toy with which her own predator-like mother would play.

Despite Carley’s own insistence that “tough” is the way to manage the world, her foster-home environment quickly bring out her true attributes, which include kindness, caring, a sense for inspiring and teaching others, and a genuine love for the younger Murphy boys. The longer she stays at the Murphys, the more fully these true characteristics bloom in Carley until they become visible to Mr. and Mrs. Murphy, the boys, and eventually Carley herself. As these traits develop, so does her new opinion that mothering looks more like Mrs. Murphy’s behavior than her own mother’s. She comes to love and respect Mrs. Murphy, thinking over the course of the story that she would rather “be a Murphy” and call Mrs. Murphy “Mom.”

In the end, a bit of “toughness” helps Carley bravely accept that she must return to her mother—who, she eventually remembers, incurred a terrible beating from Dennis while trying to save Carley. Now that Carley can balance her strength with optimistic, caring traits based in accepting emotions and helping others, she’s far better prepared for the challenges of a life with her mother. Inspired by Mrs. Murphy’s former stay in foster care and subsequent life choices, Carley intends to pursue the kind of life she envisions no matter what the remainder of her upbringing might be like. Carley’s dynamic character arcs sharply in the story in that her coming-of-age experiences in the Murphy household change her attitude and ideas.