Fly Away

“Lucas talked about Kate often, mentioning her in casual conversation almost every day. He made it sound as if she were at the store and would soon come home. At first it had disconcerted the rest of them, but in time, like the gentle, ceaseless roll of the waves, Lucas had brought Kate into their circle again, kept her present, shown them the way to remember her.”

Lucas quickly learns to grieve in a healthy way that is helpful to both him and those around him. His willingness to talk of Kate openly contrasts Marah’s refusal to do so. This foreshadows that Lucas and his brother will continue to handle the emotions surrounding their mother’s death in an effective way, but that Marah will not.

“On my show, I used to tell my viewers that you could have it all in life. I told them to ask for help, to take time for yourself, know what you want. Be selfish. Be selfless. The truth is I have no idea how to have it all. I never had anything except my career. With Kate and the Ryans, it was enough, but now I see the void in my life.”

Tully has always presented a confident and composed exterior. Now, that exterior crumbles, too, as she becomes emotionally weakened due to the loss of her best friend. It is important that here she admits the emptiness in her life and her shortcomings as this should prove the first step toward repairing the hurt she feels.

“Instead of looking away from heartache, you needed to crawl inside of it, wear it like a warm coat on a cold day. There was peace in loss, beauty in death, freedom in regret. She had learned that the hard way.”

Marah speaks here of her approach to handling grief and similar unpleasant feelings. There is a degree of pride in her tone, as though she feels that suppressing and ignoring her pain is to be applauded. As the novel continues, Marah’s method of numbing and ignoring her pain will become increasingly problematic.

“She [Marah] didn’t matter. That was the dark truth. Mom had been a reed; she would have bent to Marah’s will. Dad was a wall of steel, cold and implacable. She knew because she’d hurled herself against him and fallen in a heap at his feet.”

Marah contrasts her mom and dad’s respective styles of parenting, feeling as though Kate always sided with Marah’s wishes and understood her desires. Interestingly, this contradicts other memories Marah expresses in which Kate acted authoritatively, refusing, for instance, to allow Kate to dress as she chose. Marah blames her anger on Johnny. Their differing beliefs about the best way to cope with the loss of Kate—Marah wishes to remain in the place that reminds her of Kate while Johnny wishes to find a new start in a new city—heightens the conflict between them.

“This hurt, and she welcomed the honesty of that, the clarity. She watched blood slide down the side of her hand and plop onto her black shoe, where it almost disappeared, but not quite.

For the first time in months, she felt better.”

This marks the instance in which Marah begins cutting herself. Though the psychology behind this behavior is complicated, inflicting pain paradoxically causes Marah to feel that the pain is being lessened. This becomes a coping strategy that she will use for quite some time in lieu of speaking directly about her mother’s death.

“In the weeks that followed, Marah lost weight and marked her grief in small, red slices on the inside of her upper arm and at the tops of her thighs. Each time she felt overwhelmed or lost or mad at God, she cut herself. She knew she was doing something bad and sick, but she couldn’t stop. When she opened her pink pocketknife with its now reddish black crusted blade, she felt a rush of empowerment.

As impossible as it sounded, when she was most depressed, the only thing that helped was hurting herself. She didn’t know why that was; she didn’t care. Bleeding was better than crying or screaming. Cutting allowed her to carry on.”

This passage aims to help readers understand the psychology behind self-harm and how it paradoxically makes Marah feel better. In a sense, the physical pain distracts her from the emotional pain, allowing her to feel as though that pain is gone. Marah hides her physical wounds, knowing Johnny will be alarmed to learn of her harming herself. It is Tully, ultimately, who understands exactly Marah’s reasons for harming herself—further proof of the parallels between their coping strategies.

“‘It’s all changed,’ Marah said.

‘Yeah,’ Tully said. ‘It’s all changed, and I hate it. Especially on days like today.’

That was what Marah loved about her godmother. Tully was the only one who never lied and told her it would get better.”

The parallels between Tully’s and Marah’s handling of their grief are unmistakable. Because others do not share their approach, they feel camaraderie. Unfortunately, this connection is not enough to keep either of them from turning to substances to help them.

“[Marah] didn’t belong with these girls who giggled all the time and dreamed of falling in love and starting college and thought their moms were too strict.

She wasn’t like them anymore, and by the time their day was over, and they drove her back to Seattle, the awkward silences in the car attested to their understanding of this truth. They walked her up to the condo and gathered around her at the door, but now they all knew there was nothing to say. Marah hadn’t known it before, but friendships could die too, just wither away.”

Marah’s grief causes her to be unable to relate to her friends, whose lives are focused upon things that Marah finds trivial in comparison to the death of her mother. From here she will shift her exterior identity—dressing in a “Goth” manner like Paxton. Her mention of friendships withering is reminiscent of the fight that separated Kate and Tully during Kate’s cancer. Their friendship, however, was able to withstand this temporary setback.

“‘You’ve never been a team player, Tully. That’s why you are a superstar. Do you remember how much notice you gave me when you got the network job in New York? None, that’s how much. [...] .’

I feel hopelessness well up. I refuse to let him see how deeply his words affect me, though. Pride is all I have left.”

As she tries to rebuild her life, Tully must reckon with the mistakes she has made in the past. Accepting responsibility for those mistakes is difficult and painful. Her tenacity, however, causes Tully to continue to try to prove herself as worthy of a second chance, despite the bridges she has burned.

“I feel proud; never have I fulfilled my promise to Kate more completely. It’s true that I am not my best self these days, that panic often crouches in my peripheral vision, pouncing into the foreground when I least expect it. And yes, I am drinking more than I should and taking a few too many Xanax. I can no longer sleep without sleeping pills.

But all of that will fade now that I have this obligation.”

Tully vacillates between wanting desperately to care for Marah and feeling ill-equipped to provide her with the kind of mothering that Kate did. “This would not have happened if Kate were here” becomes a refrain that Tully and Johnny often repeat. Here Tully has a moment of confidence that she can successfully help Marah remain safe. In fact, Tully believes that caring for Marah will give her enough purpose to distract her from her grief. With time, it will become increasingly apparent that no amount of distraction will keep Tully’s grief from boiling over.

“I have been urged to go to therapy several times in my life, and I am smart enough to know that my recent panic attacks are the result of more than a hormonal imbalance. There’s a river of sadness in me; it’s always been there, but now it is rising, spilling over its banks. I know there’s a possibility that if I’m not careful, it will become the biggest part of me and I will drown in it. But I don’t believe that words will make it back down; I don’t believe that swimming in my memories will save me. I believe in sucking up, in going on.”

To an extent, Tully denies that her substance use disorder has become problematic. At other times, however, she acknowledges that she intentionally seeks to avoid dealing with the emotions that the substances allow her to mask. Importantly, her mother will point to the way she too had a substance use disorder for similar reasons. Though Tully has strived to be unlike her mother, she ultimately must face the way she has harmed others and impacted her own life negatively through substances.

“For the first time in my life, I am really, truly needed, and my reaction to that surprises me. I want to be there for Marah in a way I’ve never really been there for anyone. Not even Kate. The truth is that Kate didn’t need me. She had a family who loved her, a doting husband, and adoring parents. She brought me into the circle of her family, and she loved me, but I was the one with the need.

Now, for once, I am the strong and stable one, or I intend to be. For Marah, I find the strength to be a better version of myself.”

Tully considers caring for Marah to not only be central to her promise to care, but also an opportunity to bring a sense of purpose back into her life. She often contrasts herself with Kate, certain that she can never measure up as neither a friend nor a mother. Tully’s focus on caring for Marah here is a brief spurt of confidence—one in which she is also certain that she can control her substance use disorder.

“‘Don’t tell my dad. Please. It’s not a lie,’ [Marah] adds. ‘Just don’t say anything unless he asks.’

It is a terrible and dangerous bargain I make. I know what will happen if Johnny finds out about this secret, and it will not bode well for me. But if I tell him, I will lose her; it’s that simple. Johnny will blame me and take her away and she will never forgive either one of us.”

Tully is desperate to be able to trust Marah, and vice versa. Unfortunately, they both disappoint one another at various points in the novel. Ironically, too, though here Tully fears Marah’s withholding forgiveness from her in the future, it is later Marah who fears Tully will not forgive her when she sells the story to the celebrity magazine. Both Tully and Marah need a stable supporter at this moment, but neither is equipped to provide that for the other.

“I set down my tequila and look away.

Johnny sighs. ‘God, I wish Kate were here. She’d know how to handle this.’

‘If Kate were here there’d be nothing to handle.’”

Nearly every character comments at some point in the novel on Kate’s ability to both smooth out any conflict and to know how to prevent it in the first place. Both Johnny and Kate agree that Marah’s transition to college would be much smoother if Kate were there—not merely because of the distance that develops among them because of Marah’s grief over Kate’s death, but because Kate was always able to know exactly how to connect with Marah. Johnny’s and Tully’s struggles to make this connection are one of the novel’s central conflicts.

“But what could she [Dorothy] do to help?

She could reach out to her daughter at last.

The thought filled her with a tenuous, unexpected hope. Maybe this terrible moment would be the time to show Tully that she had changed.”

When Kate passes away, Dorothy knows that Tully will need emotional support. That she wants to be the person to provide this support for Tully indicates how much she truly loves and cares about Tully, despite her inability to show this to Tully in the past. Interestingly, however, just as Tully cannot bring herself to enter the church for Kate’s funeral, Dorothy cannot bring herself to speak to Tully in person—instead, she watches Tully grieve from afar, unable to go to her aid.

“Dorothy pulled a chair up to the bed and sat down. She knew what Tully would want to hear. It was what her daughter had come to Snohomish for, what she’d asked for in a thousand ways over the years. The truth. Dorothy’s story. Their story.

She could do this. At last. She could. This is what her daughter needed from her.”

Dorothy is finally able to not only provide Tully with the support Tully has desired all her life, but she is willing to answer the questions she has denied Tully in the past. This is an indication that Dorothy has faced the trauma of her past and is growing from it. Her ability to do so will hopefully pave the way for Tully to do the same when she recovers from the coma.

“Nowadays, shows like yours and Dr. Phil’s tell people that you need to talk about the wounds you bear and the loads you carry. In my time, it was the opposite. Some things were never spoken of and my breakdown fell into that category.”

Dorothy has grown aware of the ways in which she has masked her pain in the past. Her own mother played a role in initiating this, as she refused to listen when Dorothy insisted she was being harmed by her father. Importantly, Tully has also kept silent about her trauma. It is only when Tully can confront her own past that she can in turn begin to heal from the grief of Kate’s death.

“For two days, Marah walked around in a fog; fear set in like an iceberg, deep and solid. She didn’t want to be homeless [...] .

There was no one she could talk to about her fear, either. No mom. No best friend. The realization made her feel even more alone.

Until she remembered: My job is to love you.

Once she had the thought, she couldn’t shake it. How many times had Tully offered to help her? I don’t judge people. I know how hard it is to be human.

At that, she knew where she had to go.”

As it slowly becomes apparent that Paxton is not a positive support for Marah, she seeks out whomever she feels she can still rely upon. Having driven Johnny away, Marah feels that Tully is this person. Tully is the only one Marah feels she can humble herself in front of to ask for help. This is in keeping with Tully’s promise to Kate to care for Marah. Unfortunately, Tully proves to be ill-equipped to do so, and Marah will continue to struggle until the end of the novel when she is able to repair her damaged relationships.

“[Marah] couldn’t help thinking about the love she’d grown up around. The way her parents loved each other and their kids. She took a step forward, feeling strangely as if she were both breaking free and growing up at the same time. She imagined the view from the living room, of Bainbridge Island, and suddenly she ached for the life she once had, for the girl she’d once been. It was all still there for her, just across the bay.”

Marah begins to let go of the anger she holds toward Johnny and the way he tried to care for her in her grief. She takes steps to acknowledge the role she played in this conflict and is ready to repair the damaged relationship with him and with her grandparents and brothers. This indicates a growth and progression in her character.

“I don’t think you’re quite ready for The Hobbit yet, but someday soon, maybe in a few years, something will happen to hurt your feelings again. Maybe you’ll feel alone with your sadness, not ready to share it with me or Daddy, and if that happens, you’ll remember this book in your nightstand. You can read it then, let it take you away. It sounds silly, but it really helped me when I was thirteen.”

This inscription by Kate appears in the copy of The Hobbit she gives to Marah to read when she is ready. After returning home from the two years apart from her family, Marah is comforted by these words. Somewhat ironically, Kate’s predictions about Marah’s hurt have come to fruition. Just as Tully and Johnny have said, Kate is able to anticipate the needs of her children and know exactly how to respond.

“My mother is beside the bed. [...] I don’t know how to believe in her, but I don’t know how to let go, either. She’s my mother. After all of it, all the times she’s held on to me and all the times she’s let me go, she’s still woven through me, a part of the fabric of my soul, and it means something, that she’s here.”

Though Tully wants to believe that Dorothy is there to lend her support, she is cautious and uncertain if she can trust her, having been disappointed by Dorothy in the past. Yet, her mother is still an important person to her, and ultimately Tully is grateful for this indication that her mother cares about her.

“My heart breaks for [Marah]. I can see that she is hurting. It is what we have in common these days, but now we will come together again, be there for each other. I will never let her down again. I will be the godmother Kate wanted me to be. I will not let her or Johnny down again. ‘If you’re okay, why are you still hurting yourself?’ I try to ask it gently, but I am really shaking. I feel headachy and nauseated. The blood is pounding in my ears. It’s like a panic attack is coming on, but why?”

When Marah returns to Tully, Tully is initially overjoyed, but then dismayed when she realizes Marah only arrived to request money. Tully cares deeply for Marah but is ill-equipped to help her because of her own substance use disorder. She knows, however, that Marah needs help and chooses not to enable her by giving her money. Tully is conflicted about this, however, and her oncoming panic attack conveys that turning Marah away is not an easy decision.

“They love me. Even from where I am, though the mist of worlds, I can see that. Why didn’t I see it when I was standing beside them? Maybe we see what we expect to. I do want to undo what I’ve done—this terrible, selfish thing—I want to undo it and have a chance to be another version of myself. A better version.”

Tully’s realization that she is loved and cared for is central to her decision to leave Kate and rejoin the world of the living. In her comatose state, she has been unsure that she can survive without the support of Kate in her life. Realizing that she does indeed have a support system is life-altering for Tully.

“Dorothy released a heavy sigh.

There. It was done. For the first time in her life, she was going to be Tully’s mother.”

Having rarely been physically or emotionally present in Tully’s life, Dorothy worries she is not up to the task of being a mother now, when Tully needs her. Yet, Dorothy very much wants to be and proves to be an excellent caregiver. That she has dealt with her own past trauma is central to equipping her to be the kind of mother she could not be before.