A Thousand Boy Kisses

“‘Rune!’ she said excitedly, ‘we can talk at night, and make walkie-talkies with cans and string. We can whisper our secrets to each other when everyone else is asleep, and we can plan, and play, and…’

Poppy kept talking, but I didn’t mind. I liked the sound of her voice. I liked her laugh and I liked the big white bow in her hair.

Maybe Georgia won’t be so bad after all, I thought, not if I have Poppy Litchfield as my very best friend.”

The first glimpse of Poppy and Rune’s friendship involves Poppy overcoming Rune’s bad mood with overwhelming friendliness and optimism. Rune, though still skeptical about America, cannot help but acknowledge the fun Poppy embodies. This dynamic will become more relevant as the challenges facing Rune and Poppy escalate. The passage thus establishes the couple’s deep connection while hinting at the theme of Emotional Resilience in the Face of Loss and Mortality.

“But I couldn’t help it. I didn’t want my mamaw to leave me, even though I knew she had to. I knew when I returned home, Mamaw wouldn’t be there: not now, not ever.

Rune dropped down to sit beside me and pulled me in for a hug. I snuggled into his chest and cried. I loved Rune’s hugs, he always held me so tight. ‘My mamaw, Rune, she’s sick and she’s leaving.’”

Even before Rune and Poppy begin a romantic relationship, they depend on one another for support. Poppy does not stay with her family after learning of Mamaw’s impending death but goes to Rune. This passage also outlines the pattern of Poppy and Rune’s relationship, in which they will need to support each other through loss and mortality.

“‘Kiss three hundred and fifty-two. With my Rune against the auditorium wall.’ I held my breath, waiting for the next line. The glint in Poppy’s eyes told me that the words I hoped for next would spill from her lips. Leaning in closer, balancing on her tiptoes, she whispered, ‘And my heart almost burst.’ She only ever recorded the extra-special kisses. Only the ones that made her feel her heart was full. Every time we kissed, I waited for those words.

When they came, she almost blew me away with her smile.”

Rune’s desire to fulfill the extra condition placed on Poppy’s jar of boy kisses, that her heart almost bursts, clarifies the narrative device of the boy kisses. Not every kiss goes in the jar—only those that are special for some reason. Throughout the novel, the mention of numbered kisses indicates kisses that mark key events or emphasizes the importance of Poppy and Rune’s love for each other.