Prodigal Summer

Chapter 25 opens with an August day that Deanna will remember “for the rest of her own life” (385), not only because a cold front marks the approach of fall, and the end of her prodigal summer, but because on this day she will “commit herself irrevocably to the living” (386). Deanna’s breasts have grown fuller, her jeans will no longer button, and she finally understands her strange moods, why “a bomb had exploded in the part of her mind that kept her on an even keel” (387)—she’s pregnant.

Deanna remembers asking Nannie why Deanna’s half-sister, Rachel, was born the way she was, which led to Nannie’s explanation of sexual reproduction: “the nearest thing to a birds-and-bees lecture she’d ever gotten from Nannie” (390). Nannie described sex in terms of animals mating and plants cross-pollinating, producing something different every time, a “variety” the world needs to survive, but that also leads to “strong and not so strong” offspring. Rachel was one of the latter (390).

Now, Deanna writes a letter to Nannie, which she plans to send back with Jerry when he makes his monthly supply run. She tells Nannie she’ll be coming down from the mountain in September, and bringing someone with her, and asks if they can stay with Nannie.