50 pages 1 hour read

The Break

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2016

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Part 3, Prologue-Chapter 21Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 3, Prologue Summary

Rain contemplates her existence as a spirit. She thinks about what it means to not have a body, and she discovers that while she may not miss her own physical body, she misses the “feel of someone else’s skin” (157). She focuses on Stella as a child and how they slept together in the same bed. She misses her mother and craves to hold her hands. Rain, then, compares her body to a memory and how death feels like existing in a memory.

Part 3, Chapter 15 Summary: “Stella”

Stella wakes up, and she thinks about how her dreams are memories from her childhood. She spends her morning with her children, and the police come to inform Stella that they believe they have found the survivor of the attack and want to talk to her again. After talking to Officer Scott and Christie again, she tries to call Kookom, but she does not answer. As the day goes on, Stella further thinks about her dream, which replays the memory of a man following her, Lou, and Paulina when they were out for a walk as children. She remembers being scared and having to run home to get away from his car. As they ran away, Stella hurt her ankle and desperately wanted Kookom to comfort her. Lou did not want to tell Cheryl what happened, but Paulina did anyway, which caused a fight between the girls. Cheryl called the police to alert them of a “pervert […] creeping around [her] neighborhood” (169). They told her to not allow her children to walk around by themselves. She calls Kookom again, and she talks to her about her children. Stella learns that Emily was attacked, and she realizes that the assault that she witnessed is connected to the rape of Emily.

Part 3, Chapter 16 Summary: “Lou”

Lou goes home and spends time with Jake before going to sleep. When she wakes up, she thinks of a young girl, Cedar-Sage, whom she placed with a family in the foster care system. She thinks about how people can go through the world either with their head down or up; Lou prefers to “hold [her] head up and go forward” (176). Jake tells Lou that Emily and Ziggy went to a gang party unknowingly, but he knows that the owner of the house is Alex. He reassures her that he is not part of a gang.

Going back to the hospital, Lou discovers that Cheryl is angry with the doctor for wanting to discharge Emily because she believes that the hospital “wants to get rid of her” (180). Cheryl takes this as a sign of the hospital not caring for Emily’s well-being. Kookom starts to sing, and Lou thinks of how Rain died at this hospital. She then offers to stay at the hospital with Emily to wait for the police to come to question Emily again.

Part 3, Chapter 17 Summary: “Paulina”

Paulina sits beside Emily as Officer Scott and Christie come into the room, and Emily attempts to answer their questions regarding the events leading up to the crime. However, Emily begins to get upset and does not want to talk to them anymore. Paulina feels as though Emily is hiding something—not just from the police but from her as well, and she becomes upset. Once Emily reveals that she went to a party to see Clayton, Paulina figures out who he is, and she tells the police his full name, believing that he hurt her daughter. She feels guilty for having said anything, and Pete reassures her that everything will be okay. She gets into an argument with Emily, and she promises that she will fix this because of how adamant Emily is that Clayton did not do anything. Focusing on her relationship with Pete, Paulina thinks about the first time that he expressed his love for her, and she worries that she trusts him too much despite her attempt at keeping him at a distance.

Part 3, Chapter 18 Summary: “Stella”

Thinking about her childhood best friend, Elsie, Stella makes her way to Kookom’s apartment, where she spends the next couple of days with her children. She meets Cheryl inside, and Stella thinks about how much Cheryl looks like Kookom. The narrator comments on how all the women in the Charles/Traverse family look like each other and that even Stella’s daughter, Mattie, follows in this comparison. Stella apologizes for having not seen her family in a long time, and Cheryl consoles Stella before she starts to get upset.

Kookom, who is excited to see her great-grandchildren, appears noticeably older and worn out to Stella. She worries for the health of Kookom, and she “feels a pang of missing the old house on the Atlantic” where she grew up with Kookom, Lou, and Paulina (196). She asks how Paulina and Emily are doing, and she becomes overwhelmed with guilt.

Being back in Kookom’s home, Stella remembers spending time with Elsie. When they were teenagers, Elsie was raped by a couple of guys in their class at a party. Lou, Paulina, and Stella found Elsie as it was happening, and they took her home and argued over whether they should report the crime or not. Elsie was taken to a home for young, single mothers, and Stella never saw her again until they reached adulthood. Stella passed Elsie on the street and attempted to grab her attention. However, Elsie walked by her and showed no signs of recognition.

Part 3, Chapter 19 Summary: “Zegwan”

Ziggy lies on the couch and waits for her father and grandfather to visit her. While she waits, she spends time with Rita, who keeps smoking cigarettes to curb her anxiety over having her ex-husband coming over. Ziggy tries to believe that Emily is okay, but she worries for her best friend and wants to see her for herself. Ziggy hopes that her grandfather will ease her own pain. She has not seen her father in over a month, which is unusual because she normally goes to his house in the bush every second Sunday. Once her father and grandfather arrive, Ziggy notices how much her parents come together in times of need; this makes her feel like “nothing else seems wrong anymore” (212). She talks to her grandfather about the attack, and he consoles her until they have to leave.

After they leave, Ziggy notices her brother, Sunny, walking out of their apartment with a black bandana in his pocket, which symbolizes his affiliation with one of the gangs. Rita recognizes that her son is going out to take revenge for the attack, and she calls their father to find him. Ziggy realizes that she was not worried about Sunny until her mother told her that everything would be okay.

Part 3, Chapter 20 Summary: “Tommy”

Tommy reviews his case notes as he rides with Christie to interview Alex and Phoenix because they were given the address to the house of the party. He thinks about how he discussed the case with Hannah, who tells him that gang members are violent and that he cannot reason with them. He wants to prove to Hannah that he can find justice. Once they arrive at the house, Alex and Phoenix lie to him about who they are, and the two police officers leave. However, they quickly find out that Alex lied about his identity, and they plan to report the incident to their superiors. Tommy, then, remembers how Emily told him that her attackers were “[just] four gang bangers. With long hair” (228).

Part 3, Chapter 21 Summary: “Phoenix”

As soon as the police officers leave the house, Alex kicks Phoenix out of his home, and he tells her that she is no longer allowed to stay with him. Rather than reacting to him, Phoenix calmly leaves despite it being an extremely cold night. She has nowhere else to go, so she sits in a coffee shop until it closes.

Phoenix thinks about her sisters, Cedar-Sage and Sparrow, and her mother, Elsie, who lost custody of her children due to her drug addiction. She looks at pictures of her family and remembers how much fun she had as a child. Her grandmother, Grandmère, told her about dressing up like “she was a real important lady,” despite being discriminated against for being a “half breed” (234). Phoenix walks past her old house where she lived with her sisters, mother, and grandparents before sneaking back into Alex’s basement after he goes to sleep.

Part 3, Prologue-Chapter 21 Analysis

vermette uses the Prologue to anticipate the events in Part 3: The characters attempt to stay connected with their families and attempt to understand themselves through those around them. Rain comments how death has allowed her to let go of her physical body, but she misses the “feel of someone’s skin” against her own, emphasizing a need for this closeness that the other characters are actively trying to gain in the physical world (157). This longing for touch also provides a brief balm in the novel in which human contact has a soothing rather than dangerous quality, giving the reader a short respite from the violence of the main plot. Furthermore, the narrator says that “[the] dead don’t hang on, the living do” (158). This language implies that the experiences of the past confine the characters; they struggle to not only understand their trauma but also to prevent it from dictating their futures.

Stella is overcome with loneliness and longing for not only her mother but also her grandmother, so her decision to visit her in the city provides her an opportunity to confront her past. When Stella thinks of Elsie, who is later revealed to be Phoenix’s mother, vermette links the characters in an increasingly connected web to illustrate Intergenerational Trauma and the Importance of Healing. The flashback to Elsie’s rape provides context to not only the violence that has plagued these women’s lives but the intergenerational trauma that also affects Phoenix. Stella claims that after this incident she lost touch with Elsie: “Stella stayed far away, first out of respect, and then out of habit” (206). The word “habit” does not just implicate Stella’s actions but implies that she is repeating something that has been enacted for generations: ignoring sexual violence and not giving support to its survivors. vermette hence suggests the harm of societal “habit” that allows trauma to repeat itself. She juxtaposes this “habit” with the cluster of support building around Emily during the novel, which includes Stella making her way back to her family.

Ziggy also depends on her family to help her move on from the shame and hurt that she endures from the night of the party. When her father and grandfather come to visit, she leans on them for support; her grandfather holds her hand and comforts her while she cries, claiming that he is also “so sad this has happened” (211). The act of holding her hand grounds her to him, as though she is literally and physically holding on to him to keep her from getting lost in grief, just as Stella does with Kookom. This nonviolent moment of touch connects with Rain’s desire for the “feel of someone’s skin” (157) and emphasizes the potential of touch for healing instead of violence. However, while Ziggy attempts to utilize her family for strength, the narrator draws attention to how her brother, Sunny, leaves their apartment with a black bandana, indicating his affiliation with Alex’s rival gang. By incorporating this into the novel, vermette further explores The Impact of Violence on a Community. Ziggy is a survivor of this violence, and her brother leaves the family community in this moment to enact further violence.

By the end of Part 3, vermette solidifies the connections between the characters when Lou is reminded of a foster child, Cedar-Sage, and when Phoenix thinks of her mother, Elsie. After being kicked out of Alex’s house, Phoenix looks at a picture of Elsie, just as Tommy remembered the picture of his own mother in Part 2 in an attempt to feel connected to happier memories. Phoenix thinks, “Elsie is bending over and laughing […]. They got so many presents that year. It was almost like Elsie knew that was going to be their last happy Christmas” (233). By focusing on how happy they were, Phoenix begins to allow herself to hold on to pleasant memories. However, she quickly “checks herself” and “slips the photo back behind others” (233). Phoenix’s connections with the other characters are evident by now to the reader but not to Phoenix herself, building suspense surrounding her uncertain future as vermette presents a community with the power to connect with Phoenix but separated from her by violence and circumstance.

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