The Lovely Bones

Lindsey and Samuel graduate from Temple University and travel back to Norristown on Samuel’s motorcycle. As they get close, it starts to rain, and they pull off the highway into the forest to wait out the storm. Susie, having watched Lindsey grow up and do all the things she would never get to do, knows that Samuel is “her one and only” (234). As they walk through the underbrush, they see an abandoned and dilapidated Victorian house, which they enter to get out of the rain. Samuel, who has become obsessed with carpentry, marvels at the construction of the house and decides that he wants to buy and repair it. Samuel and Lindsey have sex inside the house, and Samuel proposes marriage. Lindsey accepts, and Susie is so happy that she gayly runs around in heaven. Knowing that Jack will be worried, Lindsey and Samuel decide to run the 8 miles back home through the storm in their t-shirts and underwear. Susie realizes that Lindsey is not running towards or away from her, and that after 8 years, the wound of Susie’s death has finally closed for Lindsey.

At home, Jack waits anxiously for Lindsey and Samuel to return after their graduation.