Eleanor and Park: Chapter 14 Summary & Analysis

Eleanor, DeNice, and Beebi have become fast friends, and their dreaded gym class now feels less lonely for all of them. The girls laugh and joke as they watch their classmates struggle to swing over a gymnastics horse, and at the end of the period, DeNice and Beebi invite Eleanor to sit with them at lunch. She happily accepts their invitation.

In English class, Park and Cal are teamed up for an in-class exercise, but discuss homecoming plans instead of Romeo and Juliet. Cal is nervous that Kim likes Park, and suggests Park ask her to homecoming so that when they all go in a group, Cal can maneuver Kim away from Park. Park is stunned by the stupidity of Cal’s plans.

That afternoon, on the school bus, Eleanor sits with Park, discussing comic books. Each day when she gets on the bus she feels a pang of nervousness that he won’t talk to her or acknowledge her—but so far, the two haven’t been able to stop talking during the entire bus ride each morning and each afternoon. They trade thoughts about music, television, movies, and comics, and aren’t afraid to argue with one another. They discuss what they’d like their superhero powers to be, and Eleanor says she’d want to be able to fly—Park agrees.

That night, after taekwondo, Park doesn’t even bother changing out of his uniform before heading over to Eleanor’s to show her something important. On the way, he runs into Steve, who lives on his block—Steve teases him about his “girlfriend Bloody Mary.” Park insists Eleanor isn’t his girlfriend, but Steve points out that Park is “sneaking out ninja-style” to see her. Though Park doesn’t know exactly which house is Eleanor’s, he uses the things she’s told him about where she lives to figure out which one it must be. He approaches the front door and knocks, passing a large Rottweiler asleep on the porch. A man who looks “too young to be Eleanor’s dad” answers the door, and is hostile to Park when he asks for Eleanor, closing the door on his face.

A few moments later, however, Eleanor comes to the door. The panicked look on her face tells Park that it was a “mistake” for him to come over. Her face lights up, however, when Park pulls the newest issue of Watchmen from inside his uniform. Park asks if she wants to read it with him now, and Eleanor hurriedly leads Paul across the street to the stoop of the elementary school, where they read together under a large streetlight. When they are finished reading, Park wants to stay and talk to Eleanor, but she tells him that she needs to get home, and hurries back across the street.

Eleanor walks back inside the house to find Richie sitting in the dark, watching TV. She tries to sneak past him to her room, but he stops him to ask if the boy who came to the door is her boyfriend. Eleanor says he isn’t—but Richie calls Eleanor “a bitch in heat.” Eleanor ignores Richie’s words and heads to bed, climbing under the covers and trying to calm herself down and keep from screaming in rage. Eleanor is angry that though she’s tried to keep Park “in a place in her head that […] Richie couldn’t get to,” Richie has managed to infiltrate that space anyway.