Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Everything, Everything, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Coming of Age
Trust and Lies
Family, Abuse, and Bravery
The Value of Experience
Summary
Analysis
Olly’s dad leaves for work around nine a.m. and gets home late in the evening, looking as though he’s already drunk. He spends the rest of his night drinking on the porch, falls asleep, and eventually stumbles inside. Maddy has no idea what Olly’s mom, Olly, and Kara are doing. Just after Christmas, Olly’s dad moves away too. Maddy hopes he’s not going where Olly, Kara, and their mom went. She studies the house and wonders how it can look exactly the same with nobody in it.
The house has changed in Maddy’s mind since the boy she loved used to live there and introduced her to some of what’s possible in the outside world. For her, the house’s meaning has changed entirely—proof again that she cannot just go back to the way things were, as even the familiar and reliable parts of her neighborhood seem different now.
Themes
A few days later, Maddy goes through the emails from Olly that she put in her trash folder. He sent her a few limericks that make her laugh until she cries. In other emails, he writes about talking to Olly’s mom about getting help for herself and for Kara. His mom might have decided to leave when Olly said he couldn’t be a part of the family if she stayed, but she might’ve made the decision when Olly told her about Maddy and how Maddy was willing to do anything to live. Olly says his mom thinks that Maddy is brave. In a haiku, Olly writes that he loves Maddy.
Though Maddy doesn’t give her thoughts on the matter, it’s possible that hearing from Olly that his mom thinks Maddy is brave will help Maddy put a better spin on what happened to her in Hawaii. Choosing to separate forcefully from Mom and go was a brave thing, even if she regrets it for now. It introduced her to who she could be out in the world, while also allowing her to build intimacy with someone other than Mom.
Themes
