The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

by

Carson McCullers

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The Heart is a Lonely Hunter: Part 2, Chapter 5 Summary & Analysis

Summary
Analysis
December brings heavy rain for days on end. On the first clear day of the month, the neighborhood kids rejoice in the nice weather—but Mick does not join them outside to play. She’s been staying after school an hour each day to play piano, and pays another student named Delores Brown 50 cents a week to give her lessons. Mick takes the 50 cents out of her own lunch money, and, as a result, is always hungry.
Music remains a way for Mick to try to mitigate her feelings of loneliness and isolation, and she is so desperate to learn more about music and create it herself that she sacrifices her physical well-being in order to do so.
Themes
Communication and Self-Expression Theme Icon
After eating, Mick goes outside to join the other kids. Bubber and his friend Spareribs are playing with a gun Spareribs has inherited from his recently deceased father. Mick spots Harry Minowitz on the porch next door and makes a Nazi salute at him as a joke—in response, he goes inside and shuts the door. Mick instantly feels badly for hurting his feelings. Over the last few months Mick and Harry, who have a few classes together, have gotten closer. Mick sits down on the porch and goes into her “inside room”—a private place in her mind that’s just for her.
Mick remains childish, contrarian, and insensitive—even as she seems to be working on deepening her relationships and questioning her actions. Mick feels remorse for hurting Harry, but she doesn’t even fully understand the weight her cruel actions have.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
Communication and Self-Expression Theme Icon
Racism, Inequality, and Injustice Theme Icon
The Individual vs. Society Theme Icon
Quotes
Mick soon gets annoyed with the kids’ chatter and decides to go the library. Bubber is playing with Spareribs’s rifle, and she warns him to be careful and not let anything happen to Ralph. As Mick heads down the steps, however, she spots Baby Wilson across the street dressed in a fancy pink outfit. Bubber calls Baby over, but instead of answering him, she does a handspring. He continues calling to Baby, but she ignores him. Bubber pretends to shoot Baby with the rifle—but the safety isn’t on, and the gun goes off. Baby falls to the sidewalk in a heap. Mick and the others all run over to her—she is covered in blood. Bubber runs away.
Bubber’s actions in this passage will soon have vast unintended consequences not just for him and Baby, but for both their families. Bubber’s carelessness and shortsightedness—the stuff of childhood—will soon be impacted forever as this event forces Bubber to grow up quickly.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
The next several minutes pass by in a strange blur. Mick feels her mouth and body move in slow motion as her father comes out to help carry Baby inside the house. Baby’s mother Lucile comes hurrying over, and together, she and Mr. Kelly ride in an ambulance with Baby to the hospital. As all the commotion slows, Mick realizes Bubber is nowhere to be found. Later that evening, Mick’s father comes home and reports that Baby has a skull fracture but won’t die. He asks where Bubber is. 
The intense and surreal nature of the accident isolates Mick from her body, her thoughts, and her family—it’s like she goes into a version of her “inside room” to protect herself from the fear and trauma of what’s happening around her. This indicates how isolation can be a defense mechanism, for Mick and for many other characters as well.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
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Mick knows exactly where to find Bubber—he is in their old tree house in the yard. She goes up to talk to him. Bubber is crying, full of regret over hurting Baby. Rather than comforting him, Mick decides to trick him. She tells him that Baby is dead and that the whole town is out hunting for him. Mick says she thinks Bubber’s bound for the electric chair. She tells Bubber to stay in the treehouse—in a few days, she promises, she’ll bring him something to eat. Mick climbs down from the tree house and heads back inside, proud of herself for teaching Bubber a lesson.
Once Mick realizes that Baby is going to be okay, she goes back to being her playful, feisty self—and yet as she teases Bubber in this scene, she doesn’t realize that to her brother, the threat of what he’s done is still very real.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
Communication and Self-Expression Theme Icon
There is an anxious air inside the house and the whole family is discussing the shame and hardship this incident stands to bring them. At one point in the evening, Lucile Wilson calls the house and says she’s coming over to have a talk with the Kellys. Mr. Kelly says he’s worried that Mrs. Wilson will sue them. Mick suddenly feels terrible for Bubber and worries that something bad actually will happen to him. Mick longs to run back out to the tree house and comfort Bubber but soon Mrs. Wilson arrives in a taxi.  
As the situation once again grows grave, Mick realizes that her childish games have been cruel and irresponsible and longs to amend her actions—but she can’t, which forces her to recognize that growing older comes with inescapable consequences.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
Lucile Wilson comes inside—Biff Brannon is with her. The two of them sit in the living room and explain that while she isn’t planning on suing the Kellys or pressing charges against Bubber, she’s only refraining from doing either because she doesn’t want Baby swept up in a “common lawsuit” that could damage her reputation. Mrs. Wilson says that she does want them to pay for Baby’s care and convalescence. The Kellys agree to pay, and Mrs. Wilson departs, promising to be in touch with a total soon.
Lucile Wilson is clearly taking advantage of the Kellys—while she’s not suing them in court, she’s enacting an even harsher punishment on them by extorting them outside the bounds of the law.
Themes
The Individual vs. Society Theme Icon
Mick runs out to the tree house and climbs up to find Bubber—but he isn’t there. Mick realizes he must be running away. Mick runs back inside and tells the others that Bubber has run away from his hiding place. Biff Brannon, who has stayed behind, takes a search party including Portia, Mick, Mr. Kelly, and John Singer out in his car to look at Portia’s house, but Bubber isn’t there. He has, however, been to the house, and has left a note explaining that he’s bound for “Florada.” Mick suspects that the note is a ruse, and that Bubber is really headed for Atlanta. The group gets back in the car and, together, they drive down the highway in search of Bubber.
Even though Bubber has done something terrible—and has brought even more strife into his family’s life—everyone bands together to try to search for him when they fear real harm might come to him. The Kellys (and the other characters helping them) stick together even in difficult times, showing that there are opportunities for real connection in their town—even if many of the main characters don’t recognize those opportunities.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
The American South Theme Icon
After they drive half a mile out of town, Mick spots Bubber on the side of the road. He has a butcher knife on him, and Mr. Kelly gets out of the car to wrestle it away from him. Bubber kicks and screams the whole way home and has to be dragged inside. At the house, Bubber throws a tantrum and cries on his bed for hours. Mick sleeps in Bubber’s bed and tries to hug and comfort him in the night, but when she wakes up in the morning, he is not in bed.
Mick tries to make Bubber feel less alone, but he continues to isolate himself from her and the rest of the family out of grief and shame. Even though he’s a young child and essentially not to blame for what happened, Bubber’s experiences show how trauma can lead to isolation, even when others try to connect.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
Communication and Self-Expression Theme Icon
The Individual vs. Society Theme Icon
As the days go by and Christmas approaches, Mick notices a change in Bubber. He insists on going by his given name, George—even as kids in the neighborhood cruelly start calling him “Baby-Killer Kelly.” Once outgoing and genial, Bubber becomes quiet and lonesome. At Christmas, Mick sleeps in Bubber’s room again. She begs him to stop acting so strangely, and though they enjoy a nice morning opening presents the next day, Mick can’t shake the sense that things will never be the same.
Mick knows that things are changing forever—not just within her, but within the landscape of her family more largely. Her attempts to connect with her brother fail as he isolates and alters himself, communicating the feelings he’s grappling with to no one.
Themes
Loneliness and Isolation Theme Icon
Communication and Self-Expression Theme Icon
The Individual vs. Society Theme Icon