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Iano Tavoularis
Aldus (Dusty) Tavoularis is the infant son of Zeke Tavoularis and Helene. After his mother’s suicide, Dusty moves to the Vineland house and lives with his grandparents, Willa and Iano, aunt Tig, and great-grandfather Nick. Dusty is prone to extreme crying fits in his first months of life but calms once the family learns he is longing for human contact. Though Zeke prioritizes work over his son, Tig cares for Dusty as a mother.
Aldus (Dusty) Tavoularis Quotes in Unsheltered
The Unsheltered quotes below are all either spoken by Aldus (Dusty) Tavoularis or refer to Aldus (Dusty) Tavoularis. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 3: Investigators Quotes
But two minimum wages weren’t noticeably better than one. She’d probably written lines like that in her better-paid journalist days, believing herself savvy to working-class woes. In some sheltered life she could barely see from this one. Ticking down the list, her father-in-law was a liability, not an asset. Stunningly, her Harvard-educated son fell into the same category. It made no sense but there it was. Zeke had mind-blowing debts and an infant in his care. If forced to leave this rent-free house, they would disperse to various refuges she could not make herself think about. And yet. How were they not just a normal family?
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It felt surreal, watching her family bicker about abstract catastrophe under an actual collapsing roof, but it was a relief to see her son animated again. Zeke embodied the contradiction of his generation: jaded about the fate of the world, idealistic about personal prospects. A house built on youth’s easy courage. And Tig in her way was also brave, dissecting the world as she saw it, believing her strategies mattered. In a world of people who either let things happen or made them happen, these kids were instigators. Willa felt obsolete. The need to shelter her family never lifted its weight from her shoulders, but in practical terms she was useful to no one there but the dog and the baby.
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Chapter 7: The Cake Quotes
“Damn Hurricane Sandy and the damn Park Service budget cuts. We can’t afford to stop doing the shit that’s screwing up the weather, and can’t afford to pick up the pieces after we do our shit.”
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“What if Tig is right?” she asked.
“When is Tig ever right? About what.”
“That the problem is actually the world running out of the stuff we need. That capitalism can only survive on permanent expansion but the well eventually runs dry.”
“Nothing is ever that simple, moro. First of all, well in the sense you’re using it is just a metaphor.”
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Chapter 15: Unexpected Reserves Quotes
“You made such a big deal about security that you sacrificed giving us any long-term community.”
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“I guess your plan would be to live somewhere perfect and give Dusty roots.”
“No place is perfect. Don’t be so touchy.”
“Well, it’s been kind of a week, Tig. I just found out our house is slated for demolition.”
“Mom. The permafrost is melting. Millions of acres of it.”
Willa tried to see the connection. “And I’m just worried about my house. That’s your point?”
Tig shook her head. “It’s so, so scary. It’s going to be fire and rain, Mom. Storms we can’t deal with, so many people homeless. Not just homeless but placeless. Cities go underwater and then what? You can’t shelter in place anymore when there isn’t a place.”
Willa tucked her hands between her knees and declined to believe these things.
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Chapter 17: The Downfall Quotes
“The hard thing with Zeke,” Tig finally said, “is he has to always win.”
“You’re right. And also to be sure he’s doing the right thing. For Dusty, in this case. I’ll call him later. You’ll have to trust me to handle this. I can walk him through it.”
Tig shook her head. “He would have to figure out how to see it as his win.”
“I think he will. Because it is.”
Willa studied the wide-eyed face of this child who expected nothing and mostly got it. She’d had no use for anything Willa ever tried to give her, it seemed. But maybe this. “Sometimes the right thing isn’t a thing but a person.”
“And that’s me?”
“And that’s you.”
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Aldus (Dusty) Tavoularis Character Timeline in Unsheltered
The timeline below shows where the character Aldus (Dusty) Tavoularis appears in Unsheltered. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1: Falling House
...disabled father-in-law (Nick). Petrofaccio noticed a crib upstairs, but this is for Willa’s newborn grandson (Dusty) who lives in Boston.
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...killed herself in their apartment. Willa is shocked—Helene just gave birth to their first child, Aldus (later nicknamed Dusty), weeks earlier. Her body is still in the apartment as Zeke waits...
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...funeral takes place five days after Willa arrives in Boston. Exhausted from taking care of Dusty, Willa wears one of Helene’s Armani suits to the church and wonders if Helene’s friends...
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...Willa. On the phone, Iano asserts the unplanned pregnancy was a bad idea as if Dusty hasn’t already been born. Willa leaves most of the childcare to Zeke, who takes comfort...
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Zeke has no plan for where he and Dusty will live. His friends have turned him away because of the baby, and he is...
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...but she had none. Sensing Zeke’s anger at Helene, Willa suppresses her own, thinking of Dusty’s future perception of his mother. Zeke claims that a person can do everything right and...
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Chapter 3: Investigators
Willa returns to work, listening for Dusty, who cries often. The bills accumulating on her desk overwhelm her, and she longs to...
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...her daughter asked to be paid through barter. Zeke returns from a four-hour drive with Dusty, seeming refreshed. Over dinner, he remarks on an old asylum near Vineland’s outskirts. Tig knows...
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Chapter 7: The Cake
...Trust funding their house repairs. They are visiting a walking trail near Cape May with Aldus, whom they have nicknamed Dusty. Iano suggested a change of scenery to help with Willa’s...
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...this peninsula. Nearby, two birders admire the swans, who mate for life. When they ask Dusty’s name, Willa lies and says “George.” Afterward, she and Iano discuss the baby’s strange moniker...
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...proximity to homelessness despite their relative privilege. They backtrack to another path by a lake. Dusty seems happy to be outside and against Iano’s chest. Sometimes Tig and Jorge, the neighbor,...
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...Willa’s anxiety about how much grant money they’d need to raise to fix the house. Dusty sleeps, and Willa and Iano stop to watch a huge flock of birds land in...
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...their house. She has plans to visit the Historical Society again. Willa’s phone rings, waking Dusty and startling the birds into flight. A text arrives—it’s Tig on someone else’s phone. She...
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Chapter 9: The Front of the Line
In the present, it’s near dawn when Willa, who’s been feeding Dusty, lets a pink-haired girl—presumably one of Tig’s friends—into the house. The girl, Gwen, fails to...
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...in the same direction, moving from personal ambition to mundane daily tasks, namely caring for Dusty, who is strapped to her chest. Zeke is in Boston meeting with clients. Willa’s latest...
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...the kids were born. To her friends’ irritation, Willa forgave him. Now, she wonders if Dusty’s presence has returned Iano to an earlier state of mind.
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...feels guilty for leaving Nick alone overnight. Willa had to leave the hospital early because Dusty is eating more. Iano’s students’ essays are bad, giving Willa an opening to bring up...
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Leaving Dusty at home with Iano, Willa goes to the hospital to see Nick. The nursing staff...
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Chapter 11: Revelations
Back in the present, Willa is lying on a mattress on the floor, waiting for Dusty to nap, when her phone buzzes. Ignoring the call, she considers how parenting recommendations have...
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...with her daughter. Iano talks with Zeke, who is pushing Nick’s wheelchair, while Willa carries Dusty. Willa feels like a voyeur watching Tig interact playfully with Jorge’s family, allowing Jorge to...
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Zeke doesn’t offer to take Dusty. He’s had a lawyer draw up a document to give Willa and Iano custody. This...
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...a snide remark about Tig living with their parents, and Tig implies that Zeke abandoned his child . With this, the siblings resume their earlier argument about politics. Zeke claims economic growth...
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At his six-month checkup, the doctor confirms that Dusty is healthy. Nick, however, seems close to death. Willa and Tig keep vigil in his...
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...children equally. But Tig retorts that her point is that Zeke hasn’t taken responsibility for Dusty. Willa knows this is true, given the imminent custody agreement, but she maintains that Zeke...
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...feels shamed that Tig is the most practical of them, making baby food and knitting Dusty’s clothes. She and Tig reach an uneasy truce in their argument.
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Chapter 13: Mr. Occam’s Razor
...the mornings, so the rest of the family has learned the particulars of his care. Dusty is asleep. Willa feels guilty for taking off and leaving Jorge, a bystander, to pick...
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...visit the cemetery. Willa and Tig load Nick into his wheelchair and set out with Dusty in tow. Despite her promise not to argue with Nick, Willa can’t abide his praise...
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Chapter 15: Unexpected Reserves
Back in the present, Nick dies quietly in his sleep. A week later, Willa feeds Dusty and examines the baby-food jar holding some of Nick’s remains. Dixie, the dog, sleeps under...
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...Tig’s good graces. Tig is getting a phone as the first step toward possibly becoming Dusty’s legal guardian. Iano is staying in his niece Artemisia’s old room. Art is small but...
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Some days later, Willa, Tig, and Dusty take Nick’s ashes to the cemetery. They bring a picnic as cover for their illicit...
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...space between them. She outlived him by over 40 years. Willa and Tig sit while Dusty naps. Tig finds the cemetery comforting because of all the lives that have literally been...
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...dream of security which never materialized. Frustrated, Willa questions what Tig would do differently with Dusty. The house’s likely demolition has Willa on edge. Tig says that, when the permafrost melts,...
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...a mother, but Tig is grateful for her own adaptability. She wants to look after Dusty in the new world of scarcity that’s coming. Again, Willa can’t accept this vision of...
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Chapter 17: The Downfall
Willa and Iano host a potluck for Dusty’s first birthday. Zeke drives in and Tig invites her friends, so the backyard is full...
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...of Helene. When his life is more stable, Zeke plans to hire a nanny so Dusty can live in Boston part-time. Willa suggests they discuss things when his head is clearer....
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Jorge arrives with dessert for Dusty—chocolate cake smashed to look like dirt, laced with gummy worms. Zeke disparages Jorge for stealing...
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...them, her community supports her, and she’s made a strong case for taking custody of Dusty.
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...go through their boxes of childhood memories. Sitting at the table with her children and Dusty, Willa sorts through her own collected articles, preferring the substantial weight of the physical papers...
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...her funeral, but she forgot. She blames excessive materialism for losing track of the passage. Dusty manages to open bottle rattle. Tig fishes gravel out of Dusty’s mouth, saying “Give those...
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...“shambles.” From the corner on her walk home, Willa sees Tig and some friends watching Dusty try to stand up on his own. Not wanting to break his concentration, Willa stops,...
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