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Chapters 10–12

Summary: Chapter 10

The next morning, Julie administers Will’s trial medicine and says she is glad to see Will finally sticking to a regimen and feeling hopeful. Will reminds himself to not get overly hopeful but can’t help wondering if there’s a chance the trial will work. Will finishes his drawing of Stella by adding flames coming out of her mouth and slips the drawing under Stella’s door. Stella laughs and FaceTimes Will, and Will notices a drawing of lungs above Stella’s bed. Will asks who drew the picture, and Stella answers it was her sister, Abby. Will says he would like to see more of Abby’s work, and Stella snaps at him and ends the call. Will heads out of his room to confront Stella and sees his friends, Jason and Hope, who have come to visit him. Will realizes that while he has seen Stella’s parents and friends visiting her, he has not seen Abby, nor has Stella mentioned Abby until their call. Will tells Jason and Hope about Stella and shows them one of her videos, which Abby is in. Will tells them that the video is from a year ago and Abby has not been in a video since and that he believes something has happened to Abby.

Will goes to find Stella in the gym and asks if Abby has died. Stella confirms that she did and that Abby’s death is the reason why Stella is so committed to staying alive, as she cannot let her parents lose both of their children. Will tells her that she is not truly living by being in and out of hospitals, and Stella becomes angry and leaves.

Summary: Chapter 11

Back in her room, Stella reflects on how she was supposed to be with Abby on a trip to Arizona when Abby died. However, Stella was too sick to go, and so Abby went by herself. Six months after Abby died, Stella’s parents divorced, and ever since, Stella has been focused on staying alive for her parents’ sake. Stella texts Poe to meet her in the multipurpose lounge and tells him of her guilt over not being with her sister when she died. Poe reminds Stella that Abby’s death was not her fault. Stella suddenly feels pain in her side and realizes that the infection around her feeding tube has gotten worse. Dr. Hamid examines it and tells Stella that she will need surgery to excoriate the infected skin and replace her feeding tube. Stella knows that having surgery, which her lungs may not be able to handle, is just as risky as not having surgery, which would lead to the infection getting to her bloodstream. After Dr. Hamid leaves, Will slides an envelope under Stella’s door. Stella opens it to find a drawing of Will holding flowers and saying he is sorry.

Summary: Chapter 12

Waiting for a response from Stella, Will wanders around the hospital. Walking by the chapel, he hears Poe on the phone talking to his mother. After Poe hangs up, he explains to Will that he hasn’t seen his parents in two years, as they were deported to Colombia. Since Poe was born in the United States, he was able to remain in the country, and his parents wanted him to stay so he could continue getting medical treatment. Poe says his mother wants him to visit them, but there is not enough money. Will offers to give Poe money to see his parents, but Poe declines. That night, Will is anxious that he has not heard anything from Stella. He goes to her room, and Stella tells him that she will be having surgery the next morning. Will notices how nervous Stella seems and realizes this will be her first surgery without Abby.

Analysis: Chapters 10–12

These chapters reveal the reason for Stella’s desire to prevent her parents from experiencing another tragedy. As they have already lost one daughter and have lost each other, Stella feels they cannot bear losing her. Not only does Stella feel responsible for keeping her parents going, she also feels responsible for Abby’s death, as she was supposed to be on the trip when Abby died. The fact that Stella becomes angry when Will asks about Abby and that she cannot even talk about Abby shows the enormous weight of guilt Stella has felt ever since Abby’s death.

In these chapters, Stella’s influence on Will becomes evident. Will, who at the beginning of the novel felt no hope for the clinical trial, is now feeling better while on his regimen and allows himself to wonder if the trial might work. However, Stella and Will still clash when Will points out that Stella is merely existing by being in and out of hospitals instead of living. Earlier, Stella had been coming around to Will’s way of thinking and wondered what it would be like to live for herself. Now, the reminder of Abby’s death and therefore the obligation Stella feels to her parents to stay alive has driven her back to her initial position. At this point in the novel, Will wants to live life for himself, while Stella wants to survive to avoid hurting her parents further.

The immediate threat of death hangs over Stella for the first time in the novel as she finds she needs to have surgery to replace her feeding tube. While Stella has said she prepared herself for her eventual death long ago, Will notices that she is visibly nervous when she tells him about her surgery. Even though it is risky, the fact that Stella makes the choice to have the surgery shows she still wants to be eligible for new lungs, hoping to stay alive for as long as possible.

As Poe tells Will about his situation, Poe’s relationship with his parents is contrasted with both Stella’s and Will’s relationships with their own parents. While Will resents his mother’s persistence in getting him treatment and Stella feels the need to protect her parents from any possible bad news, Poe was forcibly separated from his parents. This causes Will to think about the unfairness of their situations. While Will can’t wait to get out of his mother’s control, Poe would like nothing more than to be with his parents but cannot. This disparity shows how vastly relationships between parents and children can vary and can affect how children transition into adulthood, whether they are ready or not. While Will may seem to value his independence, he has still had his mother to look after him his entire life. Meanwhile, Poe was forced into independence from his parents through no choice of his own.

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