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Summary
Chapter Forty-One
During the summer Belly is twelve, Mr. Fisher and Conrad are away on a fishing trip while Jeremiah has stayed behind because he’s sick. He confides to Belly that he feels his father prefers Conrad to him. He says Conrad only joined the football team to please Mr. Fisher, but then he turned out to be surprisingly good at the sport. Jeremiah asks Belly if she likes Conrad. She denies having a crush, but he does not believe her. In an inner monologue, Belly describes when she realized the depth of her feelings for Conrad. Earlier during the summer Belly was twelve, Conrad had planned to make a special breakfast for Father’s Day. However, Mr. Fisher was unable to travel to Cousins Beach that weekend. Although he was disappointed, Conrad valiantly attempted to cook the breakfast anyway. Watching him attempt to overcome his sorrow, Belly thought to herself, “I will love this boy forever.”
Chapter Forty-Two
Late in the summer, Belly confronts Conrad outside the beach house as he returns from a morning run. She decides to reveal her feelings because she does not want another year to pass without telling him the truth. Belly takes him by surprise, blurting out that she’s loved him since she was ten years old. She describes the moments when her crush developed and grew stronger, including the time he saved her in the ocean. Conrad takes a long moment before responding that she should not love him. She replies that she knows he has feelings for her, too. However, he denies having feelings for her and calls her a kid.
Stung by the rejection, Belly presses the issue. She tells him that he can either admit the truth or they can no longer be friends, escalating the confrontation into an argument. Conrad accuses her of playing games with him, Jeremiah, and Cam. She tells him that he has been selfish all summer and that his parents’ divorce is not an excuse for his poor behavior. As Conrad steps closer to Belly, she feels that he is about to kiss her. But he grabs her arms and gives her a quick shake instead. As Belly begins to cry, Jeremiah approaches. He tells Conrad to stop being a jerk and chastises him for taking out his anger on others. The altercation turns physical as the brothers begin to brawl, wrestling each other on the ground. Belly screams at them to stop, and Laurel rushes out to investigate the commotion. She breaks up the fight, separating the two boys. Then Laurel asks, “You know, don’t you?” Susannah appears in the doorway. Stepping outside, she sorrowfully embraces Jeremiah and Conrad.
Laurel pulls Belly away from the emotional scene to give the Fishers some privacy. They step inside the house where Laurel reveals a secret the two mothers have kept all summer. Susannah’s cancer has returned and has spread to her liver. She did not want the kids to know until the end of the season. Susannah wanted them all to have one last perfect summer together. Later that night, Belly cries alone in her bed.
Analysis
Although Mr. Fisher does not appear at the summer house the year Belly turns sixteen, his presence looms large over the story. Mr. Fisher influences the relationship between his sons. Based on Jeremiah’s complaints to Belly, the two brothers are competing for their father’s attention just as they later compete for Belly’s affection. Conrad joins the football team not because he enjoys the sport, but because his father does. “He just tries to be what our dad wants,” Jeremiah tells Belly. This frustrates him because he likes football and seems to want to bond with his father over it. Mr. Fisher also indirectly plays a role in Belly developing a crush on Conrad. As she watches him cook breakfast for his absent father, she realizes she loves Conrad. In addition, Susannah and Mr. Fisher’s impending divorce and his hesitation to visit foreshadow all the upcoming relationship shifts between the Fishers and Conklins. Their lives are about to change as marriages dissolve, teenagers go off to school, and an illness threatens to shorten Susannah’s life. As a result, Mr. Fisher has a strong presence in the novel even though he does not appear in the present-day storyline.
Jeremiah’s declaration of love for Belly inspires her to finally face her crush on Conrad. All summer long, Belly works to maintain the status quo because she fears any disruption in the delicate balance between the Conklin and Fisher families. However, Jeremiah’s revelation creates an unexpected shift in Belly’s thinking. Things may never be the same between Belly and Jeremiah now that she knows he cares for her. She can’t tell herself that they are only friends after his admission. As a result, Belly no longer needs to fear things changing between her and the Fishers because Jeremiah has already set change in motion. Jeremiah proves to be more mature than Belly and even Conrad because he is the first character to say exactly what he feels for another character to that character. Characters may joke about Belly crushing on Conrad but neither ever speaks about it truthfully to one other until Belly confronts him outside of the beach house with an ultimatum.
In Chapter Forty-Two, many characters reveal long-held secrets at once, shifting the novel into a chaotic climax of revelations. It begins with Belly telling Conrad she’s in love with him. Although the others have known about her crush, her feelings had gone mostly unspoken. Confessing the crush threatens Belly and Conrad’s friendship, due to her ultimatum and his unhealthy response. He rejects Belly, insists that he does not reciprocate, and even grabs her by the arms and shakes her. The revelation also results in a confrontation between Conrad and Jeremiah and a physical fight. The sudden brawl leads Laurel to tell Belly the secret that the other characters have known all summer. Susannah is dying. The teenager realizes at that moment why Susannah has been so weak, Jeremiah so sensitive, and Conrad so sullen for the past few months. Suddenly overcome with fear of losing the woman who was like a second mother to her, Belly's concerns over romance with the Fisher boys lose their importance. Unearthing these buried secrets results in the first moment of the novel when all of the characters know all of the secrets and can process them together.
