All's Well

“She’s just not a very compelling heroine to me. She’s just … sort of pathetic, isn’t she?”

During a rehearsal mutiny, student actor Trevor critiques Helen, the protagonist of All’s Well That Ends Well. His dismissal of the fictional heroine mirrors the way Miranda is viewed by her students and colleagues. This blurs the distinction between Helen’s story and Miranda’s by suggesting that Miranda’s obsession with the play stems from her identification with a protagonist whom others dismiss as “pathetic.”

“Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie which we ascribe to heaven.”

One of the three mysterious men at The Canny Man quotes this line from Helen’s soliloquy in All’s Well That Ends Well. This literary allusion marks a pivotal moment, functioning as the direct offer of the novel’s central supernatural bargain. By invoking the play’s theme of a character taking proactive, almost magical, control of her fate, the man suggests to Miranda that a supernatural solution to her suffering lies not in external help but within her own will, initiating her turn toward a darker form of agency.

“‘I’m going to take ownership of your pain, Miranda,’ Mark said.”

Miranda recalls this promise that her physical therapist, Mark, made to her during their first session. The quote encapsulates the false hope offered by a medical system that ultimately fails her, with Mark’s initial vow of empathy devolving into dismissiveness. His declaration to “take ownership” is ironic, as it underscores a professional arrogance that presumes authority over Miranda’s body while invalidating her lived experience. It directly illustrates the theme of The Gendering and Invisibility of Chronic Pain.

“A tiny, bleak forest. Black, bare-branched trees of Plasticine. A low, full paper moon. Three little hags in shredded black in the corner. […] ‘Macbeth,’ I say.”

This description of the set model Hugo has built reveals to Miranda that her production has been usurped. The imagery of the maquette serves as a symbol for her loss of narrative control and professional power. The visual shift from her chosen play to a miniature version of Macbeth’s witch-haunted landscape directly mirrors the dark and vengeful direction her own story is taking, reinforcing the theme of The Blurring Lines Between Performance and Reality.

“No. My body is a black sky filled with bright stars of pain.”

In a meeting with the college dean and presidents, Miranda internally contrasts their superficial inquiries about her health with her physical reality. This metaphor externalizes the isolating experience of chronic pain, transforming her body into a vast, dark, and observable cosmos of suffering that those around her fail to see. The imagery of a “black sky” suggests despair and immensity, while “bright stars” conveys the sharp, piercing quality of her pain points. The sentence structure, beginning with a blunt “No,” creates a stark opposition between her internal truth and the social expectation to perform wellness.

“But pain can move, Ms. Fitch. It can switch. Easy. Easily. Do you know how easy? From house to house, from body to body. You can pass it along, you can give it away. Piece by piece.”

At the Canny Man pub, the middling man of the mysterious trio explains the nature of their “trick” to a desperate Miranda. This dialogue establishes the central, supernatural premise of the novel, explicitly defining chronic pain not as a personal, medical condition but as a transferable commodity. The repetition of “easy, easily” and the conversational question “Do you know how easy?” creates a tone of seductive persuasion, framing the diabolical bargain as a simple, logical solution to her suffering. The phrasing “pass it along” and “give it away” morally sanitizes the act of inflicting harm, presenting it as a form of redistribution rather than vengeance.

“I squeeze her wrist slightly, looking deep into her leaf-green eyes with their little brown flecks. Her eyes widen. Her skin pales. Her breath catches. I watch the script drop from her hands.”

During a confrontation over the student-led coup to stage Macbeth, Miranda touches Briana’s wrist. This moment marks the first direct transfer of pain from Miranda to another character, representing a pivotal shift from victimhood to agency. The author uses a series of short, declarative sentences to build tension and call attention to the physical, observable effects of the supernatural act. This close-up view of Briana’s sudden physical distress transforms Miranda’s internal suffering into an external, weaponized force, initiating the theme of The Morality of Reclaiming Power Through Vengeance.

“‘You seem different, Miranda,’ she says to me now. But she doesn’t say it like Hugo. Not smiling. Not curious. She looks at me with narrowed eyes like little pinpricks.”

Grace observes Miranda’s newfound vitality with suspicion rather than joy. This passage establishes Grace as a narrative foil whose skepticism grounds the supernatural events in a realistic interpersonal dynamic. The contrast between her reaction and that of the romantically interested Hugo highlights how Miranda’s transformation is perceived as either alluring or unsettling. Grace’s narrowed “pinprick” eyes serve as a visual metaphor for her focused, piercing suspicion, foreshadowing her role in uncovering the dark source of Miranda’s recovery.

“I reach out a hand to Mark. I grasp him firmly on the wrist. I look him in the eye and grip, grip as I slowly pull myself up.”

After her physical therapist, Mark, aggressively dismisses her improvement and causes her pain to return, Miranda falls and then pulls herself up by grabbing his wrist. This act is a conscious and vengeful reclamation of power against a figure who represents the medical establishment’s invalidation of her suffering. The repetition of the word “grip” and the detail of direct eye contact signal a deliberate transfer of power, distinguishing this act from the subtler, possibly accidental, incident with Briana. The physical action of pulling herself up is symbolic of her rise from a state of helplessness, which is made possible by forcing her tormentor to experience her pain firsthand.

“Like you’re trying to shake off your actual flesh. Arms, legs, head, hips, yes! Like you’re possessed. Full of demons. The only way out is to shake, shake them out.”

In this moment from an outdoor rehearsal, Miranda’s narration reveals the disquieting nature of her newfound vitality. The author uses visceral, incantatory language and repetition (“shake, shake them out”) to suggest that Miranda’s freedom from pain is not a gentle healing but a forceful expulsion, linking her wellness to supernatural or demonic influence. The diction of possession (“possessed,” “demons”) foreshadows the sinister source of her recovery and frames her liberation as an unsettling performance for her students.

“I guess I’m just not letting it get to me like I once was, you know? I guess that’s the secret. Like you said to me. Sickness is really just psychological. Mind over matter. I guess I’m finally putting that philosophy into practice.”

Miranda speaks these lines to a suspicious Grace, weaponizing the very psychologizing rhetoric that Grace once used to invalidate her suffering. This is an instance of dramatic irony, as the reader knows her cure is supernatural, not psychological. This dialogue directly engages with the theme of The Gendering and Invisibility of Chronic Pain, demonstrating Miranda’s shift from victim to perpetrator as she uses Grace’s past dismissal of her pain to gaslight her and deflect scrutiny.

“I look at Hugo under the sea of stars. Paul. He looks just like Paul again. I rub my eyes because it’s a trick, it has to be. Just the light, surely. Just the shadow, surely. Still looks like Paul.”

During a romantic encounter with Hugo on the newly built stage set, Miranda’s perception blurs, superimposing the image of her ex-husband, Paul, onto Hugo. This moment of psychological conflation illustrates The Blurring Lines Between Performance and Reality, as the stage—a space of illusion—facilitates a dangerous form of wish fulfillment. The repetition of “surely” underscores her desperate attempt to rationalize the supernatural bleed-through, revealing that her magical bargain does not heal past trauma but rather resurrects it in an unstable, hallucinatory form.

“‘I’ll be the King, then,’ she says. ‘I heard that part just opened up.’ […] ‘And look at me, I’d be perfect for the role now, wouldn’t I, Miranda.’”

After returning to rehearsal visibly ill with Miranda’s former symptoms, Briana demands the role of the ailing King. Her statement is not a request but a challenge, directly linking her physical suffering to her authenticity as a performer. This moment crystallizes the novel’s exploration of pain as a prerequisite for compelling performance, suggesting that only through genuine affliction can Briana access the “gravitas” she previously lacked, thereby turning her illness into a source of artistic power and a tool for confrontation.

“We just want to see a good show, Ms. Fitch. Just put on a good show.”

The middling man articulates the price of Miranda’s bargain in the pub’s surreal basement. This quote explicitly frames Miranda’s life as a form of entertainment for her demonic patrons, cementing the novel’s theme of The Blurring Lines Between Performance and Reality. The simple, transactional nature of the demand reduces her complex moral transgressions—transferring her pain to others—to the mere fulfillment of a directorial role, suggesting that the “cost” of her cure is to make her suffering, and the suffering she inflicts, a spectacle.

“‘I forgive Briana. She’s obviously upset. Anxious. Under a great deal of stress, who wouldn’t be?’ Anxious. Stress. I’ve said the magic words. I’ve rung the bell. Briana looks up at me like I’m a nightmare she’s trapped inside of.”

This quote demonstrates Miranda weaponizing the dismissive medical language once used against her, turning the tables on her accuser. The italicized phrases highlight her conscious, strategic deployment of terms she calls “magic words,” which function to invalidate Briana’s experience. This is a direct parallel to the theme of The Gendering and Invisibility of Chronic Pain. The simile comparing Miranda to a “nightmare” illustrates Briana’s powerlessness as she is subjected to the same psychological dismissal Miranda previously endured.

“Don’t panic, why are you panicking? What did you do wrong? Nothing. She’s the one who treated you like you were a criminal. […] All you did was reach out and help her up. Drive her home. Put her in bed. She should be thanking you, if anything.”

Through a series of rhetorical questions and declarative statements, Miranda’s internal monologue reveals her complete rationalization of her violent, supernatural actions against Grace. She reframes an assault as an act of kindness, demonstrating the profound moral distortion that accompanies her newfound power and exemplifying the theme The Morality of Reclaiming Power Through Vengeance. The disjointed, self-reassuring tone of the passage highlights her increasing psychological unraveling and detachment from reality.

“It’s just … look. I almost felt like you weren’t really with me. Like you were but you weren’t. You wanted someone else. You wanted me to be someone else.”

Hugo’s dialogue articulates the growing disconnect between Miranda’s internal world and her external reality, which is a key component of the theme The Blurring Lines Between Performance and Reality. His perception that she is mentally recasting him as “someone else”—her ex-husband, Paul—reveals how her obsession with rewriting her past prevents genuine connection in the present. The repetition of phrases like “like you were…” and “someone else” emphasize the depth of Miranda’s psychological dislocation and how her quest for a perfect narrative has become alienating.

“‘You see, Briana,’ I say. ‘A display of wellness. That’s what’s called for in this moment. A performance of health so that the audience understands. The audience will only know how deeply you have been in pain when they see how hard you dance afterward.’”

Miranda explicitly links physical recovery to theatricality, framing wellness not as an authentic state but as a spectacle for an audience. This meta-theatrical instruction forces Briana, the victim of Miranda’s transferred suffering, to perform the joy of its absence, which is a cruel demonstration of Miranda’s power. By demanding a “performance of health,” Miranda reveals the transactional nature of her worldview: For pain to be acknowledged, its absence must be made visible with equal, legible intensity.

“I need to perform my little bit of pain for you so you’ll know I’m human? […] Why don’t we try it? Why don’t you try hurting me right now and see? See if I can feel it. See if you can make me cry out.”

This confrontation reveals the paradoxical outcome of Miranda’s bargain: Her immunity to pain has rendered her inhuman in the eyes of others. She equates the sensation of pain with humanity itself and views the expectation to feel it as a demand for a “performance,” directly tying her physical state to the novel’s exploration of performance versus reality. By goading Hugo to hurt her, she displays a complete detachment from physical consequence, showing how her invulnerability has become as isolating as her chronic pain once was.

“I’m a shining tower of calm behind the curtain. My body emanating two words: All’s Well. And all is well. Not dying at all for once. Not a ghost for once.”

This quote, from Miranda’s internal monologue on opening night, marks the apex of her supernatural transformation. The metaphor of a “shining tower of calm” directly contrasts with her earlier descriptions of herself as broken and crooked, illustrating the profound physical and psychological effects of her supernatural bargain. The direct invocation of the play’s title, All’s Well That Ends Well, demonstrates how she has subsumed the play’s narrative of miraculous resolution into her own identity, reflecting the theme of The Blurring Lines Between Performance and Reality.

“Run, I tell myself. Get help. But I don’t move either. I’m frozen in place, in this kneeling position by Grace’s side. Like the spotlight itself, the light itself, is holding me down, pinning me here on the floor by Grace’s body, my knees right on another taped X.”

During a surreal vision in the black box theater, Miranda is confronted with what appears to be Grace’s dead body. The author uses the literal language of stagecraft—a spotlight, a taped X marking a stage position—to symbolize Miranda’s entrapment in a performance of her own guilt. This moment externalizes her inner conflict, forcing her into the role of a powerless spectator at a tragedy she believes she has authored, thereby questioning The Morality of Reclaiming Power Through Vengeance.

“‘Will you be mine, now you are doubly won?’ Paul says, cuing me one more time. Go on, Princess.

I look at Grace, who is on her knees now. Doubled over. Choking. […]

‘I can’t,’ I say to Paul. ‘I have to go.’”

In this climactic moment of her hallucinatory trial, Miranda is presented with a choice between an idyllic fantasy life with her ex-husband and saving Grace. The dialogue juxtaposes a line from All’s Well That Ends Well—representing her desired happy ending—with the visceral reality of Grace’s suffering, which is a direct consequence of her own actions. By rejecting the fantasy and choosing Grace, Miranda makes a crucial moral decision, breaking the spell of her wish-fulfillment and turning away from the seductive power offered by the three men.

“‘Luckily, there were some doctors in the audience.’

‘Doctors?’

‘Yes, three of them. Sitting front row center, right where you fell, can you believe that? They examined you and said you were just fine. Nothing at all broken.’”

After re-creating her career-ending accident by falling off the stage, Miranda awakens to this news from Ellie. This is dramatic irony, as both Miranda and readers understand that the “three doctors” are the mysterious men from the pub, and their verdict signifies the end of her supernatural protection. Their pronouncement that she is “just fine” cruelly echoes the medical dismissal she has faced throughout her ordeal, signaling a return to a reality where her pain is real but invalidated, a core tenet of the theme The Gendering and Invisibility of Chronic Pain.