Dolly All the Time

In the novel’s second section, Monaghan exposes The Harmful Consequences of Class Division by showing how the socioeconomic disparity between Dolly and Stewart damages her self-perception and their budding relationship. When Dolly explains her and Stewart’s social incompatibility by comparing herself to a functional “Comfort Inn” and him to a luxurious “Four Seasons,” she reveals her deeply internalized sense of class inferiority. This analogy shows how Dolly measures her own worth against Stewart’s inherited wealth. She views herself as practical and sufficient but ultimately unremarkable, a service provider existing “by the side of the highway” for others’ convenience (119). This perception dictates her actions when she arrives at his lavish family home and instinctively uses the delivery entrance. Inside, the estate’s Gilded Age opulence reinforces the social chasm she perceives, and the gold-leaf acorns that abound through the space become a motif of The Harmful Consequences of Class Division. The theme is further explored through the varied reactions of Stewart’s family. Kendall performs a theatrical spit take at the mention of the Brick Fish House, a site of manual labor, while the older generation, Henry and Ellen, react with warm nostalgia, fondly recalling Dolly’s grandmother’s sewing and pies. This generational split suggests that long-standing service relationships have woven the working-class Bricks into the town’s social fabric in a way the younger, more class-conscious Whitfields fail to recognize. 

The narrative structure in these chapters juxtaposes highly public performances with intensely private confessions, a dynamic that accelerates Dolly and Stewart’s intimacy. The fundraiser in Providence is a carefully staged event where their role is to project a convincing image for a wealthy audience. Here, their conversation is transactional, focused on maintaining their cover story about meeting in Boston Common. In contrast, the trip on the Marian offers a secluded space far from the social pressures of Whitfield. This private setting facilitates a different kind of exchange, one built on genuine vulnerability rather than performance. The settings function as distinct arenas for their relationship’s development: The public spaces test the believability of their ruse while the private ones allow for the emotional honesty necessary for real connection to grow. This structural back-and-forth is central to the novel’s use of the fake dating trope, as the movement between public performance and private reality gradually breaks down the artificial boundaries of their arrangement.

Despite their class differences and the initial transactional nature of their connection, Dolly and Stewart begin to forge genuine intimacy through their shared experience of The Burden of Caretaking. The boat trip to Ruddy Duck Cove culminates in a journey to a secret grotto, a space that strips away their public personas and fosters deep emotional trust. The physical passage from the open sea, through a dark and disorienting cave, into a hidden, sunlit pool mirrors their emotional journey from a superficial arrangement toward deep intimacy. In the cave, Stewart, a man defined by his need for control, must guide them through total darkness, while Dolly, fiercely self-reliant, must surrender her control and trust him completely. This shared act of trust prepares them for the vulnerability that follows. In the grotto, Stewart confesses that his sister’s illness triggered his workaholism, and Dolly reveals that Gus’s father abandoned her with $300 when he learned she was pregnant. These confessions expose a shared foundation of trauma, as both were forced into immense responsibility at a young age. When Stewart observes Dolly is also “fending off the chaos” (141), he recognizes their common ground, identifying The Burden of Caretaking as a force that has shaped them both, momentarily transcending their class differences.

As Dolly and Stewart practice their romantic cover story, the narrative explores how the performance of intimacy can generate authentic feeling. On the ride home from the fundraiser, Dolly’s practical dating advice on hand-holding evolves into an unexpectedly charged moment of physical contact that makes her viscerally aware of her attraction to him. The clinical lesson becomes an intimate experience when he “entwines [their] fingers, each one slowly scraping the inside of [hers]” (107). The moment blurs the line between instruction and genuine connection. This dynamic is repeated in their other staged interactions, such as Stewart’s awkward but specific compliment about her thighs and his feigned whisper that results in him sniffing her. These calculated gestures are designed to convince an external audience, but they elicit authentic physical and emotional reactions in Dolly. Her insistence to her father that their relationship is just an act is steadily undermined by her body’s involuntary responses to their manufactured closeness, demonstrating the romance trope’s central premise that repeated performance can erode emotional defenses and cultivate real desire.

This section introduces the theme of The Importance of Accepting Love and Support through Stewart’s resolution to help Dolly advocate for herself. Dolly’s ingrained role as a caretaker manifests in her deep-seated reluctance to voice her own needs, a pattern Stewart begins to gently challenge. During the dinner at Eight Oaks, she is prepared to drink the coffee she dislikes rather than cause a fuss, viewing the simple act of requesting tea with honey as an “absolute arrogance.” Her discomfort reveals a person conditioned to be accommodating, a direct result of her mother’s abandonment and the responsibilities she subsequently assumed for her sister and father. The memory of the house smelling of “garbage and decay and giving up” after her mother left is the chaos she has fought ever since (140), and she’s suppressed her own needs to maintain order. Stewart’s insistence that “it’s okay to say what [she] want[s]” is an important turning point (160). His comment confronts her learned self-denial and introduces The Importance of Accepting Love and Support by validating the desires she reflexively stifles. His promise to make her “practice” asking for what she wants signifies a shift in their dynamic from a business arrangement to a relationship in which he is invested in her personal growth.