“Naomi wanted to know how we did the special effects—the atomic eye blasts and flying sequences. I was explaining chroma-keying to her, how we’d hang from wires in front of a green screen, when I suddenly stopped. My expression changed. I turned away and, through my nose, forced all the breath from my chest. It was a trick I’d learned in order to make myself tear up.”

Griffin’s manipulation of his demeanor and emotions in this scene introduces the novel’s theme of the Dichotomy Between Public Image and Private Reality. Griffin is literally sitting with Naomi, one of his parents’ friends, but he internally transports himself elsewhere. He inhabits an alternate version of self and performs a part for Naomi’s benefit. In doing so, Griffin evidences his discomfort with his true self and his way of using acting to navigate his complex relationships.

“Did I reflect on our talk? Was I stirred toward introspection afterward? Did I consider, for instance, that the next catastrophe might evict my family from the city altogether? That the next success might permanently transport us to roomy luxury uptown?”

Griffin asks himself this string of questions in order to understand his internal world. The passage affects a curious, searching tone and conveys Griffin’s desperation to make sense of what he’s experiencing and feeling. He is narrating from his adult point of view, reflecting on his past and trying to retrospectively infuse meaning into his coming of age.

“The air was good for us both. But my bafflement, now that we were outside, was suddenly more extreme. It was not simply that I’d forgotten what to say but seemed to have nothing to say whatsoever, my inner life rendered so utterly void I wondered if I possessed one at all.”

Griffin’s internal monologue during one of his therapy sessions with Elliot Barr captures the difficulties of Navigating Challenges in a Fast-Paced Environment. As soon as Griffin leaves the building and goes outdoors, the outside world overwhelms him and muddies what he’s feeling. This passage captures how external stimuli might distort the individual’s internal experience, particularly as they come of age.

“She made a great show of the effort this cost her as she gathered herself, although the effort was no act. And then she asked me a very simple question, one that revealed a key detail I’d left out and constituted the knot from which I could not figure out how to untangle myself. ‘Why don’t you just quit?’ Naomi whispered. ‘The show, acting, all of it.’”

The question that Naomi poses to Griffin about his life and work conveys the significance of Griffin’s entrapment. Griffin describes his circumstances as “the knot from which I could not figure out how to untangle myself,” a metaphor that evokes notions of binding, restriction, and ensnarement. Griffin feels incapable of quitting because he knows to defer to the adults in his life, all of whom expect something different from him than he wants for himself.

“I sit through the meet’s conclusion, blind to the proceedings, crushed but utterly elated. I replay the match with perfect recall. Was this what my father meant about being in the moment? Nothing in my life ever felt so real.”

In the wake of Griffin’s one wrestling match win, the narrative assumes a buoyant, hopeful tone. Griffin feels “utterly elated” because, for the first time in his adolescent life, he feels engaged with the present moment. He is accustomed to donning a mask or inhabiting a role to stave off reality, but in this scene, he is embracing the real and finding that this level of authenticity is enlivening.

“And my great shame was strangely somehow for him. Of which I could not speak. To anyone. To my parents. To Elliott. Certainly not to my friends. Even later, when I joined Cliff and Tanner in the front hall and they asked, ‘Where were you?’ I need only reply, ‘Kepplemen.’ Not even so much as a nod from them. Which was the trick, or the spell. Which was the only power we had. Because he was the only word for it we knew.”

Griffin’s wrestling coach Mr. Kepplemen’s sexual abuse contributes to the novel’s explorations of the influence of adult relationships on adolescent development. Kepplemen is an authority figure in Griffin’s life, and he takes advantage of this role. He emotionally, verbally, and sexually abuses Griffin, in turn complicating how he sees himself and entrapping him in silence and shame. In this passage, Griffin is trying to make sense of this abusive relationship while acknowledging how alone he feels inside of it.

“You’re going to stop listening and feeling and instead start making arguments, every day of your life asking yourself what isn’t instead of what is, and then it’s all over already. You’ll think you’ve bitten the apple, but really the apple’s bitten you. Your argument for what isn’t becomes the world and you become the argument and then it’s already happened: the beginning of adulthood.”

Griffin and his friends’ interaction with the man in the park offers them insight into their coming-of-age experiences. Griffin isn’t sure exactly what the man means, but the man’s words illuminate the psychological complexities of transitioning from childhood into adulthood. The man’s reference to “the apple” is a biblical reference and thus a metaphor for losing one’s innocence and gaining an awareness of the world—specifically, the apple is an allusion to the Garden of Eden myth and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Griffin will have a similar experience as he leaves childhood behind and his perspective on life begins to change. The apple also refers to a common moniker for New York City, the “Big Apple,” highlighting the sense that one must take control of one’s life in the city, lest it control one.

“Lucy said, ‘Can he do nine, ladies and gentlemen?’ and when I blew past that number, everyone grew quiet and watched, since now something extraordinary seemed within reach, not simply a new record but a new power, a mutant ability: I was possessed of a superheroic capacity for consumption. I was the fish who ate the fish who ate the fish. I was a boy with ten stomachs.”

The scene where Griffin gorges himself on French toast illustrates his desire for control and autonomy. Griffin knows that he isn’t supposed to gain weight over the break so that he can maintain his place in his particular wrestling weight class. However, he eats voraciously because he wants to exercise his agency. He likens the experience to being a superhero and to becoming a fish or mutant boy with extra stomachs, metaphors which show Griffin’s desire to be someone other than the person people have told him to be.

“My words came like a torrent that I didn’t exactly understand either. I told her I was always behind, I was always late. I told her that I didn’t say what I saw when I saw it. When I saw it and knew what it was, I ignored it. That I didn’t listen to myself when I spoke.”

Griffin’s relationship with Naomi offers him the illusion of safety, comfort, and camaraderie. For this reason, he opens up to her about a litany of frustrations and insecurities. He likens his monologue to “a torrent,” which conjures water imagery, particularly that associated with an outpouring or overflow. He is expressing himself in this unbridled manner because he has no other outlet for his feelings. Furthermore, the elliptical structure of his sentences enacts a harried, searching tone that echoes his emotional state.

“Because I realized that I hated him. I always had, all these years. Not for who he was or what he wanted. I hated him because he’d showed me who he was without knowing he had. Because I knew him better than he knew himself, and this seemed the very condition of his being an adult.”

Griffin’s reflections on his relationship with Kepplemen affect a revelatory tone. This is the first time that Griffin acknowledges his hatred for Kepplemen and begins to confront the depth of the coach’s impact on his psyche. The moment marks a turning point in Griffin’s coming-of-age journey and contributes to the novel’s theme of the influence of adult relationships on adolescent development.

“True, my body’s transformation was nowhere near as dramatic as what was taking place in my heart and mind, but these were still a trio of accelerants and each intensified the others. Longing, expectancy, waiting for…what? Oh, all the energy such a process produces, all the byproducts!”

Griffin’s adolescent experience is physiological and comprehensive. In this passage, he is reflecting on how his body, heart, and mind are all changing at the same time. The intensity of these transformations is overwhelming and inarticulable to Griffin—a phenomenon enacted by his use of ellipses, questions, apostrophe, and exclamations. These stylistic choices create a confused and emotional tone, which echoes Griffin’s internal state.

“It’s pretty obvious, but here’s my point. Back in the office you said you felt like you were speechless. That you had things you saw but struggled to communicate. Those are the two most heartfelt things you’ve ever shared with me. So maybe that’s what you’ve been put on the earth for. To come up with a language for your life.”

Elliott Barr’s advice to Griffin offers him some insight into navigating challenges in a fast-paced environment. Elliott plays the most notable “guide-like” role in Griffin’s life, although he doesn’t always do so in a comprehensive manner. In this scene, Elliott is identifying Griffin’s struggles (his difficulty communicating and feelings of speechlessness) and offering him a solution to them (creating his own language and meaning).

“I was still in a daze when my parents greeted me at the apartment with the news. They met me at the door as if they’d thrown me a surprise birthday party. I had committed Amanda’s number to memory on my walk home; I’d walked the entire distance in a state that felt much bigger than happiness. Borne aloft and weighed down, the way swimming underwater can feel like flying.”

Meeting Amanda West overwhelms Griffin with new emotions and sensations. Although his parents are thrilled that he’s gotten the part in Take Two, Griffin is consumed by thoughts of Amanda. He likens his excitement over this new relationship to a feeling “bigger than happiness” and the feeling of being “borne aloft” or “swimming underwater” and “flying.” These metaphors conjure notions of transportation, elevation, and buoyancy, which echo Griffin’s positive mood.

“Here was the difference between Amanda and every other girl I’d known so far. She noticed things I hadn’t realized I had until she spoke them aloud. That on the city’s East Side, for instance, the crossing islands are more beautifully manicured, but nobody sits on them. That at night its avenues are deserted, but Broadway always seems crowded. That the East River, she observed, is half as narrow as the Hudson but more menacing.”

Griffin’s use of anaphora and descriptive language affects an enraptured tone. He is delighted by Amanda and lists all of the things about her (and her distinct way of seeing the world) that interest him. He notes her observations of the rivers, avenues, and islands, all of which inspire him to see the world anew. He is using the language that Amanda has used with him; embedding her outlook into his own foreshadows how her character will impact him over time.

“Oh, that tiny apartment, where we spent most of our time together. Of all the places in my memory that I’m certain would seem smaller if I revisited them, this one, I’d like to believe, would in fact seem larger, being, as it was, the site of one of my first and most tender acts. I raised my hand and stroked her hair.”

Griffin’s reflections on his and Amanda’s experiences babysitting together affect a nostalgic mood. Griffin uses language like “tender” and “stroked” to convey the intimacy and beauty of these memories with Amanda. Although he’s narrating from years in the future, Griffin’s melancholic tone implies that he still cherishes his time with Amanda.

“The elevator sank. I thought about what Amanda’s mother had said the previous week, about picking the ones who don’t run and how Amanda had been taught that love was a chase. Shouldn’t love be a swimming with, like fish in a school, as opposed to a swimming after? And if I wasn’t chasing, what was I doing? That these questions had no answers made me miserable.”

Griffin’s questions about love and relationships show the emotional difficulties he faces while navigating challenges in a fast-paced environment. One of these challenges is how to make sense of his intense emotions for Amanda and her confusing responses to him. Because Griffin doesn’t have a constant guide in his life, he’s often forced to pose his questions only to himself. He feels miserable because in asking the questions, he receives no answer.

“And although his story shouldn’t have been a comfort to me, it was, for I realized I wasn’t alone in my misery. And although I didn’t consider what it meant at the time or whether he should have told me in the first place or what my mother might have thought of the telling, I believed he’d imparted a great secret, and for this I felt overwhelming gratitude.”

Shel Hurt’s story about falling in love for the first time offers Griffin insight into his romantic conundrum with Amanda. He assumes a reflective tone in this passage because he’s trying to make sense of how Shel’s experiences relate to his own. He uses language like “comfort,” “great,” and “overwhelming” because he’s trying to categorize the profound yet inarticulable effect Shel’s account has had on him; Griffin is also surprised by the story because he’s unaccustomed to receiving such wisdom from the adults in his life.

“As I flipped through loose-leaf binders full of botched quizzes, my textbooks full of already forgotten facts and formulas, I was ashamed by how much I’d missed these past two semesters. Of the opportunities I’d lost. Of how far behind I remained. Next year could be different, I thought, if I had a better start.”

Griffin is so desperate to please the adults in his life that he internally punishes himself for failing to perform the way others expect him to. No one is overtly telling Griffin to feel ashamed of how he’s done in school, but this emotion immediately encompasses him as he packs up his locker. His use of repetition and anaphora underscore his frustration with himself by affecting an insistent tone, and thus inspire his private vow to do better and to change in the future.

“What did it mean, I wondered—I still do—to not remember something so fundamental about yourself? Was it the same as if it never happened? Or was it still happening? Like the fire still smoldering beneath the forest floor.”

Griffin’s reflections on and discoveries surrounding the fire from his childhood complicate his sense of self. For years, Griffin has been telling himself the story of the fire in one way. In this passage, he’s learning that he hasn’t remembered the incident accurately. As a result, he begins to question who he is and what he’s actually experienced. The passage thus underscores the symbolic significance of the fire and shows how childhood trauma might distort the individual’s sense of time, reality, and self.

“Only decades after these last sessions with my therapist would I fully comprehend what Kepplemen had done to me—and to my friends and teammates; only in middle age would I identify the source of the fury I felt when, deep beneath my school, I’d clasp that man and make him feel it—would make him pay for his pleasure with pain.”

Griffin’s adult perspective intrudes upon his childhood account and affects a retrospective narrative tone. Griffin intentionally interrupts his coming-of-age story in order to offer insight into his youthful experiences. The passage offers the reader a clarified understanding of Griffin’s trauma and implies that he will find a route to healing in the years following Kepplemen’s abuse.

“I wanted to exercise my new powers, spread my wings. I thought about the first thing Kepplemen had taught us about wrestling: Where the head goes, the body will follow. So I moved Naomi around, I reversed our positions. I flipped her over to claw the back of her neck. She loved when I did this, she was encouraging as we proceeded.”

The way that Griffin interacts with and reflects on his relationship with Naomi underscores his desperation for control and freedom. He moves Naomi around when they’re having sex because he wants to exercise his “new powers” and “spread his wings.” These references evoke notions of both the superhero and of flight and show how Griffin is trying to use his sexual relationship with Naomi to escape his circumstances and access an alternate version of himself.

“Why didn’t I take that opportunity to tell him about living with the Shahs? About Naomi? The truth is that it would have never occurred to me then to share the things I’d seen and done, any more than discussing Kepplemen, because our lives were atomized, because we lived so unattended, because we were already so strangely private, access to each other’s inner lives did not come naturally.”

Griffin’s inability to confide in his brother about his childhood trauma directly results from his adult relationships. The adults in his life didn’t give him the tools to identify his emotions or the language to express his complex experiences. He’s therefore been navigating challenges in a fast-paced environment on his own, as has his brother.

“It comes from decidere. It means ‘to cut away from,’ like a boat from a mooring. A decision, then, is simply the beginning of a journey. If it seems fateful, it’s because it is. If fateful seems too heavy, subtract the weight from it by recognizing you will make countless decisions in your lifetime.”

Hornbeam’s explanation of the etymology of the word “decide” grants Griffin insight into his own future. Hornbeam is encouraging Griffin to take control of his life by choosing to play in his next movie. Ironically, Griffin uses Hornbeam’s guidance to make the opposite decision and to free himself from “the weight” of being someone he doesn’t want to be. As Hornbeam’s words portend, choosing to quit acting marks the start of Griffin’s adult journey.