“I stare at my new magic friend. I feel like I’m letting it down in some way. Written in cursive along the front is the word ‘LUCKY.’ I don’t feel lucky right now; I feel like a very bad question asker. I wonder if small things like this feel big to other people as well.”

As a child, Elyse receives a Magic 8 Ball keychain for Halloween and personifies it by naming it “Lucy,” turning it into an imaginary friend. She feels that she must form the perfect first question to ask the Magic 8 Ball. She feels an irrational sense of failure when she cannot think of a good question, and this emotional snag introduces the first serious example of Elyse’s anxiety. She fears that she does not think or feel as others do, and she therefore feels judged and inadequate.

“But going to Sam’s sleepover because Lucy told me to go makes me feel a little less scared and a little more excited.

Not a lot less scared, but enough.

Maybe I’m allowed to go and feel uncomfortable the entire time.

Maybe being uncomfortable is okay?

Maybe I don’t even have to pretend I’m not uncomfortable.”

As a child, Elyse experiences extreme anxiety in social situations, such as sleepovers with friends. However, she uses the Magic 8 Ball to mediate this anxiety, finding that by shifting the responsibility of her decisions to the object, she can reduce some of her fear and discomfort. This is the first example of the many creative methods that Elyse uses to cope with her anxiety.

“His eyes fall from mine, and suddenly I feel like I’m in trouble. I’ve done something wrong. I’m not sure what, exactly. I couldn’t have done anything wrong. Because I’ve done nothing at all. I’ve stuck to the script. I’ve delicately measured every single word, interaction, and accidental touch we’ve shared in this godforsaken closet to make sure it all adds up to the sum total of Completely Platonic.”

Elyse feels considerable discomfort during her encounter with her friend, Marley, primarily because her neurodivergence makes it difficult for her to accurately interpret his unspoken social cues and implicit romantic interest in her. This passage first introduces the Inaccessibility of Social Scripts for Neurodivergent Individuals, showing that neurotypical social scripts create discomfort, confusion, and anxiety for neurodivergent people like Elyse.

“More than anything in the world, I want my arms to reach out in front of me and betray the limits my brain has placed on my body without my consent.”

This passage underscores the negative impact that anxiety has over Elyse’s life. She often feels that her anxiety hijacks her body, making her do things that she does not consciously want to do. This trend reappears throughout the book and demonstrates that her anxiety, which often stemming from her challenges with understanding social scripts, hinders her ability to connect with others.

“Sophie smokes cigarettes.

Sophie owns cigarettes.

What else don’t I know about Sophie? I suddenly felt jealous for the parts of her life she clearly doesn’t feel safe enough to share with me.

Does she have any other hobbies I don’t know about?

Does she smoke weed?

Does she have another best friend?

I’m hurting my own feelings with all these silent questions.”

The short anecdote about discovering that her best friend smokes cigarettes displays a light and humorous tone, but it also highlights Elyse’s anxiety about the unspoken “rules” that dictate neurotypical social behavior. In this case, she fears that she has somehow missed something important about her friend, and she wonders if her lack of knowledge on this aspect of Sophie’s life means that she is not, in fact, Sophie’s best friend.

“All I’d wanted was my very own Factory Reset, where I could completely unpack myself and select only the best and easiest parts of my personality to put back in. The parts people liked. The parts I created, tweaked, and fine-tuned so I would be someone that people liked liking. Maybe with all the strange and unlikable parts of me erased, I would transform into a Friend Maker.

And if not a Friend Maker, then, for the love of god, at least someone who could easily blend in.”

When Elyse attends community college, she hopes that the change in location will allow her to erase her previous identity and craft a new one to better fit in with neurotypical society. This moment contributes to the impulse to escape one’s self even as it typifies her efforts to leave her past behind and reinvent herself. She also struggles with the sense of being “strange and unlikable” (57), and she wants to change the very essence of herself so that she can “blend in” more easily.

“Standing in front of Parisians makes me wish I had one of those Tiny Museum Headsets. You know, the ones that you rent at the help desk that come with audiotapes and a free side of shame? Those headsets always make me feel like I need help catching up on the culture and context I clearly lack in order to fully appreciate the beauty of the art in front of me.

I wish I had one of those to fully appreciate Parisians.

They are living art.

I begin imagining how grateful I would be if I had a Tiny Museum Headset for every situation in life. Can’t read social cues? Tiny headset. Can’t remember if your best friend is currently on again or off again with her not-boyfriend? Tiny headset!”

Elyse uses the image and metaphor of “tiny museum headsets” to illustrate the inaccessibility of social scripts for neurodivergent individuals. Through this image, she highlights her struggle to interpret cultural and context clues in all social situations, and it is clear that this issue extends beyond her experience with the sex worker in Paris. Her anecdotes thus demonstrate the neurodivergent need for guides or explicit explanations to better navigate the world’s more treacherous moments.

“And then laughter explodes out of my mouth as he watches me lose the last of my self-control. He looks back at me as if what he just confessed isn’t the most absurd fun fact he could shout at me after he just spent the entire evening telling how sacred and important my sexual purity is to him and all mankind. For him to punctuate his unrelenting and unsolicited advice regarding my own virtue with a confession about owning a pretend flashlight that he can discreetly masturbate into makes more sense than I ever want it to.”

In response to a former friend’s sexual harassment about her sexuality and about the topic of masturbation, Elyse alleviates her tension by laughing, thus underscoring the absurdity of the friend’s behavior. As Elyse uses humor to defuse uncomfortable situations, this scene presents yet another example of the coping mechanisms that she employs to manage her discomfort in challenging social settings. However, in this case, the other party has failed to understand the inappropriateness of their own behavior.

“This email is from a friend she used to know.

Sometime, long ago, in Her Past Life. She refers to anything that happened before her move to Seattle as Her Past Life. She thinks it’s subtle enough to serve as an inside joke she can keep between herself and no one else. Everyone knows what she means, and she smiles secretly every time she says it.”

This passage, written in third-person prose, still clearly features Elyse’s experiences, contributing to the impulse to escape one’s life. The scene reveals another example of the many times when Elyse has abandoned part of her past, a habit that allows her to erase or ignore a previous iteration of her identity and reinvent herself with new friends and acquaintances.

“We do all the things two people do in a typical conversation.

Things I usually work very hard to remember to sprinkle into social interactions.

Things Jonas seems to do with even thinking.

I’m usually unable to pay attention in situations like this, especially if another conversation is happening just an arm’s length away. Too many sounds. Too many lights that are Too White and Too Bright. Altogether, there are Too Many Toos in this grocery store. I shouldn’t be able to focus on what Jonas is saying, considering all the aforementioned Toos.

But I’m focusing just fine and enjoying myself as much as any other person might enjoy making a new acquaintance.”

During Elyse’s first meeting with Jonas, Elyse highlights her difficulties with understanding and interpreting social situations. She also explains another common neurodivergent trait—being distracted or overstimulated by too many external stimuli. Finally, she highlights the surprising ease with which she interacts with Jonas, demonstrating that this experience is different than her usual interactions. This contrast hints at their eventual romantic relationship.

“whatever she’s missing isn’t missing at all.

she sees the empty spaces where More belongs, and she decided

when she met him that filling all that empty space would be

More than she wants to want.”

In the free-verse poem, “more,” Elyse explores The Human Need for Unconditional Acceptance. Even as she wishes for more emotional commitment from her unnamed boyfriend, she also fears the social consequences of asking for more. The motif of more appears again, most notably in Chapter 15, revealing the contrast between the unnamed boyfriend and Jonas.

“The short answer for why I take notes like this: People confuse me.

Being around people just for the sake of being around people drains the life out of me, but learning people doesn’t drain me nearly as much. Making small notes and reframing the way I think about social interactions has helped me get better at something I am naturally very terrible at:

People.

Even though I prefer being alone, I want my introversion to be a choice I make. I don’t want to feel trapped by it. Sometimes I feel very trapped by it.”

In this rambling passage, Elyse explains why she takes copious notes about the people around her, and her reasoning highlights the inaccessibility of social scripts for neurodivergent individuals. She finds interacting with people to be difficult and confusing, and these frequent encounters only heighten her anxiety. By being observant and taking notes about the nuances of people’s behavior and preferences, she can manage these encounters more easily and cope with her discomfort.

“But there are unspoken social contracts within a workplace that—by some miracle—everyone else already understands, and I don’t. This Understanding seems baked into others’ DNA in a way I can’t replicate with any amount of trying. When things Go Without Saying, they Never Get Said, and sometimes people need you to Say Those Things So They Understand What The Hell Is Going On.

So a few years ago, I became Just The Right Amount of Observant. The idea that I could learn how to Be Someone Who Understands by becoming Just The Right Amount of Observant was life-changing for me.”

Elaborating on the passage about taking notes, Elyse explicitly describes her concept of social scripts and unspoken rules, lamenting the fact that neurotypical individuals appear to understand and adhere to these guidelines in an innate way that escapes her. For neurodivergent individuals, these social contracts are often incomprehensible and can only be mastered after a great deal of cognitive effort. Elyse copes with this difficulty by measuring everything, including her observation skills, reactions, and words.

“Energy spent learning something new is never a waste. It’s valuable even when the end result isn’t what you were hoping for.”

While sharing her tips on how to make a bed with proper hospital corners, Elyse speculates that this lesson will not be useful in life, but she adds that learning something new is still valuable. Her pithy statement applies not only to the topic of making a bed but also to other areas of her life. The implication is that even when relationships do not bring the result she hopes for, such as with her unnamed boyfriend, she still learns something valuable from the experience.

“8b. Everything really is going to be Okay. That isn’t a lie. Sometimes things don’t feel like they’re going to be anything except for Not Okay, Sometimes days feel long—so much longer than days used to feel. The Very Long Days end up passing, and eventually Days That Didn’t Feel Long Enough To Be A Day At All end up passing too.”

Though the majority of Chapter 13 is comedic in tone, several passages also demonstrate the depth of Elyse’s feelings. The steps slowly reveal her feelings of confusion, isolation, and sadness, although the precise reasoning for these feelings remains vague. Crucially, in this passage she focuses on the belief that such feelings will fade and her life will be “okay” (167). With this sentiment, she offers a message of hope to other neurodivergent individuals.

“Video calls that always ended with deconstructing where our relationship went wrong and why neither of us was to blame for our lowercase (love) that I’d hoped would turn into The Uppercase Kind of LOVE! if we just give it more time and also more of every other flavor of More two people might try to feed their (love).”

After breaking up with her unnamed boyfriend, Elyse reflects on the reasons using the motif of “more” to explain the disconnection between them. She wished for more in every sense of the word. Crucially, she concludes that both parties wanted and gave different kinds or “flavors” of “more.” This disconnection highlights the issues that arise upon failing to meet the human need for unconditional acceptance, as neither party can give the other the kind of emotional commitment that they need.

“I am so accustomed to being treated like someone’s secret that I can’t fathom being loved out in the open for everyone to see. From my very first encounter with Jonas until now, he has been fiercely generous with his affection toward me. It all feels too good to be true. He feels too good to be true.

It makes sense to leave him now.”

This passage demonstrates the fact that the impulse to escape one’s self can hinder one’s need to be authentically seen and loved. Specifically, Elyse wants to be appreciated for who she really is, but the closer she grows with Jonas, the more his willingness to fulfill this need makes her fear the possibility of being hurt. She therefore gives in to her impulse to run away, seeking to save herself from pain in the future.

“I’ve only been here for twelve hours, but I already can’t remember why I warned Jonas that he wasn’t allowed to kiss me as I was boarding my plane at LAX. […] It’s safe to say I’ve figured a few things out since arriving. One of them being: I wish I wasn’t an idiot, and I really wish I didn’t tell him not to kiss me. Unfortunately, I’m stubborn enough to follow through with this ridiculous rule, which I made for absolutely no legitimate reason.

(Other than the fact that I am terrified of healthy relationships and will do almost anything to get in my own way and then wonder where it all went wrong.)”

Having agreed to spend a week with Jonas in Kansas, Elyse proceeds to keep her distance by placing arbitrary rules and limitations on their interactions. She later recognizes that she does this out of fear, just as when she first tried to break up with Jonas via text message. This scene marks yet another example of the ways in which her fear and anxiety dictate her behavior and hinder her connections.

“Part of me wanted to prolong this weird in-between that we’ve been living in for the past few months. Where there are four states and fifteen hundred miles of space between us. The part where I still get to be everything he thinks I am, and maybe even more. The part where if we break up, there’s nothing at all to break.”

As in Chapter 17, Elyse reflects that the closer she grows with Jonas, the greater his capacity to hurt her with a potential breakup. The human need for unconditional acceptance thus comes with the risk of emotional fallout. She also highlights the motif of “more,” as she wants to be more for Jonas’s sake and fears that he will decide she is somehow not enough.

“When I’m with Jonas, all of those alternate versions of myself feel like a mask I’m suffocating under. I care less about look and more about the way I feel when I’m around him. That’s exactly why I’m scared. Because every other person who’s walked away from me has been walking away from a version of me that barely exists.”

A crucial component of the human need for unconditional acceptance is the accompanying requirement to be genuine. In previous relationships, Elyse wore a variety of masks for the benefit of others, preventing them from seeing her authentic self. By contrast, with Jonas she abandons these masks, feeling they are no longer necessary. However, she must also contend with the risk of being rejected for who she is rather than for who she is pretending to be.

“You will never find yourself in anything that I make, because this is not about you. I do not know you. I have never met you. I forget you exist. You are forgotten.”

In the letter titled “To whom it will never concern,” Elyse addresses the unnamed boyfriend who has reappeared at different stages throughout the book. In the letter, she explains her conscious decision to leave this man unidentified, and her decision emphasizes his negative impact on her life. This figure provides a stark contrast to Jonas, her future husband, who provides Elyse with all the care and affection that her previous partner could never bring himself to provide.

“FLIGHT.

I AM ALL FLIGHT.

I AM NO LONGER FREEZE.

I am Flighting so fast—and so unexpectedly—in the opposite direction of Jonas that I don’t have time to consider where I’m going or why I’m Flighting in the first place. I just drove twelve hours to see my favorite person in the whole world. But as soon as he became a real person standing in front of me, my first instinct is to run away?”

When Elyse drives cross-country to move in with Jonas, she experiences a severe panic attack and literally runs away from him in the parking lot. This moment illustrates how her anxiety hijacks her body and dictates her actions in ways that she cannot control and does not consciously choose, creating barriers to her relationships. In this moment, the impulse to escape one’s self manifests in a literal form as she seeks to physically flee from her own emotional discomfort.

“From what I know about love, it crushes you. Whether it’s the weight of settling, or the weight of begging to be loved by someone who promised you the world and then disappeared, or the weight of needing to be Someone’s Everything All Of The Time—it crushed me all the same.

Nothing about being loved by Jonas feels remotely close to being crushed. In fact, it might be the safest feeling I’ve ever felt.”

Elyse reflects on the sensation of love, comparing her current relationship with Jonas to her previous relationship with the unnamed boyfriend. Notably, she has often found love to be painful—either because she wants more from the relationship and does not receive it, or because the other person wants more from her than she can give. In either case, she feels inadequate and overwhelmed, but in her healthy connection with Jonas, she now feels that his love makes her feel safe, and she sees in him a symbol of home.