Confess

Owen’s art is inspired by people’s anonymous confessions. They provide the emotion behind his work, and for different reasons, the confessions make Owen and Auburn feel less alone. Owen takes comfort in the confessions because they show he isn’t the only one putting up a façade to hide his grief, and Auburn feels like they give her permission to share her true self, which she rarely does. When Auburn writes a confession for him, she wants it to stay anonymous, so she pushes it into the box that is already full of confessions. Owen says, “It’s not a confession if no one reads it. It’s just an unshared secret” (69). Confessions, then, are the opposite of secrets, and The Dangers of Keeping Secrets continues to prevent and harm the possibility of their romance.

The tent that Owen bought has a mesh screen in the middle, which reminds Auburn of confessions made in church. She suggests Owen confess first, and he tells her he has lots of confessions to make. He shares an innocuous confession, and when she wants him to continue, he considers how the tent makes him want to confess more. He thinks, “Maybe if I tell her the truth, she can accept it and trust me” (143). He knows that confessing means being truthful, and honesty creates trust. He confesses to Auburn that his mother and brother died in a car accident when he was driving, and he shares that sometimes the heartache of missing his mother is overwhelming. Auburn confesses to Owen that AJ’s father was her first boyfriend, Adam. She goes on to express all the ways Lydia’s possessiveness with AJ changed her life decisions, and that she cares most about getting custody of him. They confess secrets to each other through that mesh screen, which brings them closer together.