Heart Bones

“It’s as if I adopted myself when I was a kid and have been on my own since then. This visit with my father feels like just that: a visit. I don’t feel like I’m coming home. I don’t even feel like I just left home.

Home still feels like a mythical place I’ve been searching for all my life.”

This passage captures the pervasive attitude Beyah holds in the first part of the book. She believes she’s essentially raised herself, and that—even though they were both a part of her life to a degree—she has been abandoned by both of her parents from an early age. She attributes all her successes to herself and views both of her parents as having strictly negative impacts upon her life.

“I grew up in a trailer house with a drug addict for a mother, and now I’m about to spend the summer in a beach house with a stepmother who holds a doctorate, which means her offspring is more than likely a spoiled rich girl I have nothing in common with.

I should have stayed in Kentucky.

I don’t people well as it is, but I’m even worse at peopling with people who have money.”

Hoover examines multiple forms of prejudice in the narrative. Here she gives a clear example of Beyah’s prejudice against people she has not met because she knows that they are financially well-off. She assumes without having met either that her stepmother will have nothing in common with her and that she will be unable to connect with Sara, her new stepsister. Believing she will encounter Financial Prejudice fills Beyah with fear and causes her to withdraw further.

“I wonder what color his eyes are.

No. I don’t wonder. I don’t care. Attraction leads to trust leads to love, and those are things I want no part of. I’ve trained myself to turn off faster than I can be turned on. Like a switch, I find him unappealing as instantly as I found him appealing.”

These are Beyah’s thoughts when she finds Samson looking at her from the upper deck of the ferry. As she looks at him, she determines quickly that he, like her, is a damaged person. She also finds him tremendously attractive, which triggers an immediate inner defense mechanism, causing her to decide she will not respond to the attraction she feels toward him. Her decision is soon called into question when Samson, recognizing that she is hungry, seeks Beyah out and attempts to give her money.

“I’m not sure I’ve ever felt more alone than I do right now. At least when I was in the house with my mother, it felt like I fit there. We belonged there together, no matter how mismatched we were. We learned to navigate and weave our lives around each other, and in this house, I’m not sure I can invisibly weave around any of these people. They’re like brick walls I’m going to crash into at every turn.”

After meeting her new stepmother and stepsister in her father’s house, Beyah realizes the isolation she has grown comfortable with will be challenged. She feels completely distinct from the people she lives with now, having nothing in common with them. However, unlike her mother, they want to connect and share the good and bad of Beyah’s daily life.

“‘You ate bread off the ground.’

‘I was hungry. You’re rich, you wouldn’t understand.’

[…] I don’t know why I’m so defensive around him. After all, if he really did think I was homeless, he didn’t ignore that. He offered me money. There must be a soul in there somewhere.

Maybe I’m the soulless one in this situation.”

This is the first of many candid conversations between Beyah and Samson. For the first time, she admits to being hungry and confesses her prejudice that wealthy people cannot understand what poor people endure. However, the undeniable evidence of Samson’s benevolence contradicts her bias against wealthy people. In retrospect, this is ironic because Samson himself is actually destitute and homeless, further contradicting Beyah’s prejudice about him.

“I try not to stare at Samson, but it’s hard. He’s about ten feet away, sitting with his arms wrapped around his knees, watching the waves claw at the sand. I hate that I’m wondering what he’s thinking about, but he has to be thinking about something. That’s what staring at the ocean produces. Thoughts. Lots of them.”

Hoover uses the ocean as a symbolic source of power, wisdom, stability, and renewal. The relationship Beyah has with the ocean is one of mystery and joy, as she fears entering the water at first, then, as the book progresses, comes to love the water. For Samson, the ocean is a source of life and loss. He considers the ocean, which he calls Darya, his home, despite the fact that the ocean took his father’s life. Beyah and Samson share their first kiss standing in the ocean.

“‘What makes you happy?’ Her expression is full of genuine curiosity.

I don’t know what makes me happy. I’m kind of curious about it, too. I’ve spent my whole life just trying to survive; I never really thought about the things that lie beyond that.”

For the first time in her life, Beyah finds herself in a nurtured place among people, meaning she does not have to worry about simply surviving. All of her human needs will be cared for, which frees her up to answer Sara’s question about what will make her happy. Because this is the first time she has been confronted with this question, she has no good answer. This exchange is part of Hoover’s examination of the difference between subsistence living and living a life of security.

“It’s hard not to grow bitter when you spend so much time alone. It’s especially hard not to grow bitter at class systems and people with money, because the richer they were, the more it seemed I didn’t exist to them.

[…] Maybe the only reason I wasn’t accepted is because I didn’t want to be. It was easier to stay by myself.”

As the narrative progresses, Beyah spends time in deep reflection about the isolation she feels, the causes behind it, and whether or not her prejudices are correct. She is open to the possibility that she may be part of the problem. She perceives that, despite the fact that he is apparently wealthy, Samson also feels isolated and is determined to live a secretive life. The great irony is that, like her, Samson actually comes from a background of real deprivation.

“My voice comes out in a whisper when I say, ‘When I first met you on that ferry, I could tell you were damaged.’

There is a flicker of something in his eyes as he tilts his head to the right. ‘You think I’m damaged?’

‘Yes.’”

Most of the intimate steps forward in the relationship between Beyah and Samson take place on the beach or in the water. For the first time, Beyah risks expressing her inner perception of another person. Though she senses the brokenness in Samson, she cannot guess why he is damaged, and he does not tell her. Her observation about him and his response is a basic first step of true intimacy between them that sets the stage for an enduring relationship.

“‘My mother died when I was five,’ he says. ‘We were swimming about half a mile from here when she got caught in the rip current. By the time they pulled her out of the water, it was too late.’

[…] I get the feeling he hasn’t told a lot of people that. A secret for a secret. Maybe that’s how this will go. Maybe that’s how Samson’s layers are peeled back—by peeling my own layers back first.”

The tragic death of a mother is one of the motifs that Hoover uses as a way of demonstrating the kinship of Beyah and Samson. Initially, Beyah believes that the two have little in common. Yet, as the story proceeds, it becomes clear that they have many similarities. Both are damaged, live isolated lives, keep very important secrets, engage in dangerous behavior to survive, and have an extremely difficult time trusting others.

“And I love that Sara didn’t flinch when I mentioned the ice cream. Maybe I’m not as bad for her as I thought. I might not be as bubbly and as happy as she is, but knowing she’s starting to enjoy food and doesn’t seem as worried about her weight as she did when I arrived makes me think I might actually have something to offer in this friendship.

This is a new feeling—the idea that maybe I’m worth having around.”

Beyah and Sara are each finding something in their relationship that they had needed and done without. As Sara says just before this passage, she sees Beyah as the sister she has always wanted. For Beyah, Sara fills a longed-for role as well, not sister but friend.

“And even though it seems like he’s trying to make an effort with me now, I can’t help but feel full of resentment that I went most of my life without him in it.

I will not allow his words to make me feel good, nor will I allow them to excuse his second-rate parenting.

Of course you’re proud of me, Brian. But you should only be proud of me because I miraculously survived childhood all on my own.”

When Beyah reveals the first of the big secrets she has kept from her father, that she has earned a full athletic scholarship to Penn State, her enduring resentment toward her father prevents her from accepting the admiration he feels for her. Her response here is a clear expression of her lifelong feelings of isolation and abandonment. Readers may perceive the sincere emotions her father attempts to express, though Beyah still struggles with Accepting Love.

“I can see the slow roll of his throat after he says that, as if he’s swallowing a lie. What are the chances he’d run into a guy from New York on a peninsula in Texas?

Very slim, but is it really Sara’s business? Is it mine? None of us owe one another our past.”

When a rough-looking young stranger greets Samson, sitting in a restaurant with Beyah, Sara, and Marcos, and he calls Samson “Shawn,” Beyah gets the first inkling of the dark, secretive past Samson conceals. Unlike Sara, who feels protective of her stepsister and demands to know the truth behind the encounter, Beyah feels protective of Samson. This stems from the reality that she also conceals dark secrets she has no intention of revealing, ironically creating yet another link between her and Samson.

“Samson presses his lips into a thin, irritated line and then dips his head, looking at me with intensity. ‘There are two different kinds of wrong. The wrong that stems from weakness and the wrong that stems from strength. You made that choice because you were strong and needed to survive. You didn’t make that choice because you were weak.’”

During a discussion of their past negative behaviors, Samson comments on Beyah’s decision to have sex for money with Dakota. From his perspective, this was a choice Beyah made for survival but one she could have refused, meaning it was a choice stemming from strength rather than weakness. The irony and power of his words only come to light after readers discover that Samson lived outside the law for more than a decade. Like Beyah, he is familiar with making difficult, even illegal decisions to survive.

“‘What kind of things make you happy, Samson?’

‘Rich people are never content,’ he says instantaneously. It’s sad he didn’t even have to think about it.

[…] ‘The more money you have, the harder it is to find things to be excited about. You already have your dream house. You can go anywhere in the world anytime you want. You could hire a private chef to make you every food you crave. […] You can fill your life with nice things, but nice things don’t fill the holes in your soul.’”

Samson quickly upends the key pillar of Financial Prejudice by saying that wealthy individuals, though privileged, do not enjoy life as a whole any more than poor individuals. He reasons that the incentive to work for happiness is gone when one can buy anything one wants, allowing underlying personal emptiness to emerge. He speaks from the perspective not of being wealthy, as Beyah assumes, but of having spent years invading the homes of rich beachgoers and vicariously learning of their neediness.

“‘Are you calling the ocean Darya?’

‘Yeah,’ he says, matter of fact. ‘Darya means the sea. It’s what Rake used to call her.’

‘You told me Darya was the ex-girlfriend who broke your heart.’

Samson laughs. ‘I told you Darya broke my heart, but I never said I was talking about a girl.’”

There are multiple levels of symbolism at work in this passage. At the most literal level, both of Samson’s parents died in the ocean, meaning the ocean broke his heart. Samson also refers to the ocean in the narrative as his home, here implying that his home was a place of heartbreak. In Hoover’s grander sense, for Beyah and Samson, the ocean represents life itself. Thus, Samson symbolically says that life has broken his heart.

“I don’t like birth control. I’ve been on it almost a week now and I feel like it’s messing with my emotions. I’m starting to feel things even more than I did after showing up here. There are moments I severely miss my mother. Moments I convince myself I’m falling in love with Samson. Moments I feel excited to have a conversation my father.

I don’t know who I’m becoming, but I’m not sure I like it. I doubt it really has anything to do with birth control, but it feels good to have something to blame.”

Beyah’s time in Texas at the beach unleashes the development of her character in numerous ways. Though she facetiously wants to blame her new birth-control pills for the changes, the reality is that the pills are simply causing her to become aware of the feelings she has been successfully stuffing. The awareness of her feelings disturbs Beyah, making her fear she can no longer control her emotions. She has no point of reference to help her realize that ordinary people her age have already dealt with these emotions she can no longer ignore.

“I can feel my skin begins to tingle with nervousness. I’ve had sex plenty of times, but never in a bed. Never fully naked. And definitely never with someone I care about.”

After a long lead-in, the author brings the two main characters together for intercourse. Hoover makes it clear that this romance is unique for Samson, who initially expressed the desire to “stay in the shallow end,” meaning they would not fall in love. For Beyah, whose anticipation is recorded in this passage, Hoover gives her a “second first time,” a tender, romantic sexual experience with someone she truly loves. This is one of the many second chances extended in the narrative.

“‘If there’s nothing inside a heart that can break, why does it feel like mine is going to snap in half when I move? Does your heart not feel like that?’

Samson’s eyes scroll over my face for a moment. ‘Yeah,’ he whispers. ‘It does. Maybe we both grew heart bones.’”

Lying together before making love, Beyah states her disbelief that hearts cannot break. Samson’s recitation of the book’s title, Heart Bones, is an expression of the profound feeling the two characters have developed for one another. Samson’s words and the exquisite experience of being together foreshadow the sudden dissolution of their relationship when the police arrest Samson and his criminal activities come to light.

“Everything is so black and white with people like Sara. The real world doesn’t operate under a simple system of right and wrong. People who have never had to trade a piece of their souls just to have food or shelter can’t understand the scores of bad decisions desperate people are forced to make.”

As Beyah comes to understand Samson’s actual background, she realizes why she always felt an underlying kinship with him. While this makes her aware of his motives and his struggle, it puts her at odds with her father and Sara, who automatically perceive Samson to be a con artist who is only interested in using Beyah as he has used the empty vacation houses for his own purposes. Hoover develops these contrasts throughout the last portion of the book to illustrate the Social, Financial, and Legal Inequalities faced by individuals like Samson and Beyah.

“My tears start falling and Alana immediately responds. She doesn’t say anything to make me feel bad for feeling sad. She just wraps her arms around me and tucks my head against her shoulder.

It’s a comfort that’s completely unfamiliar, but one I desperately need right now. The comfort of a mother. I sob against her for several minutes. It’s everything I didn’t know I needed until this moment. Just a small morsel of sympathy from someone.

‘I wish you could have been my mother,’ I say through my tears.”

Throughout the narrative, Beyah has resisted physical touch. The first time she meets her stepmother, Beyah holds a backpack in front of herself to prevent Alana from hugging her. Part of the fear that brings Beyah to this point of desperation is the thought that she might go back to being the isolated bitter person she was when she first came to live with her father. The accepting embrace of Alana, the author implies, is the compassionate love Beyah never experienced from her own mother.

“I don’t want phone calls or letters, either. I want you to go live your life and not be weighed down by mine. […] We have been alone on islands our whole lives. It’s why we connected, because we recognize that loneliness in each other. But this is your chance to get off your island, and I refuse to hold you back for however many years I’ll be gone.”

In this passage that takes place in a jail visitation room, Samson tells Beyah he will refuse all future contact with her. She perceives this to be another act of abandonment by someone she should be able to depend upon. Samson makes this statement as an expression of profound love. He knows that asking Beyah to wait for him would upend her life plans. In turning her away, he makes a sacrifice for her that, to her, feels like betrayal.

“I understand his intentions in every part of me. How would he react if he found out I spent my entire time in college as depressed and alone as I was in high school?

He would be so disappointed if I wasted these years.

[…] What version of myself can I be while I’m here?”

Having made the decision to accept her scholarship to Penn State, Beyah at last has come to a full understanding of Samson’s decision to sever all contact. Lying in her dorm room, Beyah decides she must not retreat to the sort of isolation she chose in high school. She realizes that opening herself to the joy of life not only gives her the opportunity she has always desired but also fulfills Samson’s fondest wishes for her.