49 pages • 1 hour read
Sloan HarlowEverything We Never Said
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2024A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Importance of Feeling One’s Feelings
Many characters try to repress their feelings, such as how Sawyer and Ella attempt to disregard their attraction to one another due to misplaced loyalty to Hayley. Sam and Sawyer both try to avoid dealing with the anger that results from their childhood abuse, and Hayley tries to ignore her feeling of unlovability—caused, in part, by Phoebe’s emotional abuse—but it resurfaces in her relationship with Sam, causing her to act in ways that she cannot explain or justify. Ironically, it is Sam Wilkens whose words introduce this theme, but the experiences of nearly every significant character demonstrate its truthfulness.
Sam, a school psychologist, foregrounds the importance of “letting [one]self feel the feelings” (103), however painful and difficult. This is ironic because Sam never accepts responsibility for his violent and abusive behavior or deals with his anger, which might allow his emotional wounds to heal. However, his training highlights the fact that the path to healing is through acknowledging one’s feelings and working through them.
Sawyer is the character whose experiences highlight the theme most clearly. While he recognizes that his feelings about Ella are hugely significant, he decides to “do what [he’s] been doing for a while: […] bury and ignore [them]” (92). He tries not to allow his romantic interest in Ella to develop due to the secrets he keeps from her and his loyalty to Hayley. He tells himself, “I know how to handle this. Shove down. Ignore. In a second, I’m fine” (118). However, he’s not fine; instead, he’s so used to trying to avoid his feelings that, for a long time, he refuses to work through them, pushing him to act more and more like his abusive father. Confused by his guilt, his fear of becoming an abuser, and the huge emotional burden that he carries about Hayley, Sawyer tries not to feel, which doesn’t work. After he’s released from police custody, he tells his mother, “I think I bottle a lot up” (296). Fortunately, however, he knows that this isn’t an excuse to lash out. Further, when he gives himself permission to feel his feelings, he begins to recognize his responsibility to himself and others. In response to Hayley’s confession about her and Sam, Sawyer says, “I felt as helpless as a child, overwhelmed with conflicting emotion. ‘Can I have a minute?’ I’d asked […] ‘Some time to just…think about this?’” (290). After he takes this time to process, he recognizes that Sam took advantage of Hayley, and he sees her as a victim rather than himself. He doesn’t resort to petty resentment. Instead, he focuses on helping her escape her situation. When he permits himself to feel, he comes to fitting conclusions and acts accordingly, proving how important it is.
Phoebe and Sam never deal with the resentment and anger that stem from their childhood abuse, causing them to reenact the same patterns. Ella also tries to avoid her feelings for Sawyer, causing her unnecessary guilt. Likewise, in the end, Scott sends her flowers, congratulating her on knocking Sam out and not getting herself killed. She thinks, “When I read [his note], I thought about […] the vast amount of emotion that Scott keeps buried” (304). Scott bottled up his feelings for Hayley, only confessing them on the night she died. Then, he tormented Ella about her involvement in the crash that he believes killed Hayley. For her part, Hayley eventually recognizes the toxic nature of her relationship with Phoebe and gives herself permission to abandon her mother to her own misery, which Phoebe chooses again and again. Ultimately, most characters’ experiences demonstrate the dangers of failing to acknowledge and accept one’s feelings or the tremendous benefits of doing so.
The Futility of Guilt
Connected to the first theme is the related idea that guilt and shame serve little productive purpose. The more characters try to hide something, the more their guilt turns to shame, influencing their decisions and creating bigger problems. Ultimately, guilt is a futile emotion that prompts characters to avoid its apparent cause, preventing them from working through those feelings and creating unnecessary embarrassment and pain.
Ella feels guilty over her feelings for Sawyer and her role as the driver in the accident. Regarding Sawyer, Seema tells her, “Hayley loved you […] She would want whatever made you happy. It’s not like you’re stealing him while she’s actively dating him” (128). Ella beats herself up for acting on her attraction to her dead best friend’s boyfriend because she doesn’t know that Hayley was not in love with him. Her guilt is unnecessary for the reasons that Seema provides, as well as reasons that Ella cannot fathom yet. Later, she seeks “proof” of Sawyer’s ability to behave as “S” does because she is confused by her experience, which dramatically conflicts with what she reads. In the corn maze, she thinks, “I’m a needy, guilty mess, doing everything I can to fight off instincts I hate myself for having” (197). She feels guilty for her continued attraction to Sawyer, given that Hayley—Ella thinks—presents him as an abuser. It turns out that Ella’s instincts about Sawyer are right; he’s not abusive but, rather, a good guy who wants to address his unresolved anger. Finally, regarding Hayley’s accident, Ella tells Sam, “You killed her. And you nearly killed me. Both that night and every night for six months […] I never put down that boulder of guilt” (255). The terrible guilt that Ella carries is completely misplaced both because Sam is responsible for the accident and because Hayley didn’t die.
Hayley’s guilt, which originated with her mother’s emotional abuse, keeps her in a relationship that perpetuates the patterns that already feel so familiar. Of Phoebe’s boyfriends, Hayley writes, “If I’d been more lovable…there’s no way any of them would have left” (168). Phoebe told Hayley that she was to blame for her father leaving, and this led to Hayley’s guilt for all subsequent abandonments. Of course, Hayley had little to do with the failure of her mother’s relationships, which were more likely to be caused by Phoebe’s emotional manipulation and alcoholism. However, later in life, Hayley’s guilt causes her to fault herself for Sam’s abuse. After he screams at her and throws a mug against the wall because she made plans with Ella, she writes, “I felt guilty. Guilty for making S so upset. A part of me wanted to go to him, beg for forgiveness” (142). Though Hayley did nothing wrong, her guilt keeps her quiet, making her feel ashamed, a feeling that grows in isolation until she writes, “I’m sorry I’m a coward […] I’m sorry I can’t tell you, E” (176). Eventually, Hayley takes on the guilt for being afraid to come forward about the abuse that she feels, on some level, that she deserves.
Many characters deal with guilt, and it is almost always misplaced. At the very least, the guilt doesn’t actually prompt them to act differently; at most, it leads to shame that can do real harm.
The Cyclical Nature of Abuse
The experiences of Sam, Sawyer, and Phoebe and Hayley demonstrate the cyclical nature of abuse; survivors’ unresolved anger and guilt can allow patterns of abuse to repeat until someone breaks the cycle.
Sam’s childhood abuse leaves him angry and possessive, unpredictable feelings that he blames for his abusive behavior. When he fears that he’s not enough for Hayley—as he was not enough for his father—she writes that “his eyes [are] an open wound. [Her] heart br[eaks] at the pain [she] s[ees]” (140). Sam didn’t feel loved by his father, and he is so desperate for Hayley’s love that he demands all of it, forbidding her from loving anyone else, including Ella. His father’s abuse opened this wound, causing Sam’s fear that he isn’t enough to deserve someone’s love. Even when Hayley promises him that she will love all of him, even the ugliest parts, it cannot be enough because her love cannot fill the void that his father’s abuse created. Hayley writes, “He told me about how when he was seven, he wasn’t strong enough to hold the bedroom door shut against his father when his dad was in a blustering, drunken rage” (167). Sam allows his fear of being fundamentally unlovable to govern his actions, and he never takes accountability for his choices, perpetuating the cycle of abuse.
Sawyer, on the other hand, acknowledges his anger and accepts responsibility for his actions, breaking the cycle. His mother helps by explaining to him that he has a choice: “You’re not a werewolf, Saw.’ She gestures to the photo of Wilkens. ‘He’s not a werewolf […] He wants us to believe that he only wakes up in the aftermath, that he’s as horrified as us” (294). Unlike Sam, who refuses responsibility and constantly feels like a victim, Sawyer owns up, saying of his anger and pain, “None of it’s an excuse” (296). This recognition prompts him to work with the new school psychologist to be sure that he can manage his challenging emotions in healthy ways rather than destructive ones.
Hayley also succeeds in breaking the pattern in her family when she recognizes Phoebe’s emotional abuse and chooses not to tell her mother that she survived the crash. Of her childhood, she writes, “P had begged my dad to forgive me, ‘She’s a stupid kid,’ she’d said, pointing to my face. But that hadn’t been enough to get Dad to stay” (142). Unwilling to take responsibility herself, Phoebe blamed Hayley for her own failed relationship, creating Hayley’s confusion about what love should feel like. Thus, when Sam doesn’t leave her, she wonders, “Isn’t that enough? That he stayed? That he didn’t leave? […] Isn’t that love?” (142). It takes time for her to realize that love and control are not the same and that his possessiveness is different from love’s protectiveness and care. Phoebe’s speech to Ella demonstrates the cycle’s presence, as she says, “I deserved better than my mom, and on and on—it’s the oldest story in the book” (189). Hayley breaks this cycle by refusing a relationship with her mother and attending therapy to work through the guilt and resentment created by Phoebe’s abuse.
Sam and Phoebe demonstrate how the refusal to accept personal responsibility for one’s choices can lead to the repetition of abuse, while Sawyer and Hayley emphasize an individual’s ability to overcome anger and guilt, breaking that cycle.
