50 pages • 1 hour read
Sarah AdamsThe Cheat Sheet
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 25-28Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 25 Summary
The days drag on as Bree waits to talk to Nathan after their jog on Tuesday. She teaches classes, watches her scrapes heal, and waits until he is free to talk. On Thursday, she manages to submit her application for the Good Factory. That night, Nathan calls, and they discuss talking about their romance but agree that talking in person would be best. Bree tells Nathan that she’s going to her nephew’s sixth birthday party the next day, and he tells her that he wants to go with her. Bree tries to encourage Nathan to take the night off and relax with a bubble bath during playoffs instead of driving two hours to attend a child’s birthday party, but he insists on going with her.
The next day, Bree drives to Lily’s house early, armed with candy for her nephews. They’re ecstatic to see her, and so is Lily, though she scolds Bree for bringing more sugar to the party when there’s already cake and ice cream. Bree and Lily’s parents arrive, thrilled by the news of her relationship with Nathan. Her mom even made a burner Twitter account to see social media updates about them. Bree assures them that Nathan will arrive later.
Chapter 26 Summary
Practice went long and Nathan got stuck in traffic, so he arrives at the party two hours late. He chose to drive himself because he did not want his car service to draw more attention to his celebrity status, but now he’s even more exhausted. When he gets to the party, the kids mob him. Levi, the birthday boy, shows him his new NERF gun. Nathan gives him a signed LA Sharks football, but Levi is too young to fully appreciate it. Nathan continues into the house, kids still swarming him, while the adults begin to crowd around him too. He starts to feel panicky, and his vision begins to swirl and shift.
Chapter 27 Summary
Bree sees Nathan’s face go pale. She pushes through the crowd to get to him and can barely hear him as he tries to politely excuse himself. She looks for him as he disappears and finds him in the corner of the upstairs laundry room, arms curled around his chest, breathing heavily. Bree helps to calm him, explaining that he’s having a panic attack and leading him gently through a grounding exercise. She explains that she used to get panic attacks after her accident. Nathan asks her to look away so that he can cry, but she tells him that it’s okay to cry, echoing his words to her after she fell. She holds him tightly as he sobs. He then explains that his anxiety makes him feel broken and incomplete. Bree tells him that he is not broken for struggling to deal with anxiety and that it is something that is very difficult to cope with. She asks him why he won’t let himself rest, and he says that he doesn’t deserve to. He feels that he doesn’t deserve peace and rest because he thinks everything has been handed to him his entire life: He never had to work in high school, and he got his role as starting quarterback after the original quarterback was injured; he feels like a spoiled rich kid who’s had everything handed to him, with no right to feel exhausted. He admits that he only feels the guilt inside him lessen when he’s working hard and that he doesn’t feel like he deserves to feel overworked.
Bree wants to reciprocate his vulnerability. She tells him that he is allowed to feel his emotions, as he is human and everyone, regardless of who they are, experiences emotions. She also tells him that his perfectionism and ability to give “200%” of himself in all aspects of his life is not what makes him a valuable human being and is not the reason she fell in love with him, finally confessing her feelings. She tells him that she loves him for all the other things about him: his sense of humor, his caring heart, and his generosity. She also promises him that even if he never plays football again, she will still love him, and he will still be a wonderful person deserving of love and kindness. He tells her that he loves her, too.
Chapter 28 Summary
Bree drives Nathan home in his truck, and he sends someone to pick up her car and drive it back. Bree plays gentle music in the car ride home, holding Nathan’s hand. When they get home, Nathan asks Bree to stay with him. They go to his bedroom, and both admit that they are nervous. Bree asks if Nathan meant that he loves her or if he was humoring her. He promises that he loves her and takes a box out of his closet and shows her the contents: her yellow scrunchie that still smells like her coconut shampoo, a cocktail napkin with her lipstick on it from the night of magazine gala, the orange Starburst she threw at him when they sat on the couch after the gala, a concert ticket from a show they saw together, and, deeper in the box, the gum wrapper she wrote her number on when they first met in high school. He admits that he’s loved her since high school and that he’s only been celibate because he can’t stand the thought of being with anyone but her. Bree tells him that she’s loved him since he tied her shoe for her the very day they met. Nathan asks why she left him in college, and Bree tells him that she was depressed and in a dark place and worried that she’d drag him down with her and that he’d give up on his dreams of football for her. Nathan tells her that he will love her no matter what and always wants to take care of her. They begin to kiss, holding each other while atop the bed. Before it gets too heated, Nathan pulls back and tells Bree that he wants to wait until marriage to have sex. He tells Bree that he will propose soon, as it already feels like they’ve been dating for the six years they’ve known each other. Bree agrees if that’s what he wants and playfully calls him a softy.
Chapters 25-28 Analysis
As Nathan and Bree confess their feelings, the fear of Romance as a Threat to Friendship finally recedes. Bree finally tells Nathan how she feels, which lets him feel comfortable doing the same, especially after a moment of fraught and intimate emotions in the wake of his panic attack. When they return to Nathan’s apartment after confessing their feelings, Bree thinks, “It’s all so normal, but also lightly scented with different” (261). The core of Bree and Nathan’s romantic relationship is the strong foundation of their friendship, suggesting that far from detonating their friendship, the confession of mutual romantic desire will allow that friendship to continue in a more honest and fulfilling way than before. Bree also finally tells Nathan why she pushed him away during college:
I was afraid you were about to completely give up your dreams for me, and after hanging around me in my mopey, angry, defeated state, you’d realize I wasn’t worth your time anymore and resent me. I was scared you’d see me low and heartbroken and not want me like that. So I pushed you away (265).
She was scared that if she did not push Nathan out of her life, he would resent her and choose to leave her, a pain that would hurt worse than if she ripped off the bandage herself. She tried to end their friendship to let Nathan keep his dreams, when, in reality, she broke his heart and complicated their rekindled friendship, as she made Nathan more afraid to lose her and therefore more hesitant to share his romantic feelings for her.
Nathan’s panic attack forces him to acknowledge The Cost of Fame. When he explains his feelings to Bree, he says, “What right do I have to be exhausted? None. I’m just a rich kid who was provided everything he ever needed and handed more money and more success on a silver platter” (257). Nathan’s view of himself is a harsh one: He believes that his privilege means he has no right to feel anxious, exhausted, or overwhelmed. He thinks that because of his background, he must constantly be put together and working himself to the bone. If he’s not, he thinks that it shows him to be an undeserving person, contrary to the public persona he’s worked to cultivate and the person that he’s formed himself into. Bree challenges Nathan’s idea of his public image after their love confession when he jokes about her not telling anyone that he’s a softy for her. She asks, “Which image? The one of you secretly sneaking hundred-dollar bills into my widowed neighbor’s mailbox? Or you buying an entire building so little ballerinas can continue to afford their training?” (268). These are private, even secret gestures, and Bree’s point is that the private personality Nathan hides is no less admirable than the persona he projects to fans.
Nathan’s panic attack also demonstrates The Power of Vulnerability. When Bree finds him, she immediately seeks to take care of him, as she understands deeply and personally how difficult panic attacks are. She thinks, “I want him to know I will never view him differently or see him as less just because I’ve seen him undone” (255). She works to foster a space where Nathan can feel vulnerable and safe with her, like how he makes her feel safe. She also reciprocates his vulnerability with the most personal and risky thing she can tell him. She says, “Your ability to shoulder everything, to give 200 percent of yourself all the time, to be perfect at everything you attempt…these are not the attributes that make you a valuable human being. […] And they are not why I fell in love with you” (259). This confession is as vulnerable as Bree can possibly be, and it pays off. Nathan returns her feelings, which offers her the emotional fulfillment she’s been seeking.
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