The People We Keep

“It feels like I’m starving without a guitar. If I still had mine, I wouldn’t notice the cold in the campground and I wouldn’t feel hungry right now. I could play until my fingers throbbed and then walk around with fresh indents in my calluses to help me remember that the world can disappear and I can float in sound and breath and nothing else has to matter.”

For April, playing the guitar is about more than just playing music. It is a way for her to escape her surroundings and the problems weighing on her. It was how she survived her lackluster home life, so it is no surprise that after losing her guitar, she finally sets out to find a better life.

“My dad always says anytime someone offers you something you have to figure out what’s in it for them. I don’t think Adam could be in it for whatever free coffee I could pass his way, so it’s exactly the kind of situation Margo would warn me about.”

This excerpt illustrates the two parenting styles that April has experienced. Her father instills in her a sense of cynicism, while Margo approaches parallel situations with a skepticism more focused on April protecting herself from harm. Margo is much more aware of the dangers men pose to women by men and wants to ensure that the motherless April recognizes those dangers as well.

“Maybe I could stay at the motorhome again for a few days before anyone noticed. I miss the company of my tiny TV and knowing what the land around me looks like even when it’s dark. I recognize the men who stumble home after Gary’s closes. I know their children. I understand who’s dangerous and how to hide from them, mostly. I don’t know these boys shouting at the party, and the streetlights make me feel like a doll in a display case.”

One of the subtler themes of The People We Keep involves the opposing cultures of small towns and cities. In Ithaca, April is lost not only because she does not know anyone, but because she doesn’t understand the social environment. In Little River, she knew exactly how to navigate the small society and protect herself. In more developed areas, she struggles to understand how to keep herself safe.

“It feels like we’re playing house on an old fashioned TV show where the couple comes home and talks about their day. I never thought people actually did that. My dad, when he did come home, used to sit and smoke and be all stuck in his head like he wasn’t even there. Adam’s voice is soft, but it fills the room. There’s more space than furniture, so every word echoes just a little. My extremities are thawed. The dark is outside. I wish this was actually what life was like, even though it’s just this simple little thing. Two people sitting on a couch.”

April’s family life in Little River was so unhealthy that she believed that families in which people can relax and communicate were TV fiction. April and Adam now create an environment in which April can feel content just sitting on a couch, and the figurative language she employs shows how tremendously this has affected her: She feels as though the cold and dark cannot creep in, safe and stable for possibly the first time in her life.

“This time the bed is made and I know where he sleeps and that he’s not expecting anything from me. But no one has ever talked to me the way he does, with all the little details of a life that’s not like mine. Everyone I knew before—they were people who were around my whole life. We lived from the same angle. But Adam is interesting and he thinks I’m interesting too, and he’s seen so much more of everything than I have.”

Once again, April contends with confronting someone unfamiliar from her life in Little River. Not only is Adam older and more versed in city living, but he also approaches their relationship in a way that April never witnessed at home. This is another way in which leaving Little River challenges April’s small-town expectations.

“When I turned twelve, Margo bought me a training bra and gave me warnings about getting my period and growing hair in weird places, but maybe there are other ways I’m supposed to change past what’s already happened and I don’t even know.”

Margo is April’s mother figure and the only person who cared for April emotionally for much of the latter’s life. April here recalls Margo versing April in the realities of female puberty—one of many instances in which Margo tries to prepare April for the wider world. Margo has been instrumental in April’s development, but like any parent, she couldn’t prepare her child for everything.

“Adam hears every word I say, but he has to be drunk to want me and even then, he can always stop. The fooling around part with Adam is better than sex was with Matty, but I worry it means that this isn’t going to last, and I want it to. More than just because I want a place to stay, but because I like being with Adam. I like talking to him. I like the way we have patterns, that things are the same most of the time.”

In many of April’s romantic relationships, a motive other than romantic attraction drives her to commit to the relationship. In the case of Adam, that motive is her desire for the stability her father never gave her. She finally has someone she can talk to and “have patterns” with. If things weren’t “the same most of the time,” her desire to be in the relationship would not be as strong.

“There aren’t gay people in Little River. I’ve never met one, and I never even thought about women having sex with women until just now. Gary would mouth off about the homos who were ruining America, but he was talking about men who sleep with other men, which I know, because I looked it up at the library. I expected homos to be some kind of robber barons or corrupt politicians or evil wizards and it was kind of a disappointment to learn that they were just men who slept with men. I couldn’t figure out how that was ruining America, but most of what Gary said never made much sense to me anyway.”

April’s small-town origins are on full display as learning that Carly is gay catches her off guard. For most of April’s life, she has heard only negative things about gay men from the ignorant adults around her. Though April never really absorbed that prejudice, Carly’s presence still comes as a shock since gay women were simply invisible in Little River.

“‘I think maybe everyone is scared to be alone,’ I tell her. ‘Maybe when you get down to it, that’s why everybody does everything. Maybe all we’re doing is trying to be less alone.’”

While giving advice to another, April unwittingly describes her own motivations. April has always been lonely, abandoned by her mother and neglected by her father, and her journey away from Little River is about finding a place to belong and a Chosen (Rather Than Found) Family. When she leaves places like Ithaca, she does so to flee before others can abandon her. She expects to be alone and therefore removes herself before she can experience the pain and loneliness of being left.

“I read somewhere once about animals caged too long staying put even when someone opens the door. I spent so much time in that motorhome before I realized I could go, and while I was there, I never saw the ways I could make it better.”

April was always so focused on leaving Little River that she never thought of how she could improve her life there. Rather than working on the motorhome and truly living in it by making it her own after her father left, she merely existed in it. This ironic replication of the actions of her father, who never got around to building a home for his family, shows how that trauma has continued to shape her.

“Even though I know it’s just a fairy tale,

I keep waiting, waiting for you

To rescue me from the pale.

Even though I know it’s just a passing phase

I keep waiting, waiting for you

To save me from this choking haze.

Even though I’m the one who said goodbye, it’s true

I keep waiting, waiting, waiting…

Waiting for you.”

These are the first original lyrics April performs after leaving Adam. In their personal focus, they exemplify Expression Through Music. April sings about longing for the people she loved while recognizing that she was the one who ended these relationships. To her, happiness with others is a “fairy tale” because she can’t bring herself to trust herself and others not to hurt her.

“It’s easier, I think, to plunk down in the middle of romance. Or lust, or whatever it is. Justin and I know what roles we’re supposed to play, what goes where. There’s a script. A way to act. Friendship is so much harder. It needs time and I never have any. I don’t ever stay long enough to be a friend.”

April finds it easier to be in a romantic relationship because she knows what is expected of her. Having gone her entire childhood and adolescence without a true friendship makes it difficult for her to connect outside these norms and conventions. Friendship would also require her to be completely genuine with people, which she struggles to do.

“I don’t point out how his kind of broke is not the same as mine. How he can get off this ride with a phone call. Our words don’t mean the same things. He doesn’t care anyway. I’ve fallen apart for him. The same way he’s fallen apart for me. But it hurts worse because I tried so hard to keep him together.”

April struggles not to let Justin’s privilege and wealth impact her feelings for him but recognizes that it’s too late. Both Justin and April have lost the idealized image they had of one another; Justin sees her as beneath him, while she realizes that he cannot break the mold created by his privilege.

“I follow the signs to the airport. The things I want to explain are thin and wispy. Too delicate for words. His life is so simple and mine is full of knots. He’ll fly home and forget me. Pretend this didn’t happen. Maybe pull it out as a drinking story when he wants someone to think he has a wild side. One time he took a trip without a plan. One time he broke into a house with a crazy girl. But I don’t think he’ll let himself believe it was the time he followed his heart. He won’t let me matter that much.”

Once again, April struggles to look past Justin’s privilege. She imagines him describing their relationship as a bizarre blip in his life, her everyday struggles nothing but an adventure to him. He will use her to entertain others while refusing to recognize how her situation in life is a product of her family and upbringing.

“I study his face, lines in places that tell me he’s smiled a bunch, but worried more. I try to picture him grabbing my wrist, slamming me against a wall. I can’t. It’s a ridiculous thought. He cares too much. Wears it on his sleeve. He put his feelings into asking me to dinner, trusting I’d be careful not to hurt them. I wonder if my eyes look familiar to him too, if that’s why he liked my music so much. Takes one to know.”

When April meets Ethan, she recognizes herself in his eyes. She sees the weight of constant worry as well as a preoccupation with always thinking of others and how one’s actions impact them. She and Ethan have a near-instant connection because of their similar characteristics.

“Because as much as I’d prefer to play my own stuff all the time, people like covers. They like to know the songs you’re singing. I always change something—sing it at a different tempo or do a new arrangement—but hold on to the heart of the song so it’s just familiar enough. The audience listens harder then, like it’s a quiz. Can they figure out the song before I sing the chorus? And then they’re invested, so I can slip in a few of my own songs too.”

April is a seasoned performer by this point and showcases her ability to connect with an audience. She has discovered a way in which she can perform her own songs while garnering crowd engagement. That crowds tend not to be enthusiastic when they don’t know any of the lyrics speaks to the personally expressive nature of music in the novel.

“Pride for someone else always seemed to me like it had to come from seeing the journey. You knew how hard it was for them to get there and you felt invested in their success. But Ethan says it was assurance. Maybe it’s enough to understand that there’s been a journey. Maybe he’s tricked himself into actually believing we’re already in the middle of our friendship. I don’t think I mind. It’s nice to have someone rooting for me.”

April’s understanding of pride is challenged when Ethan expresses confidence in her. Ethan is committed to being her friend and supporting her, so he expresses pride in seeing her succeed. In April’s mind, she hasn’t let anyone close enough for them to be proud of her.

“I say that it’s amazing how much you can miss people you only got to be with for one tiny little perfect bit of time; how a place where you barely got to live can be the closest thing you’ve ever had to home.”

April finally realizes that love, friendship, and home aren’t based on anything but the love and support one receives from them. A person’s quality depends on the actions they take to help and support others.

“I heard once that before you drown, you get euphoric. That’s what this feels like. Happy drowning. I have a family now. I have a home. I am terrified.”

April’s association of drowning and happiness shows her inability to allow herself to enjoy success or stability. When good things happen to her, she becomes anxious. She is more comfortable on the run because if she doesn’t stay or let people in, then they cannot disappoint her and she cannot disappoint them.

“‘Of course,’ she says. ‘Your father can’t very well yell at me for overstepping my bounds now, can he?’ She claps her hand over her mouth. Her face goes pale. ‘I’m sorry. I just—I always felt bad taking you back to that motorhome. I didn’t mean to…’ I’m ready to cry, to know that Margo might have actually wanted me. To know that she really would have taken me home with her if she could.”

April finally realizes that Margo has always been the mother she needed. Margo has cared for her for years and always wished that she could do more. Now that April’s father is dead, there is nothing stopping her from stepping in as April’s parent.

“And then, at the end of the road, there’s the motorhome. It’s not a clubhouse. It’s a closet. A tomb. It’s where he left me so he could forget I existed, the way Margo sends her fake Christmas tree to storage after New Year’s.”

April’s depiction of the motorhome turns what some adolescents would see as a desirable situation into something far more sinister. Her father left her in the motorhome to start a new life without her, hiding her away in a “closet” and only taking her out when he needed her. April also likens the motorhome to a tomb, doubling down on the negative depiction but also suggesting her rebirth: The “tomb” holds the person that she no longer is.

“None of these people even liked my father. And all of them knew about me. They knew where I lived. They knew that he left me. They left me too. Instead of thinking that maybe a kid who lives in a motorhome in the woods might want to come over for cookies and milk after school, they told their kids not to play with me. They looked at me like I should be ashamed for existing, because my parents were divorced and my shoes were ratty and my hair was stringy and I always had dirt under my fingernails. I was something they could catch if they got too close, like my shame would rub off on them. They were happy to forget me, same as my dad.”

April was not only abandoned and neglected by her parents but by the community around her. A community is meant to support one another, not turn away from those most in need. This realization further proves just how important Margo’s care has been for April’s survival.

“Driving will fix things. Changing directions. Gaining distance, getting to the kind of numb where miles fill in for feelings. I like the way the road sounds. I like the rhythms that come from the tires and the windshield wipers, rain and the rush of wind, and how the sounds change when I raise or lower the window. My dad used to say that good folk music is etched with the rhythm of the road. I always listen for it in songs and I find it in the best ones. So when I’m driving, I pay attention to all the noise; I take in the smells and everything I see and everything I am and I start my song.”

April does a lot of driving, which proves essential to her art. She grew up hearing about the importance of the road in music and uses her travels as inspiration for her songs, not only based on what she’s running from, but also based on the experience of moving and witnessing the landscape change around her.