Chapter 25: Ann — The River, the Boat, and Unspoken Truths

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

Ann, still reeling from her argument with Crystal King, calls Wes out of boredom or anger. They take his homemade boat onto a Florida river. Ann admits she is four months pregnant, and the father (Noah) is not involved. Wes reveals that he too has a child—a seven-year-old son named Elijah—who moved to California with his ex-wife Fiona. Wes admits he has not seen Elijah in years and keeps a bag of rubber ducks as a painful memento. The day on the water becomes an exchange of vulnerabilities: Ann shares her pregnancy, Wes shares his lost fatherhood. Their conversation touches on Bà Ngoại’s hoarding, the strangler-fig nature of banyan trees, and Ann’s struggle to draw her grandmother’s portrait. By the end, Wes tells Ann she will be a wonderful mother, and for the first time she feels truly maternal.

Key Events

Ann calls Wes and he takes her out on the river in a boat he built himself.
Ann draws the banyan tree in her sketchbook and talks about its invasive, strangler-fig nature.
She mentions running into Crystal King at the art store and the cruel words Crystal said about Bà Ngoại.
Ann reveals she is four months pregnant and that Noah is not involved.
Wes discloses that he was married to Fiona and that she moved to California with their son Elijah when the boy was two.
Wes describes his grief over Elijah and the bag of rubber ducks he still keeps.
Wes reassures Ann that she will be a tender mother, and Ann feels a key turning inside her—she finally feels like a mother.

Character Development

Ann allows herself to be vulnerable in this chapter. She initiates contact with Wes despite weeks of silence, and she reveals her pregnancy. Her insecurity about becoming a mother softens when Wes voices belief in her. She also confesses her lingering anger at Crystal and her difficulty drawing Bà Ngoại’s portrait, showing that grief and creativity remain tangled.

Wes sheds his easygoing façade. He admits to a painful past: a failed marriage, a son he barely sees. The rubber-duck collection hints at unresolved grief. His willingness to comfort Ann despite his own hurt deepens his role as a compassionate anchor for her.

Bà Ngoại is present through memory (the chili dare, the hoarded dolls) and through the banyan tree, which Ann now draws obsessively. She haunts the chapter as a figure both feared and missed.

Noah remains offstage but is defined by distance: he ships Ann’s boxes, acknowledges the child’s existence, but offers no support.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

Invasive species and belonging. Ann explains that banyan trees are strangler figs brought from India by Thomas Edison and are now illegal to plant. Wes remarks that “we are all invasive,” referring to how settlers claimed stolen land. The boat, built by Wes, becomes a vessel for two people who feel out of place and are searching for a sense of home.

Truth as an onion. Ann reflects that “truth is like an onion; I have to peel it apart.” Each layer reveals a new sting—her ambivalence about Noah, her guilt about leaving, Wes’s hidden child. The chapter performs this peeling as both characters drop guarded stories.

Motherhood and uncertainty. Ann’s pregnancy (nicknamed “Kumquat”) is four months along but still unreal to her. Wes’s story of Elijah’s disappearance underscores the risk of losing a child even after birth. The bag of rubber ducks symbolizes love preserved in absurd, small objects.

Memory and the uncanny. The boat ride stirs shared memories of Bà Ngoại’s chili challenge and Ann’s fear of alligators. Ann imagines the mangroves as dumping grounds for bodies, linking the natural landscape to hidden violence, but the sunny day keeps horror at a distance.

Why This Chapter Matters

This chapter is a turning point in Ann’s emotional arc. For the first time she voices her pregnancy aloud to someone outside the family, and she hears a counterweight to her own fear. Wes’s confession about Elijah introduces a parallel story of lost fatherhood that contextualizes Ann’s own abandonment by Noah. The river setting—between sky and duckweed, alligators and herons—mirrors Ann’s liminal state: not quite a mother, not yet free of the past. The chapter also deepens the novel’s meditation on what it means to own land, to build a home, and to inhabit a story that is never fully one’s own.

Study Questions and Answers

1. Why does Ann feel the need to call Wes after weeks of silence?
Ann is still angry about Crystal’s cruel words about Bà Ngoại, but she is also bored and lonely. Her pregnancy has made her crave connection, and Wes represents a part of her life that felt careless and free. She uses the old magic words—“want to go on an adventure?”—to rekindle that ease.

2. How does the banyan tree’s nature as a “strangler fig” reflect Ann’s situation?
The tree is invasive, imported, and smothers other plants to grow. Ann feels like an outsider in Florida, much as the tree is not native. She is also being “strangled” by her grief for Bà Ngoại and her uncertainty about motherhood. Her drawings of the tree blur with images of her grandmother, suggesting that the past is wrapping itself around her present.

3. What does Wes’s confession about Elijah reveal about his character?
Wes regrets his failure as a father and carries deep guilt about his son moving away. His admission shows he is not the carefree adventurer he appears to be. The rubber-duck bag is a tangible symbol of his unresolved grief. His willingness to share this pain with Ann deepens their intimacy and allows him to offer her genuine reassurance.

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