Chapter 4: Three — Summary, Analysis, and Key Themes

⚠️ 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

Two days after their first meeting, Frankie and Zeke are already bored. Frankie reflects on how activities she enjoyed alone now feel childish with an audience. Zeke asks what she used to do for fun, and she demonstrates tossing sock balls at a My Little Pony toy. He gently suggests they find something else to do.

Frankie's narration then opens up about her social isolation. She had friends in elementary and junior high, but they matured socially in ways she didn't—they got into sports, drinking, parties, and sexual experiences that made her uncomfortable. She still carried a Nancy Drew book while peers talked about boys. Her father left the family, marrying his secretary and leaving her mother with four children and little money. People became strange around her after that, and she kept her sadness inside, waiting for someone who wanted her.

Frankie gets an idea and leads Zeke to the family garage, which is cluttered with boxes of junk her father left behind and her mother refuses to touch. Under a tarp, obscured by water skis and a ladder, is an old Xerox copier. Frankie explains that her triplet brothers stole it from the high school's storage building last year. Drunk, they made hundreds of copies of their own buttocks—Andrew admits to about three hundred—and then broke the machine by sitting on it repeatedly. They covered it with a tarp and forgot about it.

Zeke examines the machine and asks if the brothers read the manual. Frankie scoffs. Zeke works through a checklist, eventually pulling out a crumpled, accordion-folded piece of paper jammed inside—a copy of one brother's butt. The copier works again.

They spend the next hour experimenting, placing objects on the glass and enjoying how oversized items distort into unreal images. Frankie tears a photo of Cher from an old Vogue magazine and drags it across the glass mid-copy, producing a smeared, melting image that impresses Zeke. He makes his own zigzag distortion with a model's photo. They wonder if you can make art with a copy machine, unaware of Xerox art or Andy Warhol—they believe they've invented it.

Frankie presses her face to the glass, then Zeke suggests they put their faces side by side for an optical illusion effect. The result looks like two dead people pulled into a black hole, which Zeke compares to a death metal album cover. They try again, and this time, as the copier runs, Frankie leans in and kisses Zeke—the first kiss for both of them. She says it felt like a nice way to do it, like art. The resulting image looks ugly and beautiful at once. Frankie apologizes for not asking first, explaining she wanted to finally do it so she could move on and be normal. Zeke smiles and says this could be fun—referring to the copier, not the kiss. He suggests they could do something weird with it, and Frankie repeats the word weird like a magic spell.

Key Events

Frankie and Zeke, bored two days after meeting, search for something to do
Frankie reveals her social isolation and her father's abandonment of the family
Frankie leads Zeke to the garage, where they discover the stolen Xerox copier
Frankie recounts how her triplet brothers stole the copier and made hundreds of butt copies before breaking it
Zeke repairs the copier by removing a jammed sheet of paper
The two experiment with photocopy art, distorting objects and magazine images
They place their faces on the glass together; Frankie kisses Zeke during the copy—a first for both
Zeke suggests they could do something weird with the copier

Character Development

Frankie — This chapter deepens Frankie's interiority. Her loneliness is contextualized: friends drifted away as they matured socially, and her father's departure left her angry and isolated. She's been waiting for someone who wants her. With Zeke, she takes initiative—claiming the copier as hers and theirs, making creative decisions, and initiating the kiss. She frames the kiss as a way to move on and be normal, revealing her desire for normalcy even as she embraces the weird.

Zeke — Zeke shows patience and mechanical aptitude, fixing the copier that Frankie's brothers broke. He's curious and playful, suggesting the optical illusion idea and the animation concept. His response to the kiss is sheepish rather than reciprocal—he redirects to the copier, suggesting his interest is more in the creative project than in romance, at least for now.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

The Xerox copier as creative medium — The broken copier becomes the central object of the chapter. Stolen, abused, and abandoned, it's reclaimed by Frankie and Zeke as a tool for making art. Their experiments with distortion and smearing transform a mundane office machine into an instrument of creative discovery.

Art as connection — The copier gives Frankie and Zeke a shared project. It's the first thing Frankie has to offer Zeke, and their collaboration creates intimacy. The kiss happens during the act of making art, framed by Frankie as a nice way to do it, like art.

The weird as creative principle — Zeke's suggestion that they do something weird with the copier resonates with Frankie, who repeats the word like a magic word. The chapter positions weirdness not as a flaw but as a generative force—the opposite of the normalcy Frankie says she wants.

The garage as liminal space — The garage is a transitional zone: full of her father's abandoned belongings, avoided by her mother, hidden from view. It's a space outside the family's daily life where Frankie and Zeke can create something new.

Distortion and transformation — The copier's distortions—smearing Cher's face, flattening their own features—mirror Frankie's sense of being out of step with her peers. The act of transforming images becomes a way of transforming her own experience.

Desire for normalcy — Frankie explicitly states she wants to kiss Zeke so she can move on and be normal. Yet the chapter suggests that her path to normalcy runs through the weird—the copier, the art, the unconventional first kiss.

Why This Chapter Matters

This chapter establishes the central creative project of the novel. The copier isn't just a plot device—it's the origin point for whatever weird thing Frankie and Zeke will create together, and the chapter's final line sets up the mystery that will presumably drive the rest of the book. It also deepens Frankie's characterization significantly, connecting her present isolation to her father's abandonment and her inability to keep pace with her peers' social development. The first kiss, framed as an artistic act, complicates the relationship between the two characters and sets up the dynamic that will define their summer.

Study Questions

1. Why does Frankie kiss Zeke during the photocopy, and what does she say it means to her?

Frankie kisses Zeke because she's never kissed anyone before and wants to finally do it so it won't be so scary—so she can move on and be normal. She tells him it felt like a nice way to do it, like art. The kiss is framed as both a personal milestone and an artistic act, blurring the line between intimacy and creative expression.

2. How does the copier's history—stolen by her brothers, broken, abandoned—connect to Frankie's own situation?

The copier was stolen, misused, broken, and then hidden under a tarp in a garage full of her father's abandoned belongings. Like Frankie, it's been neglected and pushed aside. When she claims it as hers and theirs, she's also claiming agency over her own story. The machine's transformation from junk to creative tool mirrors Frankie's own potential for transformation.

3. What does the word weird mean to Frankie at the end of the chapter?

Frankie repeats weird like a magic word, suggesting it carries transformative power for her. Throughout the chapter, she's expressed a desire for normalcy—to catch up with her peers, to have a normal first kiss. But Zeke's suggestion that they do something weird with the copier reframes weirdness as something valuable and creative. The word becomes a promise of the strange, generative project to come.