Deadline

“This is a story about a kid who always knew at some core level he was moving on early and, even through the initial terror and disbelief, is going to figure out, come hell or high water (I vote high water), a way to consolidate a life into a year. Before Doc told me, I thought I had time to play, but now this year is my life. I have maybe twelve months to fall in love, marry, make smart investments, grow old, and die. But it’s relative right?”

Ben’s diagnosis changes his outlook on life and launches his journey toward self-discovery. Ben decides that he won’t let his newfound condition disempower him. Instead, he uses his prognosis as a source of motivation and a tool for change. His response to his prognosis conveys his strong will, bravery, and determination.

“First period of the first day of school I realize if I’m going to maximize my education this year, I’d better take control.”

Ben’s desire to live a full life extends to the academic realm. He doesn’t simply want to have fun in his final days but wants to learn as much as he can, too. His motivation is multivalent, and therefore reveals Ben’s deep, passionate character traits and desire for Self-Discovery and Personal Growth in the Face of Adversity.

“I have thought about my future plenty because I can think of it all in one thought, but saying that is not going to get Ms. Suzuki into my pickup. ‘I have,’ I tell her, ‘and I see you in it.’”

Ben’s decision to hide his condition creates challenges in his interpersonal relationships. When Dallas starts asking him about his future, Ben withholds the whole truth. He wants to be authentic with Dallas because he has feelings for her, but he also manipulates the truth to get close to her. This first dialogue between Ben and Dallas foreshadows later conflicts in their dynamic.

“But you worry about your legacy and you’ll spend all your time trying to create something you have no control over. It’s all in good works, my man. It’s about influence, about what people do in your name after you’re gone.”

Hey-Soos gives Ben the allowance and the space to explore complex questions about life and death. Ben wants Hey-Soos to understand how to leave a good legacy when he dies, but Hey-Soos is disinterested in giving Ben easy answers. As Ben’s archetypal guide, Hey-Soos challenges Ben to see his life, his community, and himself anew.

“Since Hey-Soos asked me what I wanted to do with this time, I’ve decided a little time with the least of my brethren might look good on my celestial resume and Rudy sure qualifies there.”

Ben’s prognosis expands his capacity for empathy. Once Ben starts to realize that his time on earth is finite, he begins to invest energy in the town outcast, Rudy McCoy. Ben’s own encounters with loneliness and isolation have helped him understand Rudy’s alienation. This passage marks the start of their unprecedented and transformative connection.

“But Marla wants serious, and I should give her serious. She’s not Freud, but she’s plenty smart. New, and scared, but smart. I know I have to get to the serious side soon, because shortly I’ll be living on borrowed time. I try to return to the feelings I had sitting in The Chief with Dallas, because they were serious. I close my eyes and picture her. ‘Did you ever have a feeling that you were connected to somebody? I mean the minute you see them, or have some stupid little conversation where neither one of you said anything important but…’ I open my eyes and see tears welling in hers. ‘You have,’ I say.”

Marla Dawson’s character helps Ben to see how his humor is a defense mechanism. He needs his humor in order to survive his adversity, but he also learns in this scene that seriousness is just as important. Once he begins to speak more bluntly about his emotions, he finds a way to process them.

“You can’t fix this, little bro. Every time you try and every time you fail. She’ll either wear herself out and come down or she’ll go to the hospital and come down. But your lifeguard act has no effect.”

Cody Wolf offers Ben a support system. The brothers have been best friends for as long as they can remember. Furthermore, Cody understands Ben’s inclinations to self-sacrifice on behalf of their mother and is therefore the first person to encourage Ben to care for himself so that he can care for others.

“My mind skips like a flat rock sailed onto the glass-smooth surface of that lake. I can’t tell if I’m closer to Dallas or further away. I wanted more response; wanted her to want me to stay. But if we are closer, then what? I mean, I’m like the worst kind of army brat or something, here for the year and then gone. Only I’m really gone.”

Ben’s intensifying feelings for Dallas Suzuki change his outlook on life and death. Before getting involved with Dallas, Ben didn’t feel sad by the idea of dying. However, his newfound intimacy with Dallas makes him fear what he’ll lose when he dies.

“I think when you’re dying you start looking for important things in the corners. You can’t let anything that seems even semi-important pass, because it passes forever. Things take on meaning. In my pickup on the way home, I’m figuring Rudy McCoy is somebody I’d better get to know better.”

Ben’s diagnosis and prognosis not only make him more empathetic but launch his journey toward Self-Discovery and Personal Growth in the Face of Adversity. Before learning about his condition, Ben had the license to ignore the ideas and people that didn’t feel relevant to his teenage life. His condition makes him see the value in minute interactions and conversations, and thus inspires his developing friendship with Rudy.

“It’s hard to figure out how to get answers out of Hey-Soos. He never says something is or isn’t going to happen, and he won’t tell you whether something is the right or wrong thing to do. That exasperates me cubed, but when I get past trying to wrangle answers out of him, he usually brings me around to finding my own. He’s like a good math teacher. But I’m like a bad math student: I want the answer and I don’t want to show my work. I’m dying and I’m impatient.”

Hey-Soos’s character is a narrative device used to propel Ben’s emotional and psychological journeys. Because Ben has chosen not to tell his loved ones about his condition, Hey-Soos is the only person on whom he can rely for answers and support. Hey-Soos’s constant presence and listening ear not only comfort Ben but also give him the strength to interrogate his world and to reflect on his mistakes.

“If you come off the field at the final gun with nothing, that’s perfect love. It doesn’t mean I can’t make mistakes, but they’ll never be because I’m tired and they’ll never be because I’m not thinking. My mistakes will come from excess.”

Ben’s time on the football team changes how he sees himself and his community. Ben used to be on the cross-country team, a sport that prioritizes individual achievement over teamwork. Therefore, the Trout Cougars help Ben to see the ways in which working as hard as you can for and with your team builds important relationships and strengthens the self.

“I’m smiling and teasing back as if I’m two entities, a young high school kid with his whole life in front of him and an old, old man, staring into the eye of the universe to see who blinks. I feel immortal—that catch today was undoable—and I feel so mortal because there will most certainly be nothing else like it.”

Ben’s time on the football team and relationship with Dallas complicate his regard for his condition. These communal and romantic realms have opened Ben’s heart in new ways. He feels powerful and loved, but he also realizes that he will never experience these sensations again. His joy is therefore paired with his grief.

“I need to be careful here. I like Dallas a lot. A lot. But her future and my future are of two different lengths.”

Ben’s condition causes The Confrontation of Mortality on a regular basis. Ben is trying to live his life as normally as possible. However, because he is in his senior year of high school, he can’t engage with his life in the same way as his peers. Therefore, he feels incapable of discussing the future with Dallas, because their circumstances are different and he hasn’t told her the truth. He is trying to live his life on his own terms but cannot do so while hiding his condition from those he loves.

“Now I have to decide whether or not to tell her the truth about me. I watch her chest rise and fall to her breathing, and almost choke, thinking about it. It would bring great relief to talk to someone in the real world, but I do not want people treating me like I’m dying. Nobody. I want to make this year my life: a regular life where people treat you regular.”

Ben’s decision to keep his condition hidden from his loved ones creates division. Ben has convinced himself that withholding the truth will protect others and himself. However, his relationship with Dallas proves otherwise. This passage captures the internal struggle Ben is facing regarding the matter and the lessons his condition is teaching him about The Impact of Secrets and the Value of Transparency.

“We live in a country where racism and divisiveness and ignorance and fear rule the day. It’s so bad, there are things that happened four hundred years ago they’re afraid to tell us about today. Just because we live in Podunk, Idaho, where it’s easy not to pay any attention to all that, doesn’t mean we’re not going to get confronted with it when we get out in the world.”

Ben’s prognosis makes him a bold advocate for social change. Instead of retreating from life, Ben engages with it more ardently. He particularly does so in the classroom by challenging his teachers and speaking up about what he believes in. His voice inspires small changes in his community over the course of the novel.

“So don’t worry about your brother and his college football career, or Dallas, or whether you can make your mother okay. If you play the game the best you can, you have the best chance of others seeing a piece of what you see.”

Hey-Soos helps Ben to balance his own interests with the interests of others. For years, Ben has defined himself as the protector in his family. He has given up his own experiences to be there for his dad, mom, and brother. Hey-Soos doesn’t tell him to abandon these inclinations but helps him to pair them with his own needs and desires.

“Still scared, I guess; maybe I’ll be a little less scared since talking to you about this truth I’m supposed to be telling. But mostly I want to finish the season healthy and see if I can end this right. Really scared for my mom. Maybe even more for my dad. Cody. Man, I love him. It’s always felt bad not telling but I just don’t want all the complication. I want normal.”

Ben’s desperation for normalcy complicates his ability to honestly confront his own mortality. He thinks that he is reconciled with his imminent death. However, his secret has kept him from owning his experience and asking for help. In particular, the secret has alienated him from his family.

“What the hell is going on in my short life? I’ve been on a comet since Doc Wagner delivered my news. The universe has handed me things I’d have never dared to want. Dallas Suzuki. The mantle of a football hero. Monstrous esteem. Yet it’s taking the one thing I took for granted: my life. And now it’s showing me subtleties, paradoxes, almost no one gets to see.”

Ben’s relationships with Dallas, Cody, and Rudy McCoy expand Ben’s concept of right and wrong, truth and withholding. The closer he becomes to these characters, the more complex emotions he experiences. As a result, Ben must come to terms with life’s mysteries.

“I was going to tell. I really was: Dallas, Cody, Rudy, Coach, at least. But how can I do that now? I’ve talked myself into imagining dealing with them, but how can I deal with me? I feel my bravery leaking out into the warm bathwater. I can’t let them see me weak. That would ruin everything. Going out quietly is becoming a lot more complicated than I thought.”

As Ben’s death draws closer, he begins to regret the impact his secret is having on those he loves. He understands why he decided to hide his condition, but has since learned that without vulnerability, he can’t have true love or connection. This moment catalyzes Ben’s coming decision to open up to others.

“‘I’ll be here,’ Coach says. ‘You know I will. And keep in mind, these are people who love you and they’re smart. It might take them a while, but they’ll understand. And if they don’t we’ll make them understand.’”

Ben discovers a confidante in Coach Banks when he finally tells him the truth about his condition. Ben has feared revealing the truth because he doesn’t want to appear weak. Coach surprises Ben by supporting him in whatever way he needs. He therefore reminds Ben of the importance of community, openness, and asking for help.

“But all my trouble so far has come from being the little control freak I am, deciding who should hear what when and trying to control other people’s emotions by what I say. It’s become clearer and clearer it’s just disrespectful to not let people deal with things in a straightforward manner.”

Ben’s journey toward self-discovery teaches him the value of transparency and vulnerability. This passage conveys the ways in which Ben has developed as an individual since receiving his prognosis. He is willing to admit his mistakes and to make amends for them.

“You’re right, Mr. Lambeer. I do think I’m pretty smart. No Galileo, but pretty smart. And I’m going to have to go with that because I won’t be getting the experience you’re talking about.”

Once Ben starts opening up to others, he finds power and freedom in embracing the truth. He starts to speak more bluntly in Mr. Lambeer’s class after talking to Coach and Rudy because has learned the value of owning his experience. Doing so in this public arena captures Ben’s newfound bravery and confidence.

“Something you learn on the last day of your life is as important as something you learn on the first day of grade school, because you’re not dying, you’re changing. And goddamn it, the truth is a powerful weapon to take into that new frontier.”

Embracing the truth opens Ben emotionally and gives him peace of mind. Once he learns to be vulnerable with his friends, his community, and his family, he reconciles himself with his life and his death. He also learns how to balance life’s pain with life’s joy. His thoughts in this scene immediately precede his death and therefore convey Ben’s harmonious mental state at the end of his life.