Miracle Creek

Teresa’s memory of the day of the fire introduces a current controversy about autism treatments. HBOT is one of many alternative therapies for autistic children, treatments which range from fairly safe to very dangerous. Certain groups, like the protestors at Miracle Submarine the day of the fire, believe that autism is not a disease or an abnormality, but a personality type. They believe that parents who attempt to cure autism are teaching their “kids [they] don’t love [their kids] the way they are” (33). Teresa is shocked by the protestors’ statements and tries to argue with them, but the protestors are after Elizabeth; one of them even grabs Elizabeth’s arm, threatening her: “If you don’t stop, something terrible will happen. I guarantee it” (34).

However, Matt mentions none of this in his testimony, and Teresa finds the difference between Matt’s recollection and her own unsettling. Teresa attributes this to Matt’s lack of experience in parenting a disabled child, which, Teresa believes, “transmuted you, transported you to a parallel world with an altered gravitational axis” (35). Matt doesn’t understand what was at stake in the argument and instead focuses only on Elizabeth’s behavior. By introducing Teresa’s viewpoint, the reader understands that Matt’s testimony may be missing vital information, not necessarily because Matt is being dishonest, but because Matt doesn’t understand the culture of which Elizabeth, Kitt, and Teresa were a part.

Kim introduces the idea of privilege—Matt is privileged by his position of not having a child with a chronic illness, and Elizabeth is privileged in having the time and resources necessary to devote everything to Henry’s care, unlike Kitt. By indicating how such privilege can blind one to understanding another person’s point of view, Kim impresses upon the reader the idea that no one can know what it is like to experience life as another person, which calls into question whether anyone can truly judge Elizabeth’s behavior.

Pak’s chapter reveals that he is less concerned with the trial itself than he is with the past. Here, the reader comes to understand Pak’s deep shame about being a “[w]ild-goose father.” Pak is also angry at being beholden to Matt’s father-in-law, Dr. Cho, and at the women he feels have ruined his life, the protestors and Elizabeth. He blames them for his injuries and for the fact that Mary has been traumatized by the fire, not starting college as planned. He wants to confront them but reminds himself that “[n]o one could know he was outside that night. He had to maintain his silence no matter the cost” (42).

Next, Matt describes the fire itself, and his description of what happened to Henry and Kitt reduces everyone in the room to tears. Elizabeth’s calm demeanor enrages Matt, and he wants “to shove his face into hers and scream that he still had nightmares about Henry in that moment, looking like some alien in a kid’s drawing—a bubblehead of flames, the rest of his body perfectly intact, his clothes untouched, but his legs thrashing in a silent scream” (51). By ending this section with Henry’s death, and Matt’s memory of Henry’s face, “every inch of his skin charred and blistered and bloody” accompanied by “a whiff of charred flesh, of singed hair, cooked meat” (53), Kim returns the reader to the central tragedy of the story.