Funny Story

“I swallowed a knot that felt like barbed wire. Or maybe it was a tangle of the Vincent family practicality I’d inherited from my mother, that old familiar ability to use those negative emotions as fuel to Get. Shit. Done.”

This passage characterizes Daphne as a person who, due to her difficult childhood, has learned to compartmentalize her feelings as a survival mechanism. The passage uses the phrase “swallowing a knot,” which means to choke back tears, and adds the imagery of swallowing razor wire to intensify Daphne’s emotions.

“Until that moment, I’d carried my life like a handkerchief knapsack at the end of a broom handle, something small and containable I could pick up and move at the drop of a hat. And I never knew what I was running from, or to until he said it.”

Using the metaphor of a vagabond carrying all their belongings in a sack, Daphne describes how she learned to travel light since she and her mother moved frequently. The passage also carries a more profound meaning as Daphne buries her feelings to avoid a heavy emotional burden. After moving in with Peter, the shopping spree she indulges in proves she has yet to deal with her emotional baggage.

“[T]he overpriced dress hanging on the other side of a thin laminate slider door—a telltale heart, a Dorian Gray portrait, a deep dark secret.”

The passage employs literary allusions to Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Tell-Tale Heart” and Oscar Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, both dealing with hidden sin that could destroy the protagonist. Though she can’t yet part with it, Daphne’s wedding dress haunts her like a ghost, reminding her of her failed relationship and uncertain future. The dress symbolizes the consequences of not dealing with unresolved grief and trauma.

“[W]atching Miles befriend this stranger felt like seeing Michelangelo paint the Sistine Chapel: impressive, but also dizzying. Like any second, he might fall off his ladder and splatter on the marble below.”

Having always considered herself socially awkward, Daphne marvels at the ease with which Miles engages with strangers. She compares his social skills to a skilled artist creating a masterpiece. Just as she would expect herself to fail, she waits for Miles to ruin the moment, but he doesn’t. His gregarious, personable nature attracts her to him because it is the opposite of her nature.

“He draws back slowly, the kiss settling like the tail end of a fast-moving storm, a tapering off rather than an abrupt stop.”

Daphne appreciates that Miles is never in a rush, and his kissing style demonstrates his ability to slow down and savor each moment. The passage compares the passionate moment to a storm as Daphne’s intense attraction to Miles completely overtakes her like a raging torrent, causing her to feel out of control.

“It’s like turning over a locked box, only to realize there was a crack in the bottom all along.”

The passage conveys Daphne’s desire to understand Miles better. She feels he is hiding something about his past, and she sees Julia’s arrival as a key to unlocking this hidden part of him. When she makes a passing comment about their parents, Daphne realizes that she may not be looking for a key and must look for cracks in his façade.

“The moment feels like a held breath, or a soap bubble, something that can’t last, that has to break one way or another.”

Delightfully fun, yet impossibly thin and impermanent, bubbles represent carefree, childlike fun. The early days of Daphne and Miles’s relationship bring new adventures into her life and offer an escape from her sadness. As a cynic, Daphne always waits for the other shoe to drop and the good times to end.

“I am the woman who was supposed to be swallowed by that dress, and now it’s cascading directly into Julia’s face, a raging waterfall of my mistakes.”

Daphne’s hidden wedding dress represents her inability to deal appropriately with the past. She also doesn’t want to share her feelings with others, fearing that she’s dumping her emotional problems on them. The wedding dress explodes from the closet onto Julia, forcing Daphne to deal with the situation. Instead of feeling weighed down by her issues, her friends offer to help her solve the problem, illustrating the beauty of supportive friends and a willingness to be vulnerable in front of them.

“I know what it’s like to have all your family concentrated in one person.”

For much of her life, Daphne placed all her emotional stability in her relationship with her mother. While her mother remains supportive, Daphne must reevaluate her expectations for relationships, both romantic and platonic, after her breakup with Peter. She realizes the danger of expecting too much from any human, no matter how wonderful they are.

“[I]t’s not a day to celebrate progress, anyway […] It’s a day to celebrate existence.”

Daphne makes this statement regarding Ashleigh’s assertion that there’s nothing to celebrate on her birthday. The statement reveals Daphne’s character development as she realizes the importance of not placing too much value on being at a specific place in life at milestone ages. Living a fulfilled, happy life is what matters.

“This apartment is quickly becoming the set for a terrible sitcom.”

Highlighting the absurd humor of their situation, Daphne relates her dad and Starfire’s surprise visit as yet another addition to the hilarity. This passage represents a motif in Henry’s novels, where she satirically points out farcical, situational humor in romance novels.

“The fact is, the most memorable parts of my childhood are the ones he missed, his absence exactly what gave them their weight.”

Daphne begins to piece together the pain of her father’s absences. The figurative language emphasizes her vivid memories of his not being around when she needed him and how this pain affects her ability to connect to others now as she fears they, too, will abandon her.

“The escape hatch I’ve been waiting for, right when the whole house of cards is falling down, and I should feel happy, or at least relieved, but all I can feel is this whole-chest ache, yet another loss of someone, something, I didn’t even have to begin with.”

Daphne compares Miles’s abrupt vanishing to an exit strategy for herself or an easy way out of what is becoming an emotionally complicated situation. Instead, she demonstrates her growth by sitting in her discomfort and ignoring her pattern of running away and assuming the worst.

“I spent our whole relationship auditioning, the same way I always feel when I’m with Dad, praying I’m doing enough to make the cut.”

Daphne’s metaphor describes the performative nature of her relationship with her father and the long-term consequences of never feeling like she was enough. This feeling of inadequacy spilled over into her relationship with Peter, and she never thought she could be herself with him. She doesn’t need to “perform” when she's with Miles and can be her authentic self.

“Even in this bleak moment, I feel a spike of something cool and bright. Hope, or relief, or a tiny tendril of joy, the thinnest silver lining of a jet-black cloud.”

Even though Daphne still doesn’t understand why Miles left, her reconciliation with Ashleigh gives her hope. She compares the feeling to a blackness lifting from her, assuring her that she can be okay. Making amends with Ashleigh gives Daphne the courage to reconcile with Sadie later.

“I’d wanted so badly to escape myself, my life, that I forgot about all the beautiful little pieces of it I’ve been acquiring like sea glass these last few months.”

Daphne compares her new friends and experiences to treasures she’s found on the beach. She admits that she became too lost in her pain to realize the value of the treasure, and in her rush to leave Waning Bay, she might have lost all she’d gained. Through her experiences, she’s learned the value of treasuring special relationships.

“A home, when nowhere else felt right.”

Home is an evolving concept for Daphne throughout the story. At first, she defines home as wherever her mother is and then as the house she and Peter share. She makes a temporary home in Miles’s apartment, but eventually, she realizes that home isn’t a place but a feeling of safety and contentment, which she finds in Waning Bay.

“I feel raw. I feel like the boundary between me and the world is stretching thinner, making me tender and vulnerable, a water balloon fit to burst.”

Daphne compares the discomfort of vulnerability to being stretched to her emotional and physical limits. Stretching a balloon also makes it transparent, and Daphne feels vulnerable when people can see her. As painful as it is, she learns this is the only way to create meaningful relationships, and the risk is worth it.

“I’d tempered my expectations, packed them tight into bricks, built a fortress to protect me.”

Part of Daphne’s journey is learning to adjust to the expectations of others. However, she also realizes she can’t project her father’s and Peter’s abandonment on every relationship by putting up emotional walls. The walls not only prevent her from profoundly connecting with others but also give her a false sense of security because there is no natural way to protect herself from emotional harm.

“I spent so much time accustoming myself to one kind of surprise—the kind hinging on disappointments, hurts, small abandonments, and emotional bartering—that I’d stopped considering there might be any other.”

This passage marks Daphne’s transition from a relentless skeptic to a hopeful optimist. Seeing Miles and the others show up helps her realize that she can trust others and that not every story ends in heartbreak and disaster.

“This is how time works. The things you wait months for blink past, like the flash of a strobe, huge swaths lost in the dark beats between.”

The novel’s narrative structure centers around a countdown to Daphne’s Read-a-thon, which she associates with when she can leave Waning Bay. The passage conveys the fluidity of time and how a person can get caught up in managing a to-do list and forget to live their life. Ashleigh encourages her to slow down and savor the moment when the day arrives.

“A second act I fell into, and the home that I chose, as much as it chose me.”

People often refer to seasons in their lives as chapters, and in this passage, Daphne compares hers to acts in a play. The passage relates to the story motif running throughout the novel. It emphasizes the theme of Finding Home and a Sense of Belonging and Embracing Second Chances as Daphne explains how she found a way to start over and create a life in Waning Bay.

“Everyone’s here now. The family I didn’t expect.”

The novel’s beginning finds Daphne unhoused, emotionally adrift, and alone. The story comes full circle as she ends up in a home she chose, surrounded by her mother and her found family. This moment highlights the hope of new beginnings and the truth that good things can come from painful experiences.