If I Survive You

Fiction | Short Story Collection | Adult | Published in 2022

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

“In Flux”

“Under the Ackee Tree”

“Odd Jobs”

“Pestilence”

“Splashdown”

“Independent Living”

“If He Suspected He’d Get Someone Killed This Morning, Delano Would Never Leave His Couch”

“If I Survive You”

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

“Pestilence”Chapter Summaries & Analyses

“Pestilence” Summary

Trelawny recalls the home his parents had purchased in the southern Miami suburb of Cutler Ridge. He is sure that the land it stood on, and then the house itself, were cursed. The area had only recently been developed, and the construction boom had displaced massive numbers of millipedes, crabs, and locusts. Although many locals chose to eat the crabs, Trelawny and Delano found creative ways to kill them and the insects. In the years to come, the neighborhood would be plagued by nighthawks, sea slugs, and frogs. Eventually, the insect infestations subsided. The curse still seemed active, however, as one by one, Trelawny and Delano’s pets died: first their fighting fish and then a pair of hamsters.

Trelawny recalls their parents’ favoritism during these years. It had been obvious to both boys that Delano was the preferred son, and even as an adolescent, Delano already expected to inherit their house. Although this seems unfair to Trelawny, to Delano, it is merely the birthright of the firstborn. Trelawny longs to share the closeness that he sees in his father and brother. The only time he feels himself part of their clique is when he agrees with his father that neutering their dog Double would rob him of his manhood. Although Trelawny had wanted to get the dog neutered so that it would stop roaming the streets looking for mates, when his father suggests that no man should have to live “without balls,” Trelawney defers to his father and Delano. Double later runs away again, only to be killed during Hurricane Andrew. The hurricane brings terrible destruction to their neighborhood. The boys stay with their cousin, Cukie, and Aunt Daphne, then return to their home once the storm has passed. The next morning, almost every structure has been leveled. The area is full of toppled palm trees and other storm debris. Although the boys are bereft at the loss of their dog, their father has a gleam in his eye. Topper seems to have been drinking when he tells them the story.

“Pestilence” Analysis

This story, which focuses on Hurricane Andrew, uses the motif of destructive hurricanes as well as various other imagery derived from nature to aid the depiction of complex familial dynamics. “Pestilence” thus continues to explore the theme of Immigration and Fraught Family Dynamics. Additionally, with his description of the family’s Cutler Ridge neighborhood, Escoffery continues to ground his story within the broader history of South Florida and the experiences of his own Jamaican community in particular.

Setting is important in all of Escoffery’s stories, but “Pestilence” in particular speaks to South Florida’s recent history. That Trelawny, Delano, and the other neighborhood boys were able to find so many different species of pests to kill in creative ways was the result of a development boom. This boom consisted of the rapid construction of homes in the southern portion of Miami’s metro area. Miami is a city with huge urban sprawl; its population is densely packed from the community of Homestead on the southern tip of the peninsula up to West Palm Beach, roughly 70 miles north of Miami’s urban core. Much of the population in Cutler Ridge (now Bay), Kendall, and many of the other communities near where Trelawny’s family makes their home are diverse; accordingly, Trelawny recounts the uneasy relationships between various Latinx and Afro-Caribbean groups of immigrants in the area. These clashes speak to the theme of Immigration and Cultural Identity, expanding it to a more macro-level while continuing to demonstrate its influence on Trelawny’s character.

The housing boom, with its related inciting factors and outcome, exemplifies the theme of Intersectionality, Socioeconomic Status, and Race. Driving the rapid development was the need to accommodate increasing numbers of immigrants seeking affordable housing that would provide more safety and better schools than the city. That the housing had to be affordable was key. As a result, many of the homes in the swath of the southern Miami metro area were cheaply built; the pests that invade the housing hint symbolically at the rotten systems behind their poor construction. The boom, in turn, was responsible for both the settlement of Trelawny’s community in the area and the devastating destruction of Hurricane Andrew. The housing erected as part of this building boom was simply no match for Andrew’s catastrophic winds.

That Andrew is responsible for more strife within the family and for the death of the boys’ beloved dog Double is also emblematic of how hurricanes are figured as representations of troubled family dynamics in this collection. Trelawny recalls the utter devastation of the neighborhood the next day. The fraught family dynamics of Trelawny’s parents are on full display in this story, and Trelawny learns that his brother will indeed likely inherit all of their father’s property. The tension from this and other such moments of favoritism builds within these stories and reaches multiple inflection points, forcing Trelawny to define himself against the troubled backdrop of a family with whom he does not feel entirely at home.