55 pages • 1 hour read
Graham GardnerInventing Elliot
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2003A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 16-18Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 16 Summary
Elliot calls Louise several times over the weekend but hangs up before the phone rings. On Monday, he catches up with her at school and nervously apologizes again about Friday evening, saying he would understand if she doesn’t want to see him. He wants to say so much more to her—to describe all the things about her and their friendship that he loves and still wants to continue—but he just stands there trying to figure out what she wants him to say. Eventually, Louise starts talking. She apologizes to Elliot for overreacting but explains that she thought he was different from other boys, who are only after one thing. She tells Elliot that she was hoping that he would kiss her but not try anything else. Louise sounds uncertain and embarrassed, not the self-assured girl he has fallen in love with. She asks if she had led him on, to which he stammers that she has done nothing wrong.
Louise seems tired, and after a pause she shares her feeling about Holminster with Elliot. She describes the school culture as vicious and mean, and for the first time brings up the “stupid” Guardians. Louise goes on the tell Elliot that the girls are no better, that they are generic “blobs,” full of “catty gossip and spitefulness” (162). She was hoping that Elliot was different; she wanted him to be different. A glimmer of hope sparks in Elliot when Louise mentions the Guardians—maybe she would understand his predicament—but it quickly dies as he sees the contempt she has for them. She would hate him if she found out he is one of them. Elliot has a million things he wants to tell her, but he says nothing, so Louise eventually says she needs to figure out what she wants, and Elliot agrees. Elliot holds a banal conversation with Louise before she turns to go, surprising himself with how little emotion he feels. Months of learning how to suppress his feelings have left him cold and hard.
That night, Elliot has a nightmare, reliving the day he was viciously beaten by three bullies at his old school: Kevin Cunningham, John Sanders, and Steven Watson. The abuse starts off verbally, and then one of them rips his blazer pocket. Elliot feels an anger engulf him and, for the first time, he fights back, repeatedly hitting Kevin. Kevin shouts threats as they pull Elliot off him and throw him against the wall. Elliot, feeling numb replies “You can’t kill me, […] I’m already dead” (166). The three bullies punch Elliot in the chest and repeatedly in the head, knocking out a tooth and leaving him unconscious, bleeding, and naked in the shower room. When Elliot regains consciousness and crawls to get his sodden clothes, he is amazed that he is still alive. At this point in the dream, Elliot wakes up, drenched in sweat. He lies still, thinking about Louise’s comment that the hero in 1984 was destroyed before succumbing to Big Brother’s way of thinking. He realizes that he still has some feelings; that he has survived “being killed” once, and that maybe he is not quite “dead” yet.
Chapter 17 Summary
The following day Elliot sees the yellow square of paper on the notice board: his selections, scheduled for the following day. He claims to feel nothing but notices that everything around him seems drained of color, just shades of grey. Back at home, Elliot’s mother makes his favorite dinner, spaghetti, but it also looks and tastes grey. They eat in silence, after which Elliot’s mother coldly asks Elliot to clean up, still angry from their earlier fight. His father shuffles silently to his chair and turns the TV back on. Just to feel something, Elliot washes the dishes slowly in scalding hot water, blocking out everything else except the pain.
Later, Elliot “mechanically” gets ready for bed and collects his things for the next day at school and swimming. As he is getting his towel, he notices the light is still on in the living room. His father has fallen asleep in his chair, the TV dead. Elliot looks closely at his father, silently asking him why he has just given up, why he doesn’t put his mind to getting better, and why he doesn’t follow his own advice. Elliot wonders what his dad would think if he knew how successfully he has managed to transform himself, just by working hard at it. Exhausted, Elliot collapses on the sofa and closes his eyes. Before he passes out Elliot wishes: “Please let me never wake up. That way, all this will go away. Or let me wake up and make it four years ago. Let it never be tomorrow. Please.” (172).
Elliot wakes up when his mother comes back from her shift. She makes Elliot a hot chocolate and says they have to talk. Elliot is too tired to resist and listens as she explains that she thought moving would be enough to make everything okay, but it clearly hasn’t worked. She asks for Elliot’s opinion, telling him that she blames herself for not having enough time for him. Elliot is waking up fully and is ready to start answering in his new cruel way, thinking to himself “I could make you go away and cry […] Just leave me alone” (174), but the words stick in his throat as his mother continues, telling him how much she loves him and that she’ll never give up on him.
Elliot finds himself crying. Horrified, he tries to fight the tears, but his mother draws him close and holds him, letting him cry on her shoulder. She encourages him to tell her what is going on, but he replies that he doesn’t want his mother to hate him. She reassures him that she will never hate him and, again, that she will never give up on him. Elliot starts to explain that he can’t stop what is going on, that he is always scared, but he stops himself from saying any more. His mother, sensing that pushing him will be counterproductive. She tells Elliot that she is there to help him if he wants, but she understands that some difficult fights must be faced alone. Nonetheless, she wants him know that she will always be there, on his side, and reiterates that she will love him regardless of what he has done.
Chapter 18 Summary
The following morning, Elliot manages to keep down a cup of coffee but no food before heading out to school. He walks past the yellow square of paper on the board, feeling the fear rising with each step down the corridor. His new, harsh voice is silent, but he imagines the portraits of previous principals hanging on the wall mocking him for thinking he is strong enough to stand up to the Guardians. As he stands in front of the principal’s door, Elliot closes his eyes and remembers his mother’s words: “I will never give up on you” (180). He then thinks about Kevin’s fists pounding him—remembering the thin line between life and death—and realizes that he has chosen death by “pushing away and cutting himself off from everything that mattered—everyone he cared for and who cared for him” (180). Despite these thoughts, Elliot feels strands of the old Elliot inside him, and a quiet calm descends on him as he raises his hand. Thinking of Louise and Ben, he knocks on the principal’s door.
Chapters 16-18 Analysis
After reaching rock-bottom, something shifts in Elliot. When talking over the bad end to the date with Louise, Elliot is surprised at how unsure of herself she seems. He starts to understand that everyone has insecurities—something that Mrs. Davidson was trying to tell him before. However, his emotions are still completely inaccessible to him, and he feels “immune to feeling, to sensation, to caring” (164). Elliot is having to shut down to cope. He has chosen a victim for the Guardians just because he is an easy target, and being new Elliot is the only way to deal with his bad actions.
When Elliot relives the brutal attack that almost killed him in a dream, he is unable to wake himself up—as if the old Elliot is forcing him to face what he is condemning other innocent students to, and to face the fact that he has become his worst nightmare. This attack was particularly vicious because Elliot had stood up to the bullies. He said at the time, “you can’t kill me […] I’m dead already” (166), and Elliot wakes up in the present with a realization that hits him with as much power as the attack: “I’m not dead at all” (168). Elliot identifies with what Louise told him earlier about 1984, that you can always be a hero by staying true to yourself. In the aftermath of his dream, he understands that he is a survivor who refuses to completely die, and that despite new Elliot’s best efforts, he can still feel.
Elliot has still not decided what to do. Gardner’s descriptions of Elliot’s flat affect and his passive acceptance of his grey world, coupled with the complete lack of emotion he feels when looking at his father, leads the reader to the conclusion that Elliot has indeed decided to kill old Elliot and fully embrace being a Guardian; to surrender and think the way “they” want him to. However, his mother reaching out with unconditional love gives Elliot the lifeline back to his true self. Her reassurance that “Whatever happens, whatever you’ve done, I will never give up on you” (177), combined with Louise’s interpretation of 1984—that what truly matters are the choices you make when you are afraid—help him understand that what might seem like choosing life, can be actually be the opposite. Choosing new Elliot would mean lifelong protection from bullies, but it would guarantee the death of old Elliot.
At the end, Elliot knows he has made the right decision to tell the principal everything and expose the Guardians; right before he knocks on the door he thinks about Ben and Louise, and calmly thinks, “I could tell you, now, who I really am, if you wanted to know me after this” (180). All anyone really wants, and needs, is to be loved for who they really are, to be known and accepted for their true self.
