Tash Nickel Character Analysis

The only thing I needed to know was that we were all going to live forever, together, happily, in heaven and with God, and without pain and sadness and sin. And in my town that is the deal. It’s taken for granted. We’ve been hand-picked. We’re on a fast track, singled out, and saved.

I didn’t know why she was crying, until I heard my mom say honey, what is it? What’s wrong? And Tash said: I think I’ll go crazy. I can’t stand it. It’s all a fucking lie. It’s killing me! Mom, it really is! And then something happened that took me completely by surprise, I heard my mom say, I know honey, I know it is.

My mom put some blankets and pillows into a garbage bag and carried it out to Ian’s truck. She put bread and fruit and the fresh ham she’d bought that day into a box and Ian carried that out.

I remembered my mom telling us about the Mennonites in Russia fleeing in the middle of the night, scrambling madly to find a place, any place, where they’d be free. All they needed, she said, was for people to tolerate their unique apartness.

Truthfully, this story ends with me still sitting on the floor of my room wondering who I’ll become if I leave this town and remembering when I was little kid and loved to fall asleep in my bed […] listening to the voices of my sister and my mother talking and laughing in the kitchen and the sounds of my dad poking around in the yard, making things beautiful right outside my bedroom window.

The only thing I needed to know was that we were all going to live forever, together, happily, in heaven and with God, and without pain and sadness and sin. And in my town that is the deal. It’s taken for granted. We’ve been hand-picked. We’re on a fast track, singled out, and saved.

I didn’t know why she was crying, until I heard my mom say honey, what is it? What’s wrong? And Tash said: I think I’ll go crazy. I can’t stand it. It’s all a fucking lie. It’s killing me! Mom, it really is! And then something happened that took me completely by surprise, I heard my mom say, I know honey, I know it is.

My mom put some blankets and pillows into a garbage bag and carried it out to Ian’s truck. She put bread and fruit and the fresh ham she’d bought that day into a box and Ian carried that out.

I remembered my mom telling us about the Mennonites in Russia fleeing in the middle of the night, scrambling madly to find a place, any place, where they’d be free. All they needed, she said, was for people to tolerate their unique apartness.

Truthfully, this story ends with me still sitting on the floor of my room wondering who I’ll become if I leave this town and remembering when I was little kid and loved to fall asleep in my bed […] listening to the voices of my sister and my mother talking and laughing in the kitchen and the sounds of my dad poking around in the yard, making things beautiful right outside my bedroom window.