Educated: Chapter 33 Summary & Analysis

When it’s time for Tara to leave Buck’s Peak, Audrey begs her not to go. Audrey reveals that no one, after all, has believed her and Tara’s words about Shawn, and that she feels all alone and powerless. Tara leaves for Cambridge anyway, and that night in her dorm room, writes a diary entry which ends: “Cambridge is less beautiful tonight.” Drew has returned to Cambridge with Tara, newly admitted to a master’s program there. Drew is the first boyfriend Tara has confided in about her family—the truth of her family—and as she tells him about Audrey, she asks him to watch out for her in case she “do[es] something crazy.”

The semester passes in a hurried blur—Tara is working on a piece of original academic research to qualify for a PhD, and with the support of her supervisor Dr. Runciman, she has decided to write about “echoes of Mormon theology in the great philosophers of the nineteenth century.” Tara feels closer to her friends than ever, and yet the more she begins to see her new friends as family, the guiltier she feels about abandoning her actual family. She buys a ticket to Idaho for Christmas, hoping to reconnect with everyone back home.

Tara arrives home to find the Indian Princess buried in snow atop the mountain. Tara barely recognizes her brother Luke, who has lost an eye in a paintball accident and grown a long, thick beard. Tara doesn’t see Shawn until the third day she’s home, when he comes into the house with Benjamin. As Benjamin brags about getting into a fight down in town, Shawn warns Benjamin to always watch his temper. Tara believes that Shawn has changed and cooled down, and agrees to take a ride into town with him to get milkshakes and catch up. 

Shawn and Tara have a pleasant drive, but on the way back up the mountain, Shawn jerks the car onto a side road and drives towards the church, bringing the vehicle to a stop in the parking lot. Shawn asks if Tara has been “talk[ing] much” to Audrey, who is a “lying piece of shit.” Shawn tells Tara that he’d put a bullet in Audrey’s head if she weren’t such a “worthless bitch” and a waste of a good bullet. Tara refuses to look at Shawn as he unleashes this rant, staying still in hopes that she can have some “control” over the situation by not responding to it. Shawn starts the ignition and asks Tara if she wants to watch a movie. Tara simply nods, and as Shawn drives back up the mountain towards home, he chatters cheerfully about what they should watch.