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18. Dream House as Déjà Vu
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in In the Dream House, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Queer Visibility
Christianity and Shame
Abuse, Trauma, and Healing
Storytelling, Responsibility, and Freedom
Summary
Analysis
As a young teen, instead of dating, Machado became “obsessed with sexual purity” and fervently religious after being “saved” at a Christian camp. When Machado is 16, her church welcomes a new pastor called Joel. Machado is attracted to Joel and feels like he treats her as though she’s an adult. In her last year of high school, the church sends a cohort of adults to set up a youth camp in South Africa. Joel goes along, as does Machado. It’s the furthest she’s travelled from home.
Machado’s reverence of Joel seems to echo the way she felt about the woman from the Dream House when she first met her. It’s a feeling of luck and gratefulness to be treated like a whole, adult person—and, just as in her relationship with the woman, this makes Machado feel indebted towards Joel and, potentially, less able to perceive that he may be manipulating or abusing her.
Themes
At the camp, Machado stays up late every night to talk to Joel. He tells her about his struggles with lust and says he doesn’t know if he’s the right person to be a pastor. One night, Joel and Machado sleep side by side under the stars. When they wake up, they jump into the pool together and float around each other for an hour.
Joel discloses a great deal of personal, private information to Machado. He seems to treat her as an equal instead of fully understanding that she’s a minor and, therefore, that she has less understanding of sexual relationships than he does—and less agency to dictate whether she’s a part of the conversation at all.
Themes
After they return to the States, Machado visits Joel at church regularly. They sit in his office with the door closed and discuss religion, ethics, and the sexual assault Machado experienced in her freshman year. After a while, Joel suggests they meet outside work and gives Machado his number. She feels a rush: she’s no longer just a parishioner. They meet late at night—sometimes at diners, and sometimes, if Joel’s wife isn’t home, Machado meets him there and watches him getting dressed.
The fact that Joel closes his office door suggests that he knows their relationship is close enough to raise suspicion from others, and that he wouldn’t be discussing such personal subjects with Machado if other people could hear. He also takes away some of Machado’s agency by closing the door and only seeing her late at night. Closed off to other people, Machado has to rely on her own instincts to determine whether her relationship with Joel is safe or healthy.
Themes
Machado’s mother doesn’t like that Machado calls Joel by his first name and not “Pastor Jones.” Machado hates it when Joel refers to the large age gap between himself and her. He tells her she’s a good person, that God loves her, and that he loves her. She longs to have sex with him and believes that it would help her to stop associating sex with shame.
Machado feels uncomfortable about the age difference between her and Joel, which emphasizes that their relationship has an element of fantasy: in order to continue growing closer to him, she has to pretend she’s older than she really is. She sees the possibility of a sexual relationship with him as a solution to her feelings of shame, which makes her dependent on him rather than making her feel confident and independent.
Themes
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Machado leaves for college and cries as she says goodbye to Joel. He tells her she can call him and that he might be able to visit. At college, Machado has her first kiss, after which she immediately calls Joel. As she tells him what happened, the excited feeling she had from the kiss turns into remorse as she senses Joel’s disapproval. She asks him what she should do, and he tells her to “Ask for forgiveness.”
Joel’s partial reassurance suggests he’s less invested in their relationship than Machado is. Her quick change from euphoria to shame emphasizes her emotional dependence on Joel. It also demonstrates that what the church has taught her goes against her instinctual feelings, hinting that what she perceives as pleasurable and enjoyable is shameful and wrong. Thanks to her Christian faith, Machado feels she can’t trust herself.
Themes
A few weeks later, Joel stops picking up Machado’s calls. She wonders whether he’s jealous or has lost interest in her. Machado’s mother calls to tell her Joel was fired from the church because he had an affair with a parishioner to whom he was giving marriage counselling. Machado feels partly judgmental and partly jealous. She calls him, and after getting no answer, she takes a train home and visits his house. She can’t find him there. She emails him, begging him not to shut her out. His vague reply is the last Machado ever hears from him. By the time Machado starts dating people, she feels desperate and confused, having learned nothing so far about relationships.
Machado attempts to interpret Joel’s behavior in the context of her relationship with him: it surprises her when the scope of his actions affects more people than just herself. This is a sign that their relationship has become disproportionately large in her imagination and that she perceives herself as being more important to him than he feels she is. Joel’s power over Machado, through age and professional status, creates an imbalanced relationship that ends in frustration, disappointment, and heartbreak for her.
Themes
