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Chapter 9: Chase Ambrose
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Restart, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Identity, Memory, and Responsibility
Reputation vs. Reality
Masculinity
Social Hierarchies and Bullying
Loyalty
Summary
Analysis
Kimberly adores pep rallies and football, despite not understanding the rules. She thinks the football players look good in uniform; in particular, she likes Chase, though he didn’t seem to know anything about her even before his amnesia. She’s confused that he’s joined video club: the other members are “nerds.” After the pep rally ends, Kimberly sees Brendan Espinoza getting shoved around by football players—until Chase shoves one culprit, Joey, into a wall, telling him to leave Brendan alone. Confused fighting ensues, and Aaron and Bear attempt to break it up.
Kimberly likes football players and thinks that the video-club kids are “nerds,” but she’s not cool enough for football-star Chase to have noticed her prior to his amnesia, which suggests that she exists somewhere in the middle of the school’s social hierarchy. Amnesiac Chase immediately defends Brendan against another football player, which suggests that—absent his memories—he dislikes bullying.
Themes
When Chase demands to know why Joey is bullying Brendan, Joey points out that Chase used to bully Brendan too. Chase—clearly not remembering that—retorts: “We were shooting your pep rally to make you look good.” The football players become visibly unhappy—because, Kimberly realizes, Chase is identifying himself with the video club against the football team. Joey says that the football team used to be close with Chase, but now they don’t know him.
Chase refers to the video-club kids as “we” and the football team as “you,” which—as Kimberly notes—reveals he thinks of himself as a video-club kid now, not a football player. When Joey says that the football team doesn’t know Chase anymore, he implies that if Chase is missing his memories and doesn’t identify as a football player, he lacks a recognizable identity entirely.
Themes
All the football players but Aaron and Bear disperse. Aaron tells Chase he should have acted differently because Joey has defended him in the past. When Chase asks whether he should have allowed Joey to hurt the much smaller Brendan, Aaron claims that Joey would have backed off if Chase had asked. He points out that Chase isn’t “perfect” either and warns him to “think about who your friends are.” Then he leaves.
Aaron isn’t wrong to point out that Chase could have asked Joey to stop Brendan before resorting to physical force. Yet he also claims that Chase isn’t “perfect” and that he should “think about who [his] friends are,” which implies that he’s less bothered by Chase getting physical than by Chase’s moral judgment of bullying and his lack of loyalty to the football players. Again Aaron is using his intelligence to rationalize his own and his friends’ bad behavior, whereas Chase uses his intelligence to interrogate and judge his own and others’ bad behavior.
Themes
Brendan thanks Chase; other video club members do too. Shoshanna, incredulous, points out that Chase has bullied them all in the past, he was just being violent again, and he’s still responsible for what happened to her brother Joel. She leaves in a huff. Remembering Joel, Kimberly gets sad: “A lot of this stuff feels kind of harmless until something like Joel Weber happens.” The other video club members apologize for Shoshanna, thank Chase again, and leave.
Kimberly’s sadness at the thought of “something like Joel Weber happen[ing]” reveals that even a girl who has a crush on Chase and thinks the video-club kids are losers believes Chase and his friends went too far bullying Joel. Her reaction emphasizes that Shoshanna’s anger at Chase’s past behavior is justified, even as Shoshanna continues to interpret Chase’s present, improved behavior unfairly due to her anger and her loyalty to her brother Joel.
Themes
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Alone with Kimberly, Chase turns to her and admits he doesn’t remember that Shoshanna had a brother. Kimberly explains that Joel was a piano player who switched schools due to bullying. Though she leaves out that Chase was the main bully, she wonders whether he regretted his behavior when he learned Joel’s parents were sending him away—but she recognizes that the truth about Chase’s feelings may be lost forever, since Chase doesn’t remember them.
Chase’s sad admission that he can’t remember Joel and Kimberly’s curiosity about pre-accident Chase’s attitude toward Joel leaving town both hint that Chase’s past actions and attitudes really are important to understanding who Chase was and is, even though Chase himself has lost direct access to those actions and attitudes.
Themes
Chase asks Kimberly whether he helped bully Joel. She avoids answering. He confesses how strange it is that other people remember his life when he can’t. Kimberly introduces herself and claims that Chase calls her Kimmy (he didn’t, but she always wanted him to). Chase tells her he has to go to video club, says, “See you—Kimmy,” and leaves. Kimberly, elated, decides that he must not remember that he's “out of [her] league”—and decides to join video club.
Kimberly’s realization that Chase has forgotten he’s “out of [her] league” is intended to be funny, but it also demonstrates how Chase’s pre-accident social status blinded him to possible connections with lower-status kids. Now that he’s an amnesiac, he’s willing to talk to and perhaps befriend a wider variety of people.
Themes
