The Fault in Our Stars: Chapter 12 Summary & Analysis

Hazel wakes up early the next morning too excited to meet Van Houten to go back to sleep. After breakfast she gets dressed to look like Anna from An Imperial Affliction, putting on a shirt with a screen print of Rene Magritte’s painting of a pipe, titled, Cecil n’est pas une pipe (This is not a pipe), which is referenced multiple times in An Imperial affliction. The shirt confuses Mrs. Lancaster. Hazel explains that all representations of a thing are inherently abstract.

Augustus arrives and they head to Van Houten’s house. When they knock, they hear Van Houten yelling for Lidewij. He tells her that there are two apparitions at his door. Lidewij tells Van Houten that they are his fans coming to visit. Van Houten responds by telling her that she must make them leave—he left America, he says, to avoid Americans. He asks Lidewij to tell them that he’d intended his invitation to be read symbolically. Eventually, Van Houten opens the door and Hazel is immediately surprised by Van Houten’s disheveled appearance.

In the living room, Hazel sees two trash bags behind the couch. Van Houten reveals that it is eighteen years worth of fan mail. Van Houten asks Lidewij for a drink of scotch and begins drinking. Hazel cuts right to the chase and brings up An Imperial Affliction. She tells Van Houten that his book brought her and Augustus together. Van Houten quickly notes that they aren’t together.

Hazel asks Van Houten if he remembers the questions she’d asked in her email, which he doesn't. Suddenly, Van Houten brings up Zeno’s Paradox of the tortoise, which suggests that some infinities are bigger than others. He quickly connects the theories to Swedish hip-hop. Augustus asks if Van Houten is playing some king of prank on them, to which Van Houten replies that if they cannot deal with his cryptic babbling, his work is not for them. Hazel quickly turns the conversation back to An Imperial Affliction. Van Houten immediately goes back to Zeno’s paradox. Hazel says she does not understand, and asks what happens after the end of An Imperial Affliction. Van Houten promptly tells her he disavows everything in the novel. He tells her that the characters in the novel are fictions, and that nothing happens to them after the novel ends. It’s ridiculous, he says, to think that the author of a novel has any idea what happens to the characters after the novel’s end.

Hazel pushes herself to her feet and refuses to believe Van Houten’s explanation. Van Houten tells her that he cannot indulge her childish whims, and he will not pity her that way she wants him to. Hazel tells him she does not want his pity, but Van Houten ensures her that, like all sick children, her existence depends on pity. He continues by positing that all sick children are arrested in development and their parents pity this, even though they are just side effects of an evolutionary process—a failed experiment in mutation.

Lidewij begins crying and quits her job, but Hazel is not harmed. She reveals that she has spent plenty of time in hospital beds thinking of the most harmful ways to imagine her illness. Hazel steps up to Van Houten, calling him “douchpants”, and demands to know what happens to Anna’s mother. He tells her he can’t tell her because he doesn't know. Something inside of Hazel wells up, and she smacks the glass of scotch from Van Houten’s hand. Van Houten immediately asks for another drink. Hazel tells Van Houten that he promised to tell her, but he only asks her why she cares so much. Before the altercation can go any further, Augustus grabs Hazel’s arm and leads her out.

On the walk back to the hotel, Augustus apologizes and tells her that he will write her an epilogue himself. He pulls Hazel into him and lets her cry into his shirt. Hazel feels guilty that she spent his wish on Van Houten, but Augustus reminds her that she spent it on being with him in Amsterdam. As they talk, Lidewij approaches them from behind.

When Lidewij catches up to Hazel and Augustus, they notice her mascara is running down her face. She invites them to the Anne Frank house. Augustus doesn't want to go, but Hazel insists, noting that she doesn't want to waste her last two days in Amsterdam by letting Van Houten ruin them.

As they drive, Lidewij apologizes, telling them that Van Houten is very sick. She says that she thought his meeting with Augustus and Hazel would help him. She tells them that Van Houten is rich because of a family fortune, but he is a disgrace to his family in America. Lidewij says that his circumstances have made him into an evil man.

Inside the Anne Frank House, Hazel struggles to climb the stairs, but perseveres, making it to the attic. As she makes her way up, she feels worried that she is holding everyone up below her. Hazel continues through the attic rooms, going up eighteen more steps because she feels she owes it to Anne Frank because she was dead and Hazel wasn’t, and she wanted to see the world that Anne Frank had lived in for years.

She almost passes out, but finally arrives in the place where Anne Frank spent years hiding. Lidewij tells Hazel that the only member of the family who survived was Anne’s father, Otto. Hazel thinks of Otto not being a father anymore after his children died. At the end of the hall, there is a book listing all of the names of the people from the Netherlands who had died in the Holocaust. Hazel is saddened by the fact that there are thousands of names, but nobody remembers those people the way they do Anne Frank. She resolves to pray for those who will not be remembered, noting that she does not need to believe in a “proper and omnipotent” God to pray.

Hazel goes with Augustus into a room with a video of Otto Frank playing in it. Augustus wonders if there are any Nazis still out there he could bring to justice. He says that he and Hazel should team up and fight injustices in the world. Hazel turns to Augustus and wants to kiss him. She thinks that Anne Frank would like the fact that two young broken people shared their love there. Hazel and Augustus begin to kiss. As she kisses him, she notes that she really likes her body, despite all of its imperfections. As they kiss, Hazel opens her eyes and realizes other tourists are there. She is afraid they will be insulted, but they all begin clapping, and shouting “Bravo!”

When they arrive back at the hotel, they go to Augustus’ room together. Before undressing, Augustus warns Hazel about the scar on his leg. She tells him to get over himself, and they crawl into bed together. They struggle to get comfortable with one another. Hazel’s oxygen tube makes it difficult to get on top of him, and then her shirt gets tangled in it as Augustus attempts to take it off, but they laugh about it together. Finally Augustus takes off his pants and his leg. Hazel runs her hand down his thigh onto the stump. Then they make love.

Hazel notes that the experience was not what she’d thought it would be. It wasn't particularly painful or ecstatic. There were some problems with the condom, but beyond that it was slow, patient, and quiet. Afterward, Augustus falls asleep. Hazel writes him a love letter in which she draws a big circle and writes virgins in it. Then she places a little circle right on its edge with an arrow pointing at it, and writes, “17-year-old guys with one leg”.