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Part 6, Chapter 9
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Memory and Meaning
Love and Vulnerability
Freedom
Art, Creativity, and Expression
Wonder and Knowledge
Summary
Analysis
Everywhere, Nowhere. 1952-1968. At first, it’s just sex. Addie thinks it will only happen once. But then Luc comes for her two months later. Over time, it’s only weeks until his next visit, and then days. When he leaves, Addie sets some conditions for herself: she will not fall asleep beside him. Their relationship will be purely physical. But she doesn’t keep her promises. “Be with me,” Luc finally says one night. One night, Addie wakes to Luc sketching patterns onto her skin, and she realizes how well he knows her: how he is the only person she’s woken up next to who actually remembers her. She doesn’t hate him the way she used to, and she’s not sure when this change occurred. Addie realizes that she is happy. Still, she makes sure she doesn’t forget the words Luc spoke so long ago: “But it is not love.”
Note that this chapter, unlike the others, spans nearly two decades as opposed to a single day. This suggests that what Luc and Addie had wasn’t a fling, but a long, serious affair. And the offer that Luc extends to Addie, “Be with me,” seems to suggest that for Luc as well as for Addie, the affair is more than a superficial physical attraction. Still, Addie’s lingering doubts about Luc’s feelings for her pose some important questions about the nature of love, namely whether genuine love can coexist without mutual vulnerability. In short, she doubts Luc’s love for her because he holds her fate in his hands and thus retains a fundamental advantage over her—that is, he has everything to gain from their relationship, and she, everything to lose.
Themes
