The Memory Keeper’s Daughter: Chapter 2: March 1964 Summary & Analysis

After carefully tucking the baby in the back of her car, feeling uneasy about her mission, Caroline Gill drives carefully through the snowy streets of Lexington. The car skids twice, and she nearly turns back, but soon she’s on the interstate headed out towards the countryside, on her way to complete “Dr. Henry’s astonishing request.” On the one hand, Caroline thinks what David is doing is “unspeakable”—on the other hand, she knows that there was genuine “pain and confusion” in his request. Driving along the highway, Caroline decides that Dr. Henry’s decision is not her “affair.”

In the countryside outside of Louisville, Caroline pulls up to the circular driveway of a large, red brick building—an institution for the feeble-minded and incapacitated. She takes the baby from the car, along with a bag full of diapers and formula, and heads up to the building. The air inside is hot and murky with the smell of stewing vegetables. Caroline waits for someone to greet her, reflecting on the choices that have brought her to this moment. Thirty-one years old, she is unmarried and still waiting “for her real life to begin.” She once dreamed of traveling the world and being a nurse to sick people in faraway lands, but after David arrived at the clinic where she worked, she developed feelings for him and decided to stay in hopes of persuading him to love her.

Now, Caroline wanders through the institution, hoping to find someone to take the baby from her. After spotting several of the patients in a series of grim, humiliating conditions, Caroline decides she cannot leave the child here alone, and begins running out of the hospital. As Caroline steps out into the snow and cold air, she feels as if she is “being born” again.

Caroline settles Phoebe in the back of the car and drives away, unsure of what her plan is but certain that she cannot take the baby back to such a horrible place. As Caroline approaches Lexington and encounters traffic due to an accident ahead, she notices that her gas gauge is low. Knowing she can’t risk stalling out on the highway with a baby in the back, she maneuvers onto the shoulder, reverses all the way to a nearby exit, and gets off the highway in a small town near Lexington.

Caroline parks in the lot of a grocery store and goes inside for some food—she realizes neither she nor Phoebe has had anything to eat for hours. A cashier tells Caroline that the store is closing soon, and she hurries through the aisles, picking out food as Phoebe begins to cry. Caroline feeds Phoebe some formula from the bag of supplies, hurriedly pays for her groceries, and returns to the car. Caroline sits and eats her groceries, ravenous. After the lights in the store go out and all the employees leave, Caroline realizes that her car’s battery is dead. She steps out of the car to see if there is anyone around, but there’s no one—the store is closed, and the snowy streets are empty. Caroline lets out a noise that is “halfway to a sob,” and shouts aloud to no one, “I have a baby in this car.”