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Chapter 28
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Ambition vs. Morality
Femininity, Sexuality, and Power
Truth and Identity
Family
Summary
Analysis
For two months after the elopement, Evelyn enjoys blissful freedom with Celia in the knowledge that rumors about her failed marriage are worth more to the media than rumors about her sexuality. Everything is working in her favor until she finds out she’s pregnant. After she suspects it for two weeks, she visits a doctor for confirmation before telling Celia while they’re beside the pool together. It surprises Evelyn when Celia throws her glass of iced tea to the ground, dives into the pool and screams underwater. She realizes that Celia didn’t fully understand that she had planned to have sex with Mick.
Evelyn’s body is seemingly never under her own control. Mick’s refusal to use a condom meant he put his own enjoyment over Evelyn’s future, and Evelyn’s the one who has to bear the brunt of that selfishness. Though Celia reacts dramatically, she also mutes her scream underwater, which suggests that she feels completely enraged but also aware, and possibly ashamed, that she might be overreacting.
Themes
Celia gets out of the pool and goes inside without drying off. Evelyn can tell that she’s started to pack her bags. She begs Celia to talk to her. Celia says she doesn’t want to live this way anymore, hiding her behavior while Evelyn has sex with other people. She calls Evelyn a coward. Evelyn says she did it for Celia, but Celia disagrees—she thinks Evelyn acted to protect herself and retain her fans.
Evelyn sees her reputation and Celia’s safety as inextricably linked, but Celia doesn’t share that perspective. Her idea of a relationship is simple and pure, and she occupies a moral high ground that Evelyn can’t understand, let alone reach.
Themes
Evelyn tells Celia she’ll lose everything if people find out what she is. Celia tells Evelyn they’re no different from each other, but Evelyn says they are: she can love a man, but Celia can’t. Celia tells Evelyn she’s leaving her because she’s a “whore” who agrees to sex in order to build her fame. As Celia goes to her car, she tells Evelyn she thought their relationship was fated, but she doesn’t want to believe that anymore; Evelyn replies that they were never meant to be together, because Celia can’t accept that she needs Evelyn to take these actions to protect her. Finally, Evelyn realizes that this fight signifies the end of her relationship with Celia.
This won’t be the last time Evelyn and Celia weaponize their difference in sexual preferences during an argument, and doing so reveals a shared anxiety that neither one of them truly understands the other. Their different perspectives on Evelyn’s behavior seem irreconcilable: Evelyn refuses to acknowledge her own selfishness, while Celia can’t see how Evelyn’s actions were, primarily, signs of her love for Celia.
Themes
Celia drives away. Evelyn goes back inside and cleans up the water Celia dripped everywhere, then requests cleaners to drain the pool and remove the glass Celia smashed. Three days later, she drives to Tijuana with Harry to get an abortion—something that, looking back, she hasn’t ever regretted. Still, she cries the whole way home because of all she lost in her efforts to stay with Celia. She asks Harry if he thinks she’s a “whore.” He replies that people use that word when they have nothing else to say, and it’s unfair that women are judged for demanding something in return for the pleasure they bring to men.
Evelyn’s response to heartbreak is to focus on small, practical tasks—they allow her to feel a sense of control even as her relationship crumbles. She’s not upset about the loss of a potential baby, but about the real loss of Celia—she’s able to compartmentalize her emotions in order to determine what she really feels. Harry’s understanding of the power dynamics attached to the word “whore” emphasizes his tendency to observe these kinds of power dynamics from an objective, removed perspective, given his lack of sexual interest in women.
Themes
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Harry tells Evelyn that Celia is used to acting righteous and pure, but he likes Evelyn for her scrappiness. When they arrive back at her house, he tucks her in, makes her dinner, and sleeps next to her in bed. Evelyn doesn’t speak to Celia for five years, but she feels that, with Harry beside her, she has family.
The friendship between Harry and Evelyn is, in a way, more intimate because of its sexlessness. Harry’s companionship is a sure thing, not based on what Evelyn offers him sexually, and that makes Evelyn feel safe around him—a safety she equates to familial love.
Themes
