The Women: Chapter 30 Summary & Analysis

Frankie’s Vietnam dreams return. She blames Rye for reawakening old trauma. She relies on pills to sleep and wake up and is quickly stuck in a cycle. Frankie withdraws from everyone and throws herself into hospital work, often staying past her shift’s end. One night, she sits with Madge, a dying woman who’s had many visitors but is waiting for her son, Lester. The rest of the family calls Les a drug addict, but when he finally arrives, his tattoos identify him as a veteran. Madge dies shortly after Les’s arrival. Hearing Frankie is also a veteran, Les says they’re both “the walking dead.” Frankie goes home and has a drink before taking two sleeping pills.

In spring, it becomes popular to tie yellow ribbons around trees to remind Americans of the POWs who haven’t yet made it home. Unable to escape Vietnam memories, Frankie gets more pills and holds her friends and family at arm’s length. In May, Mom and Dad leave for a month-long cruise, and Frankie is grateful for the solitude. Alone, she relies more heavily on her pills. The summer brings heavy rain that reminds her of Vietnam’s monsoon season. One night, Frankie gets called into work after taking a sleeping pill and drives through the rain. When an emergency comes into the OR, she freezes, and the doctor kicks her out.

The next day, Frankie wakes feeling ashamed. Her phone rings. Presuming it’s Barb and not wanting her friend to see her so broken, Frankie heads to the beach with a chair. The beach is busy. Hearing a man calling his daughter, Frankie sees it is Rye. His wife, Melissa, sits on a blanket. Frankie cannot look away from the apparently happy family, thinking of her and Rye’s time in Kauai. Noticing Rye’s limp and Melissa’s unintentional neglect, Frankie imagines Rye looks unhappy. Frankie heads home but hears Rye’s family getting into a car nearby. Against her better judgment, she follows them home in her car. Melissa rushes into the house despite Rye being in obvious pain. Frankie is about to leave when Rye sees her. She flees.

Frankie feels ridiculous when she gets home, but she still waits for Rye to call. He doesn’t and she goes to bed. Sometime later, Frankie’s boss calls: she’s missed a shift. Frankie pretends to be sick. She resolves that tomorrow, she’ll stop taking pills and will stop thinking of Rye. During her next hospital shift, Frankie’s boss puts her on leave, saying she’s become unreliable and needs a break. The woman is sympathetic since Frankie just lost a child. Frankie feels her life is falling apart. With no distractions, she falls into obsessive thoughts about Rye and whether he is really happy with his family.

The next day, Barb calls—Frankie forgot her birthday. Barb tells Frankie about a man she met, an ACLU lawyer who appreciates her “sharp edges.” Frankie is happy Barb has found someone. The doorbell rings. It’s Rye. Frankie tries to shut the door, but he blocks her. Strangely calm, she hangs up with Barb. Frankie says Rye shouldn’t be here. He says she shouldn’t have followed him home. He was at the beach hoping to see her, remembering her talking about it in Vietnam. Frankie calls him a liar and tries to make him leave, but Rye wants to explain himself. She relents and pours him a drink. Not trusting herself to be close to him, Frankie demands the truth.

Rye explains that he married Melissa two months before leaving for Vietnam, when she was already pregnant. None of the other soldiers knew this. Rye’s attraction to Frankie was genuine, but he also felt obligated to his unborn child. Frankie understands this. Rye intended to work things out once he and Frankie returned stateside, but then he was captured. Rye broke his leg jumping out of the helicopter the VC shot down. In the prison, he learned to communicate with other Americans and eventually Melissa wrote to him. He relied on her then. But when he saw Frankie in San Diego, he knew he still wanted her. Frankie tries to refuse Rye, but one kiss brings her “back to life.”