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Chapter 34
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Walk Two Moons, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Judgment, Perspective, and Storytelling
Parents, Children, and Growing Up
Grief
Nature
Summary
Analysis
It didn’t look like it on the map, but all of Montana is mountains. The road snakes along cliffs, and Gramps regularly encounters camp trailers. Sal thinks the scenery is beautiful, but she’s terrified. At every turn, she can almost see the car driving off the cliff. She watches buses sway and only barely stay on the road. Gram still isn’t sleepy, so Sal continues her story about Phoebe. She wants to finish the story today.
Sal’s love of the natural world isn’t enough to distract her from how frightening these roads are. Some of this also has to do with how tense Sal is getting as she and her grandparents near the end of her journey, as she wants to get to Lewiston in time for Momma’s birthday. But her fixation on the car driving off the cliff, and on the busses swaying, points to a more general fear of riding in cars—though it’s unclear why, exactly, Sal feels this way.
Themes
Sal and Phoebe set their plan in motion the day after Mr. Birkway’s visit. They plan to track down the lunatic and, hopefully, find Mrs. Winterbottom. Sal isn’t convinced that Sergeant Bickle’s son is a lunatic or at all connected to Phoebe’s mother, but she’s committed to doing something. The girls fidget all day at school. Their classmates are still upset about the journals. In English class, Mr. Birkway apologizes for reading people’s private thoughts and sends everyone to the library. There, Sal notices Ben trailing her—seemingly to kiss her. Finally, the bell rings, and Phoebe and Sal race to Phoebe’s house.
Again, Mr. Birkway may have seen the journals as a great way to teach perspective and empathy—but now he realizes that for many of his students, the exercise was just humiliating. Meanwhile, Sal can’t quite escape her budding romance with Ben, which is a mark that she’s becoming more mature and perhaps even moving away from her grief as she forms new relationships.
Themes
Sal and Phoebe find six Bickles in the phone book. Four numbers are dead ends, one is busy, and one doesn’t pick up. Finally, the number that didn’t pick up does—and it’s Sergeant Bickle’s wife. Phoebe says she’ll call back later. While Dad is at Margaret’s later that night, Sal calls Sergeant Bickle. She asks for Sergeant Bickle’s son and says she met him at the library and has lost one of his books. Sal says she doesn’t have his number at school because she lost it. Sergeant Bickle doesn’t seem convinced, but he gives Sal his son, Mike’s, address.
Sal has already said she doesn’t really believe that the lunatic kidnapped Mrs. Winterbottom. But as she and Phoebe put this plan in action, they are, in a sense, experimenting with pretending to be more adult and in-control than they actually are. Furthermore, they’re also doing this to “rescue” Mrs. Winterbottom, which is a way for them to feel like they have agency in a situation that otherwise feels helpless and confusing.
Themes
