Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? Summary & Analysis

Oates immediately establishes Connie’s vanity, as she places huge emphasis on her appearances and her good looks give her a sense of power and status. Oates also makes clear, however, that this power is inherently tied to the opinions of others—a fact that makes Connie also appear vulnerable, insecure, and naive.

Connie has strained relationships with her mother and sister, which, combined with an emotionally-distant father, creates a sense that Connie is alienated within her family. In this way, Connie’s alienation gives her a false sense of freedom; while she is left to her own devices, she is also vulnerable. Arnold Friend will take advantage of both the vulnerability caused by Connie’s obsession with appearances and her estrangement from her family. Connie’s dramatic wish for death also foreshadows her tragic fate.

Connie presents a different version of herself when she’s home and when she’s out with her friends. Importantly, this change is not only rooted in appearance but in Connie’s whole demeanor. When she’s at home, she behaves in a way that won’t attract her mother’s criticism, but when she’s out she’s eager to attract attention for the validation it gives her. That her friend’s father doesn’t ask what they’ve been up to reinforces the sense that for all the power she thinks she has, Connie is still a child and is being left vulnerable to the world. Music is connected to Connie’s pleasure in this moment, as it will be throughout the story. Finally, given how easily Connie and her friend arrange to meet up later, it seems that it’s normal for the girls to pair off with boys while they’re out.

Connie again connects pleasure with music and male attention, but this time the latter is unwanted. This time the boy—later revealed as Arnold Friend—has a predatorial presence, and the way he speaks to Connie is casually threatening. By noting that Connie can no longer hear music when they leave the plaza, Oates again underscores this connection between male attention and pleasure and music. Not only does the presence of music seem to conjure these things, but its absence also seems to signal a degree of calm, and there is a sense of order being restored as Connie and her friend are safely heading home, beyond the reach of music and boys alike. 

It seems the Pettinger girl has gotten into some sort of trouble regarding sex and/or pregnancy, and Connie is careful to separate herself from this behaviour in her mother’s mind. This is another example of Connie’s ability to present a certain version of herself at home. Her assumption that her looks place her higher in her mother’s affection again emphasizes the importance she places on physical appearances.

Connie willingly separates herself from the family; she is disdainful of the idea of going to the barbecue and would rather spend time home alone, perhaps an attempt to assert her maturity and independence. While she reflects on her previous romantic encounters, Oates demonstrates how popular music functions as a kind of prism through which Connie interprets her experiences. She also is clearly influenced by pop culture’s depiction of romance, which have led her to believe that dating and sex happen in a specific, “promised” way. 

Music is an important part of Connie’s relationship to her own body, and once again she observes how music seems to be a source pf pleasure. When Connie hears a car coming up the drive, Oates again references Connie’s fixation on appearances; rather than feel concern about an uninvited stranger, she worries that she doesn’t look good enough to receive anyone. That Connie “knows” the ominous “signal” from the horn suggests the inescapability of her abduction, foreshadowing how Arnold Friend will draw her out of her house.

The sinister element to Friend’s behavior continues, and the fact that his hair looks like a wig immediately suggests he is not the teenage boy he pretends to be. Connie is not entirely taken in by his attempts at casual conversation and intuits there is somethings strange happening. The fact that Friend’s radio is playing the same station as Connie’s is likely no coincidence; Connie, like many teens, identifies deeply with popular music, and Friend wants to ingratiate himself by pretending that he, too, is a teen who understands Connie’s emotional state and desires.

Friend’s name is, like the man himself, deceptive: he is no friend of Connie’s. The numerical code is often interpreted to be in reference to two different biblical verses. The first, Judges (the 33rd book of the Bible if counting backwards from Revelation) 19:17 reads, “When he looked and saw the traveler in the city square, the old man asked, ‘Where are you going? Where did you come from?’” Meanwhile, Genesis 19:17 reads, in part, “Escape for thy life; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountains, lest thou be consumed.” Throughout the story Friend is suggested as an embodiment of evil, a notion bolstered by the inclusion of a religious allusion here that references the title of the story and could be read as a warning to Connie from God to leave, lest she be “consumed” by Friend; indeed, Friend will later sniff Connie as if she were food to “gobble up.” The way Friend speaks to Connie also subtly negates her agency or free will, which he will do throughout the story.

Friend has made attempts to disguise not only his true appearance but his intentions from Connie by adopting the style of teenage boys so that he will seem familiar and unthreatening.  His behaviour feels increasingly erratic, which suggests a loss of control and that his disguise is starting to slip, and that Connie will potentially glimpse his true nature. Connie’s repeated attempt to ask him a direct question is met with further deflection, though he takes off his sunglasses, perhaps in frustration, and in doing so exposes more of his true self to Connie. Again, however, Friend manages to conceal the sinister reality of his intentions by speaking in a way that resembles “someone reciting a song,” and so uses Connie’s love of music to distract her from the content of his words.

Friend continues to engage in manipulative behaviour, telling Connie nonsensical things as though they’re obvious and normal. His disguise, however, remains unconvincing to Connie, so much so that she asks him straight out what age he is. This seems to break his concentration. Connie is now able to identify false aspects of his appearance, most importantly that he is a grown man and not a kid her own age, and that he has clearly made an effort to alter his appearance.

As if sensing that he has revealed too much, Friend now draws Connie’s attention to Ellie. The realization that Ellie is also a grown man heightens Connie’s panic. Friend continues his attempts to coax Connie out of the house, but she is further alarmed by his change in tone and laughter. Connie’s observation that Friend “had come from and belonged nowhere” echoes the phrasing of the bible verse marked on his car, and in this way Oates again suggests that Friend as an incarnation of evil.

Connie now fully intuits the danger of the situation. Friend’s knowledge of the barbecue and her family suggests he has been watching her (or has some sort of supernatural power), and underscores how alone and vulnerable—rather than mature and independent—she really is. He now becomes more explicit in his intentions, telling Connie things she can’t ignore or misinterpret. The sexual nature of his threats is doubly violent because it forces adult knowledge onto Connie; he seems determined to treat her like a woman when she is still a child. He nearly falls over, which suggests his disguise is becoming increasingly unstable. This is further underscored by Connie realizing his “whole face was a mask.”

By ignoring Connie’s threats of the police, Friend confirms that he is not subject to, or at least does not see himself as subject to, the same rules and laws as she is. Ellie, conversely, seems without his own agency or free will, only speaking to ask Friend if he can do his bidding, and it’s plausible that, if Connie leaves the house and gets into the car, she will be under Friend’s control in the same way Ellie is. Friend’s words continue to be threatening, but again his lyrical way of speaking draws on Connie’s love of music and confuses her so that she’s unable to focus fully on the danger of her situation. Furthermore, the promise he wants her to uphold puts her in an impossible situation: although she is still inside her house and for the moment safe, she remains unable to seek the help that could bring this encounter to a close.

Friend seems adamant that Connie leave the house of her own free will, opting to slowly manipulate her and emotionally terrorize her rather than bring her outside by physical force. The string of nonsensical language he utters seems to be further evidence that his disguise is wearing thin. This is underscored by the explicit threat to harm Connie’s family which, combined with Friend’s explicitly sexual implications, finally proves too much for Connie and causes her to act impulsively and run from the screen door back inside the house.

Connie is so shaken and traumatized she is unable to make a telephone call, and so it seems that Friend has already done sufficient emotional damage to Connie to stop her from acting in her own best interests. After losing herself in another trance, it is clear that she has undergone a real change: she is no longer resistant and complies with Friend’s instructions, and seems to have accepted her fate.

Now that Connie has decided to leave the house, Friend compounds her estrangement from her family, home, and childhood by negating her past and future. This alienation is reiterated by Oates’s description of Connie watching herself in the third person, and by Friend singing about a blue-eyed girl when Connie’s eyes are brown. The vast, overwhelming landscape could be a reference to adulthood and/or death, both of which are unfamiliar to Connie’s young mind and both of which she is being pulled towards nevertheless.