Character Analysis
At age nine, Slocum's son is already having a difficult time of things. Like his father, he fears just about everyone and everything. For example, he totally gets the jitters about all of the following:
- Gym, math, and public speaking classes in school
- Abandonment
- Being wrong
- Being called upon to read what he has written aloud as an example to others of what is superior
- Crowds
- People he has not known long
- Competition
Slocum's worried that his son is so wrapped up in all of these fears that he's beginning to let his old man down. Forgione the gym teacher says he "lacks a true will to win" [5.6], and right or wrong, competition is kind of at the heart of American social and professional life, whether on the football field or in the office. But Slocum still likes his kid, at least more than he likes his other two children. This one's good-looking, kind and inquisitive, and if not strong, at least in very good health.
Now, Slocum's son is starting to reach that age when he no longer tells his father everything. Slocum doesn't like that he's started to keep things from him, and he wishes his son would confide in him like he used to. Check it out:
Once I do make him step inside my study to talk to me, we have little to say to each other. He brings a barrier with him. Or I have one of my own. But I do want to talk to him. We have nothing to talk about. I have to search for questions. He is unresponsive. He makes me interrogate him; he gives one-word replies. I think he knows I am not really interested in answers to the questions I ask him—he seems cross and stubborn with me for even trying. (5.23)
When father and son do speak, their conversations (as told by Slocum) are merely disorganized discussions of everything that's on his son's mind or bothering him currently. But isn't that how Slocum speaks to us, through fragmented thoughts?
Like father, like son.
Slocum worries, which causes his son to worry, which in turn causes Slocum to worry even more that the worst night happen to his son. At least that's how Slocum sees it. He pities his kid and hopes he will someday relax so that Slocum can relax himself.
When something finally does happen to Slocum—you know, the something we've been waiting for this whole time—it happens to Slocum's son, much to Daddy's horror. Junior struck by a car and finds himself in severe misery and pain. To end his son's suffering, Slocum performs a mercy killing, hugging the boy so tight he suffocates. Slocum later learns at the hospital that his son would have likely survived the wounds, but he died of asphyxiation.
There's so much irony here. All Slocum's ever wanted to do is get rid of Derek, yet it's Derek who survives and the other son who's killed. In a cruel twist of fate, it's Slocum who causes the greatest harm to his little boy, when Slocum's spent his whole life trying to protect the kid.
The death of the Slocum boy shows how some events in life cannot be predicted, and how not even the suburbs can offer protection from harm.