“We both knew the knock was coming. We heard the footsteps stop outside Irene’s door, but there was empty time between the end of those steps and the heavy rap of his knuckles: ghost time. Mr. Klauson standing there, waiting, maybe holding his breath, just like me. I think about him on the other side of that door all the time, even now. How I still had parents before that knock, and how I didn’t after. Mr. Klauson knew that too; how he had to lift his calloused hand and take them away from me at eleven p.m. one hot night at the end of June.” 

Cameron contemplates how life can change in an instant. Mr. Klauson’s knock catalyzes a chain of events that drive the plot of the novel and represents the stark difference between Cameron’s life before and after her parents’ death. 

 “How, if my parents were dead, could there still be some part of me that felt relief at not being found out?” 

Cameron contends with the relief she feels at the confirmation that her parents will never find out about her kiss with Irene throughout the first part of the novel. This moment begins the development of the novel’s themes around the complexities of grief and coming to terms with homosexuality.

“I don’t think it’s overstating it to say that my religion of choice became VHS rentals, and that its messages came in Technicolor and music montages and fades and jump cuts and silver-screen legends and B-movie nobodies and villains to root for and good guys to hate.” 

Instead of following Ruth’s lead and turning to religion, Cameron turns to film. Cameron also watches movies to cope with her grief. The structure of plot and character development gives her a sense of order.