Everything, Everything

Olly Bright’s family moves in to the house next door early in the story. Madeline immediately notices that unlike her, Olly is comfortable in his physical body and possesses a vibrant energy that often manifests as restlessness or fidgeting. He is generally in motion to some extent, “like gravity affects him differently than it does the rest of us” (20). He performs feats of physical agility called parkour, and when she sees him climbing up the rock wall of her sunroom, she says, “Climbing for him is like walking for the rest of us” (72). Olly’s physicality reflects how he helps unlock Madeline’s own physicality, particularly through his attraction to her and their sexual relationship later in the book.

In contrast to Madeline’s entirely white wardrobe, Olly usually dresses in black. Olly is fascinated by math, especially calculus, and secretly builds a model of the solar system up on his roof. He is emotionally scarred by his father’s abuse and alcoholism, and he feels a need to defend his mother and sister from his father’s violence.

Pauline is a physician and is designated as Madeline’s primary medical caregiver. It’s implied that she’s Asian American. After finding a nurse to stay with Madeline during the day, she returns to work. Pauline enforces a highly structured regimen for monitoring Madeline each day and is incredibly punctual. She and Madeline observe a predetermined schedule each week and the same traditions at each birthday. Madeline reflects, “My mother believes in punctuality the way other people believe in God. Time is precious, she says, and it’s rude to waste someone else’s. I’m not even allowed to be late for Friday Night Dinners” (93-94). There is irony in this statement: By unnecessarily confining Madeline, who’s not actually sick, Pauline is in effect “wasting” her daughter’s time in a profound way.

These characteristics, and the fact that Pauline stops participating in the activities she used to enjoy after she “diagnoses” Madeline with SCID, suggest that Pauline is a highly conscientious person, to the point of rigidity, and that she feels a profound, almost crushing, sense of duty and responsibility about protecting her daughter. When Madeline comes back from Hawaii, Pauline loses weight and experiences anxiety due to worrying about Madeline. At the end of the novel, Pauline realizes that her anguish over unexpectedly losing her husband and son when Madeline was a baby led her to imagine that Madeline had SCID. She seeks counseling to work through these issues, although she still doesn’t approve of Madeline’s departure for New York at the end of the book. Although Pauline has the best of intentions toward her daughter—protecting her and providing emotional support through life’s challenges—her strict control over Madeline’s behavior and her inability to question the medical facts surrounding Madeline’s diagnosis act as antagonistic forces in the book.

Carla has worked for the Whittiers for most of Madeline’s life, and her characterization suggests that she is Latina. She has a fraught relationship with her 17-year-old daughter Rosa, in contrast to the close relationship between Pauline and Madeline. Carla facilitates Madeline and Olly meeting in person; she even initially hides the relationship from Pauline. Eventually, she urges Madeline to stop investing in her relationship with Olly, especially when she starts becoming distant from her mother. This inconsistency makes Carla a problematic authority figure for Madeline, something the text never acknowledges.

Another unacknowledged aspect of Carla’s character is that even though she suspects Pauline’s grief caused her to diagnose Madeline with SCID, she doesn’t investigate the grounds for Madeline’s diagnosis or bring the case to a different doctor. In this way Carla is complicit in Madeline’s isolation and the harm it causes her. Despite this, Madeline remains affectionate and loyal toward Carla even at the end of the book.