55 pages • 1 hour read
Jodi PicoultThe Pact
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1998A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 2, Chapters 15-16-Part 3, Chapter 18Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 2: “The Girl Next Door” - Part 3: “The Truth”
Chapter 15 Summary: “Then: September 1997”
Emily learns she is pregnant via a home test and then by an appointment at Planned Parenthood. She schedules an appointment to terminate the pregnancy and steals money by forging Melanie’s signature on a check.
Chris and Emily continue to have sex, and Emily continues to find it unpleasant. She thinks frequently of their parents’ expectations that she and Chris will marry and remain together forever. Chris, too, is adamant about his desire to be committed to Emily permanently. One night on a beach, Emily walks into the water, telling Chris she dreams of drowning. On another occasion, Emily accompanies Chris to a secluded area to practice target shooting. To Chris’s surprise, she asks him to teach her to fire the pistol. Chris is further surprised when Emily appears to be a skillful shot.
The day of the abortion arrives, but when the male physician examines her, Emily panics and cannot continue with the appointment. She discusses options with a Planned Parenthood employee, though she does not feel as if she truly has any options available to her.
Chapter 16 Summary: “Now: Christmas 1997”
Chris is surprised when Michael visits. As they talk, Michael says he does not believe Chris killed Emily. Gus, meanwhile, bumps into Melanie at a store, but Melanie will not speak to her.
Jordan McAfee meets with Chris to review the approach he will take to Chris’s defense at trial. He explains why he will not allow Chris to testify. Jordan speaks of Emily’s pregnancy, and Chris faints upon hearing the news.
Selena meets with both Emily’s art teacher and Chris’s English teacher. The art teacher insists Emily was a perfectionist and notes that her paintings had taken a dark turn as of late. The English teacher defends Chris, showing Selena a “pro-life” argument Chris wrote as evidence of his inability to harm Emily. Selena also attempts to obtain information from Planned Parenthood, but records are available only by subpoena. However, the employee who had met with Emily informs Selena that, according to Emily, the baby’s father was “out of the picture” (225). She explains that she met with Emily on the day she died.
Chris is allowed to meet with Dr. Feinstein so long as McAfee is present. Chris tells the doctor of a dream he had involving Emily and the baby.
McAfee meets with Gus and James. Gus is eager to testify on Chris’s behalf, but James refuses.
After an encounter with Hector, Chris is placed in solitary confinement. When someone slips a Bible to him, Chris reads it. When he is released, Chris learns Hector has been moved back to maximum security.
Kate Harte awakens her parents on Christmas morning—she has decorated the home and purchased gifts. When she realizes her parents have neglected to buy any gifts, Kate becomes angry, lashing out about their hyperfocus on Chris.
McAfee and his son, Thomas, fight when McAfee finds pornography in Thomas’s room. Thomas is invited to spend the holidays in Paris with his mother, and McAfee sees him off at the airport.
Hannukah and Christmas overlap this year, and Michael decides to visit Emily’s grave on Christmas Day. He is surprised to find Melanie there with several gifts she has purchased for Emily. Later Michael visits Chris and encounters Gus there. They agree to meet sometime for coffee.
Chapter 17 Summary: “Now: February 1998”
Jordan McAfee attends the pretrial hearing; Attorney General Barrie offers a plea bargain of 30 years’ prison time. Chris refuses.
Gus and Michael continue to meet for lunch. One Saturday, they discuss Chris and the case; Michael insists Emily would not want Chris to be found guilty of murder. Gus arrives late to Kate’s birthday lunch, keeping her lunch with Michael a secret. After, she rushes off to visit Chris. Chris requests that James visit. Later, Michael tells Melanie of the lunches.
Selena and Jordan McAfee meet to discuss the case. Later, McAfee receives judgment on the pretrial motions filed by both he and the prosecution. His expert witnesses and Chris’s abortion essay will be allowed, while the interview of Chris conducted when he was not Mirandized will not. McAfee regards this as a “small victory.”
On Thursday, a ceremony is held at the cemetery for the placing of Emily’s headstone. Michael attends with Melanie, and Gus appears as well. When it is over, Michael thanks Gus, and they kiss. At home, Gus has been sleeping separately from James, but that night she approaches him, and they have sex.
James visits Chris. Their discussion of mistakes James made as a teen lead to James admitting he has been wrong in not supporting Chris while he is imprisoned.
The trial of Chris’s cellmate, Steve, begins. One night, Chris finds Steve attempting to slit his wrists. Steve is found guilty and receives a life sentence.
Melanie, after a request from Barrie, tries to seduce Michael to convince him not to testify on Chris’s behalf. Michael is angered and asks Gus to meet him. He tells Gus of Melanie’s behavior.
Chapter 18 Summary: “Then: October 1997”
Chris notices Emily is sleeping more. One night, she falls asleep as Chris drives her home. When he wakes her, Emily speaks of wishing to die by suicide. She refuses to reveal her reasons to Chris or discuss what is making her upset. Chris tries to convince her otherwise. In the days that follow, Chris decides that he will “play along” with Emily’s plan to die by suicide, certain that he can change her mind. He tells Emily he would like to be present at her death. Later they discuss obtaining a gun from the cabinet at the Harte home. Days later, Chris takes a pistol and two bullets from the cabinet.
Chapters 15-18 Analysis
This section serves as the final build to the novel’s climax, which arrives in the next section.
The narrative provides evidence that Emily was indeed thinking about suicide. Initially she speaks of this somewhat innocuously; she discusses walking out into the water to drown in a way that seems fraught more with curiosity than true desire. While her parents witness no signs of Emily’s thoughts, Chris is privy to them—he notices Emily sleeping much more, and she is increasingly reluctant to engage with him physically. Eventually, Emily confides in Chris, indicating that she is serious in her wish to die by suicide.
Importantly, the novel provides further insight into Emily’s mental and emotional state, which even Chris is not privy to. Emily is adamant that Chris cannot know that she is pregnant. Though she is certain that Chris will support her, Emily believes that having a baby with Chris will cement her future, forcing her to marry him—something she is not certain that she wants. Her keeping secrets from him will come to anger Chris the most—more than perhaps her actual death. Chris will come to view this as a betrayal and, in his estimation, an indication that Emily is not as committed to him as he is to her.
Chris is unaware of Emily’s sexual assault. The trauma it causes and the resulting discomfort around sexual intimacy and encounters with men (such as the doctor who prepares to treat Emily at the Planned Parenthood clinic) are evident to the reader, but not to Chris. Likewise, Emily’s insistence that—despite what the Planned Parenthood counselor tells her—she has no options about the pregnancy lends support to the idea that she viewed her death as the only way to solve the problem of the pregnancy.
The dynamics between the Gold and Harte parents become increasingly complicated. Melanie handles Emily’s death in a manner that Michael finds to be extreme, and the two grow further distant. Michael and Gus, however, become closer via their lunch meetings. Intimacy appears to be developing, and Gus, at times, feels guilty about this. Her having sex with James—despite their feud—appears to be her way of reassuring herself that, despite her time with Michael, she remains faithful to her husband.
Melanie attempts to use sex as a tool to obtain control and power when she seduces Michael. In this way, Picoult may be subtly reminding readers of the way sex can be harmful or carried out for negative reasons, recalling the sexual assault Emily suffered.
Chris’s cellmate, Steve, plays an important role in this section. His situation parallels Chris’s in important ways. Steve appears quite remorseful about the death of his baby; the details he reveals to Chris suggest the death was accidental, rather than intentional. Chris seems to recognize a bit of both himself and Emily in Steve. Chris does for him what he could not do for Emily—saving Steve from dying by suicide. However, Steve’s guilty verdict becomes too much for him to bear. Chris wonders whether he himself will be found guilty and, though he does not say so, likely wonders whether he will be able to cope with a potential life sentence.
At this point in the novel, Steve could serve either to foreshadow what will happen to Chris or to foil him, providing a model for Chris of how not to cope with his circumstances. Regardless, Chris’s intervention in Steve’s suicide attempt raises questions; readers may wonder why Chris did not prevent Emily’s death, if she did indeed die by suicide.
In many respects, this section serves as the last opportunity for readers to make up their minds about Chris’s culpability before the trial. The events that occurred on the night of Emily’s death are still shrouded in uncertainty at this point.
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