52 pages • 1 hour read
Emery LordWhen We Collided
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2016A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 26-28Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 26 Summary: “Jonah”
Jonah is working in the restaurant, which is busier than it has been in months. Ethan, Naomi, Leah, Silas, Isaac, Bekah, and Mrs. Daniels are there speaking with their respective friends and family. Jonah is happy to be surrounded by his friends and family at the unveiling of the restaurant’s new menu. Ellie encourages the family to gather around for a photograph and they do so. Naomi tears up slightly after, and they all gather inside. Jonah knows that his father’s “legacy is more than the bricks and mortar” (217), and he finally feels like he has created something good, amidst all the grief.
Later that night after the last guest leaves the restaurant, Vivi surprises Jonah. Vivi apologizes to Jonah for lashing out at him at the hospital. She cuts Jonah off before he can respond. She asks Jonah to go on a walk with her and he agrees. They slowly get more comfortable with each other and Vivi tells him that her and her mom have been getting along together far better. They have been having therapy sessions that have been helpful for Vivi. Jonah tells Vivi that his mom has been attending a grief support group twice a week and has already been discussing possible family therapy sessions in the future.
Vivi tells Jonah that her dad’s wife sent her a letter that she still has not opened. They walk past the edge of town and sit near the water.
Chapter 27 Summary: “Vivi”
Vivi misses Seattle and is now certain that she wants to return home. She becomes certain of this after Ruby texts her about a girl she is falling in love with; Vivi wants to meet her and misses her friend terribly. Vivi tells Jonah that she is leaving in two days and Jonah is overcome with grief. She admits to him that she was the one that asked to leave Verona Cove as soon as possible. Jonah asks Vivi if they are breaking up and she is annoyed at the idea of having to conform and devote “precious time to defining or undefining who people are to [her]” (222). Despite her annoyance with this, she tries to give him what he needs.
Vivi knows that Jonah would never rush her recovery, but she tells him that she would rush herself, desperate to seem better for him should he ever visit.
Vivi tells Jonah that they pushed each other back onto the paths they were originally meant to be on. Although Vivi is upset at her own decision, she knows it is the right thing to do. Jonah asks Vivi if they could be together someday and she agrees. Vivi thinks back on the summer and is grateful to Jonah for everything; he has made her want to have a big family, be that one of kids or full of friends. Vivi is no longer as focused on the superficial things in her life but the people. Vivi tells Jonah that she does not regret anything from the summer, and she tells him that she loves him. They both tear up and kiss for the last time. Even though it is a goodbye, Vivi feels like this is a new beginning for them both.
Chapter 28 Summary: “Jonah”
Jonah wakes up to his mom making pancakes and his family bustling around the house. Jonah is happy but also heartbroken, as he has to say goodbye to Vivi. He is uncertain how to tell Leah, but he discovers that Vivi had come over the day before to say goodbye to his entire family. Jonah goes to the park to say goodbye to Vivi and, instead, finds a note pinned to the tree where she first carved her catchphrase. She does not tell Jonah goodbye so much as she lists their possible meetings in the future. Vivi also tells him that she has left a surprise for him on the restaurant patio, something that she calls “How We Say Good-bye” (231).
Jonah heads to the restaurant and discovers that Vivi has painted him a mural on the outside wall. Instead of a painting about their parting, it is a mural about the Daniels family, with seven ships in the harbor and one large ship heading out on the horizon, “sailing away for new adventures” (231)—Jonah’s dad. Jonah is overcome with emotion and tears up as he touches the horizon. Vivi has given Jonah a gift: “happiness even in uncertainty” (232). The words “Vivi was here” is painted in the bottom corner of the mural and Jonah is certain the phrase will “be all over the world someday” (232).
Chapters 26-28 Analysis
Jonah and Vivi are not meant to be together, at least, not as they currently are. They understand this, especially Vivi, who is certain that they are only meant to love each other from afar. Vivi tells him: “When we collided, we bounced each other back into orbit. And now we have to do that—we have to return to our own paths because that’s what we gave each other” (223).
While they may belong to entirely separate worlds, Vivi and Jonah undoubtedly affected each other permanently. Due to their polar opposite natures, they learned from each other in ways they could not from others.
Vivi, who has been portrayed through the novel as overly caring about her appearance, has come to care more about the people and relationships in her life. This huge change redirects Vivi’s life and her plans for the future. While she previously has focused mostly on places she will visit like India or Japan, and the acclaim she will receive as a costume designer, Vivi has begun to want something different in her life:
I’ve always fixated on the things I want in my life—paint palettes and sumptuous fabrics and star-flecked skies and dancing on my tiptoes and the smell of jasmine. […] These days, I’ve started to daydream of the permanent relationships I want to have. Friends who stay in my life forever. People who I trust to love me even if I’m wobbling—the way I trust Jonah (223).
This trust seems antithetical to their parting but to Vivi it is not so. She is able to find joy in the time they shared as opposed to stretching out their relationship in a way that will only prolong the hurt. Vivi teaches Jonah a lesson in this uncertainty that helps him with the death of his father as well.
Vivi leaves Jonah a note instead of an official goodbye. She tells him that they will meet “someday” (231) and focuses more on the wealth of possibilities that sit before them than on the closing of a chapter. Vivi changes Jonah in a way that allows him to accept his father’s death, the same way Vivi has to accept her diagnosis. Jonah thinks about Vivi's effect on him: “[S]he gave me something I’ve needed for months now: happiness even in uncertainty. What’s past that horizon line? And how many of us get our somedays? I don’t know. But just because I don’t know doesn’t mean it can’t be great” (232). Beyond seeing beginnings in uncertainty, Vivi and Jonah have given each other something else as well: hope for the future.
