Room: After Summary & Analysis

At the police precinct, as Ma and Jack get out of the car, there are “lights quick quick like fireworks” all around. Officer Oh mutters “vultures” under her breath and attempts to shield Jack with a blanket, but Jack pushes her aside and looks at the people holding flashing machines.

Inside, Jack is overwhelmed by the bright lights and the people all around. He is mesmerized by the sight of a vending machine, but Ma pulls him through the lobby to a small room where a “huge wide man” is waiting for them. The man apologizes for the “media presence,” and thanks Jack for his courage, calling him a brave young man. Jack is confused at being called a “man,” and even more unsettled when the chair in the corner of the room doesn’t rock like Rocker did back in Room.

The large man—the police captain—tells Ma that he needs to take a statement from her. After that, he says, she and Jack will be released to the Cumberland Clinic, a psychiatric care facility. Jack sits with Ma as she begins talking to the man, who calls her by her “other name.” Jack wants some, and tries to pull Ma’s t-shirt up, but she tells Jack she’s busy. Jack continues prodding her, though, and finally she lets him breastfeed. The captain asks if Ma wants some privacy, but Ma says she wants to get things over with.

After a few minutes, Jack tells Ma that he needs to go back to Room—he has to use Toilet. Ma says that there’s one in the precinct, too, and leads him to the bathroom. Jack is frightened of the toilet’s automatic flush, and surprised when Ma, seeing his soiled underwear, takes them off of him and drops them in the trash. Ma insists they’ll find Jack new ones. Jack asks if he’ll get them for his Sundaytreat, but Ma says that they can get things any day they want now. “That’s weird,” Jack thinks. “I’d rather on a Sunday.”

Jack falls asleep while Ma finishes up her interview with the police captain. She wakes him when it’s time to go to the hospital. Jack is confused—a hospital was part of Plan A. He is drowsy and disoriented during the car ride in the police cruiser—and frightened when a “person with no face” opens the door for them at the hospital’s entrance. The doctor greeting Ma and Jack introduces himself as Dr. Clay and explains to Jack that he’s wearing a mask to help keep Jack safe from germs. Dr. Clay hands Jack and Ma masks to wear, too. Jack is surprised that germs are in the real world, too, and not just in Room.

Inside the hospital, Dr. Clay tells Ma that she needs to be separated from Jack for a few minutes so that the medical resident on duty, Dr. Kendrick, can collect “evidence” from Ma’s body. Jack tries to follow Ma into the exam room, afraid to be parted from her—but he is comforted when he sees a TV on the wall near the reception desk. The admissions coordinator, Pilar, watches over Jack while he watches TV. Jack is exhausted and nearly nods off to sleep, but he perks up when he sees himself and Ma suddenly appear on the television screen. Jack calls out to Ma, telling her that they’re on TV, but Pilar quickly shuts the screen off.

Jack rejoins Ma in her exam room once Dr. Kendrick is done looking at her. Dr. Kendrick asks if she can give Jack a checkup—Ma insists he doesn’t need one. Dr. Clay says that in “other trauma situations,” patients are usually examined right away. Ma says that she has never let Jack out of her sight once in his life, and “nothing like what [they’re] insinuating” has happened to him. Ma begins crying as she begs the doctors to understand how safe she kept Jack for so many years. Dr. Clay asks if Ma is okay with them simply taking Jack’s height and weight and cleaning his scrapes. Ma assents.

Jack is spellbound when Dr. Kendrick cleans his scrapes and applies Dora band-aids to the wounds, but he is nervous when she asks to take a blood sample. Ma promises Jack that he’ll get a treat if he’s brave, and Jack chooses a lollipop, but doesn’t like its flavor. He is shocked when Ma tells him he can choose another one.

In the morning, Jack wakes up to find he has peed the bed in the night. He wakes Ma to tell her, but she urges him not to worry about it—the nurses, she says, will come and change the sheets. Ma gets out of bed and raises the blinds covering the window. Jack is mystified by the “wooden stripes,” and Ma slowly explains how blinds work. Jack is confused by Ma’s semantics as she describes how blinds “stop you seeing.”

Ma tells Jack it’s time to wash up. Jack is confused—bath, he says, comes after breakfast. Ma explains that they can do things in whatever order they like now, and hurries off to the bathroom. Jack is confused by the shower and afraid to go into it. When Ma throws out Jack’s dirty t-shirt, Jack is upset, even though Ma insists he’ll soon get lots of new ones to replace it. Ma goes into the shower, and though Jack is frightened, he follows her in. As Ma makes noises of relief beneath the hot stream of water, Jack asks her if she's in pain—she replies that she’s simply enjoying her first shower in over seven years. After the shower, Jack is surprised that he and Ma each get their own white fluffy towel and robe.

After their shower, Jack asks if they can go outside of their room and explore. As Ma helps him put some slippers on, however, he becomes afraid, and asks if Old Nick will find them again. Ma blithely assures Jack that Old Nick doesn’t know where they are and won’t be able to get to them again. As Ma and Jack wander the halls of the clinic, Jack looks out the windows and asks if the world outside is real. Ma assures him it is.

Jack and Ma run into a nurse named Noreen who seems surprised and nervous to see them out and about. She urges them to use the buzzer in their room if they need anything, but Ma says that she and Jack want to eat breakfast in the cafeteria. Noreen lets them by, and Ma and Jack enter the large room. Jack is overwhelmed—being in the cafeteria feels like “a TV planet that’s all about [him and Ma].” Everyone wants to stop and talk to them, welcoming them and congratulating them. Jack is intimidated by all the attention, and he clutches tight to Ma as fellow patients and clinic staff approach him to say hello.

Ma eats the breakfast brought over to their table hungrily, gulping juice and scarfing bacon, but Jack is overwhelmed and occasionally disgusted by the feast. He doesn’t like the cutlery, which is different from the knives and forks inside Room, and he cannot stomach the pulpy orange juice. Dr. Clay comes over to say hello to Ma and Jack and notices that Jack seems overwhelmed—he suggests that maybe breakfast in the cafeteria is too much for “day one.” Jack wonders what Day One is. Noreen offers to make Jack and Ma some plates and bring them up to the room. Ma, clearly annoyed with Jack’s inability to sit through breakfast, hurries him up and away from the table back towards their room.

That afternoon, after a nap, Jack and Ma wake up to find Dr. Clay knocking on the door. He comes in to check on Ma and Jack. He prescribes Ma some sleeping pills once she tells him she was too wired to really sleep the night before. Ma asks if she can keep her medications in her room rather than having a nurse bring them to her several times a day, “like [she’s] a sick person.”

Dr. Clay reveals that he needs to give Jack several vaccines. Dr. Clay asks Jack to be brave, but Jack hides in the bathroom and insists he “used [his] brave all up doing Plan B.” Ma and Dr. Clay manage to wrangle Jack onto the bed and coach him through the vaccinations.

After the shots, Jack plays by himself while he listens to Ma and Dr. Clay talk. Dr. Clay discusses the challenges that surely lie ahead for Jack, including issues with social adjustment and special perception. A distressed Ma tells Clay that she’d thought she was helping Jack to be “more or less” OK, even in Room—she is overwhelmed by all the trials still ahead of them both.

Soon, Noreen brings a policeman into the room, and the two of them begin talking with Ma and Dr. Clay. Jack puts his fingers in his ears to blot out the noise. Ma soon runs over to Jack and shows him a picture—the picture is of Old Nick with a “sign around his neck.” Ma explains that the police have put Old Nick in jail. Dr. Clay warns Ma that showing pictures of Old Nick to Jack might “trigger” him—or her, for that matter—but Ma insists that “after seven years of the real deal,” she’s strong enough to handle a photograph.

Dr. Clay asks Jack if Old Nick ever hurt him. Ma interjects, insisting she never let such a thing happen, but Dr. Clay urges Jack to answer for himself. Jack says the only time Old Nick hurt him was when he dropped him on the ground during “the Great Escape.” Dr. Clay tells Ma that she and Jack may need to submit to DNA testing—when Ma protests, Dr. Clay begs her not to allow a “monster” like Old Nick get “let off on [a] technicalit[y].”

After the doctors and police leave, Ma tells Jack it’s time for lunch. Jack isn’t hungry, but he is worried about skipping lunch. Ma reminds him once again that they can do anything they want to do now, whenever they want to do it. Jack says he’s tired and wants a nap. Ma lays with him in the bed, but reads the paper instead of going to sleep. Jack is confused as to why Ma would rather do something on her own than something with him.

After Jack’s nap, he wakes up to a knocking on the door—it’s Noreen, who has brought new clothes for him and Ma. Jack tries on shoes for the first time in his life, but finds them hard to walk in. As Ma dresses in a trendy outfit, Jack tells her that she’s not wearing her “real clothes.” Another nurse comes in to tell Jack and Ma they have visitors—seconds later, a woman rushes into the room and embraces Ma. Ma laughs and cries as she greets her mother for the first time in seven years. Ma happily introduces Jack to his grandma.

Grandma thanks Jack tearily for bringing her “baby” back to her. Jack is confused—he doesn’t know “what baby” she’s talking about. While Ma and Grandma “talk and talk,” Jack distracts himself by looking under his bandages at his scrapes. Soon, a man with a beard enters the room—Grandma introduces the man to Ma and Jack as Leo. Ma is confused and asks where her father is. Grandma replies that Ma’s dad is in Australia—there have been “a lot of changes,” she says, in the years since Ma’s been gone.

Ma and Grandma talk for a long time while Jack listens surreptitiously. Grandma tells Ma how miserable she’s been since Ma was taken, and how tortured she was by the confusion over whether Ma had been abducted or killed, or had simply run away on her own. Grandma tells Ma that Ma’s brother Paul has a baby girl of his own now, and the two discuss all that’s transpired in the years they’ve been apart. Soon, it’s time for Grandma to leave, and she bids both Ma and Jack a tearful goodbye, promising to come back soon.

After dinner, Ma and Jack go to bed—but Jack can’t sleep. He wonders why he and Ma can’t go back to Room just for sleeping, and he is anxious about staying in the clinic forever. Though Ma has told him they simply “need a bit of help while [they] sort things out”—as well as protection from the paparazzi—Jack wishes they could leave. Jack wakes Ma to ask her if they’re locked in at the clinic, but Ma comforts him by assuring him they’re free as birds.

The next day is full of even more strange, new things. Jack is surprised when cleaners come to take the sheets and wash them—he thought he and Ma would have to wash their sheets in the bathroom forever. He tries syrup on his pancakes for the first time, and continues adjusting to all the strange new sounds in the clinic.

Ma and Jack meet with Dr. Clay for a therapy session, and after going over Ma’s feelings with her and discussing terms like “depersonalization” and “jamais vu,” Dr. Clay asks Jack how he’s liking the clinic so far. Jack says he doesn’t like “persons looking” and “sudden things.” Dr. Clay asks Jack to tell him about Room, and Jack obliges. Ma complements Jack’s memories of Room with her own, and laments that she couldn’t have made a better life for Jack or gotten him out faster. Dr. Clay reminds her that no one is judging her, but Ma seems distressed.

After therapy, Ma and Jack take a nap. When Jack wakes up, he isn’t feeling well, and Ma tells him he has caught his first cold. Jack cries and says he doesn’t want to go to Heaven yet. Ma laughs and assures him that while doctors can’t cure a cold, they are surrounded by people who are helping to make them “better”—nothing, she says, is going to happen to Jack.

Jack and Ma go down to the lobby of the clinic and look at some fish in a tank. Jack asks if the fish are also resting at the clinic “because they’re famous.” After observing the fish awhile, Ma tells Jack it’s time for them to go outside and get some fresh air. Even though Dr. Clay helps Jack put on a mask and sunglasses, as soon as Jack steps outside, he feels frightened of the wind and sun. Jack begins having a mild panic attack, and Noreen helps him breathe into a paper bag to calm down. Ma brings Jack back inside and up to their room, where she lets Jack breastfeed for a while.

Grandma comes by to visit Ma and Jack. She brings some books for Jack to read along with her. As Jack looks at the books, he hears Grandma begging Ma to tell her “every detail” of her time in Room, but Ma refuses, insisting she doesn’t want her mother “thinking about that stuff every time” she looks at her. Grandma only stays a while, but after she leaves, there is another visitor—a lawyer named Morris. As Ma talks Morris, he urges her to file suits against several newspapers who used pictures of her over the years. Ma says legal action is the last thing on her mind—but Morris urges her to “consider [her and Jack’s] futures” and all the expenses they’ll need to pay for soon.

Morris opens up a plastic bag he’s brought with him and produces packages and letters—donations and gifts, he says, from Ma and Jack’s “fans.” As Jack marvels over the toys inside, Morris once again urges Ma to get ahead of the media attention—Ma sarcastically asks if they should “sell [themselves] before somebody else does.” Morris tells Ma to take things “one day at a time.” Ma urges Jack to pick out just five toys to keep—the rest, she says, should go to kids who need them more. Jack surreptitiously chooses six and puts them away quickly before Ma can count.

While Jack squirrels his toys away in the other corner of the room, Morris and Ma talk about the impending trial and Ma asks how long Old Nick will go to prison for. As Morris lists the charges against Old Nick, he estimates the man will get “twenty-five to life.” Ma asks about “the baby”—the first one she had—and whether it “count[s] as some kind of murder.” Jack listens, intrigued—Ma has never told him this story. Before Jack can hear any more, though, Noreen enters the room to tell Ma and Jack it’s dinner time.

After dinner, while Jack breastfeeds on the bed, he asks Ma about “the first baby.” Ma explains that a year before Jack was born, she gave birth to a baby girl. The umbilical cord, Ma says, was tangled around the baby girl’s neck, and though Old Nick was in Room while Ma delivered the baby, he refused to help Ma at all—and as a result, the little girl died. Ma tells Jack that when Jack was about to be born, she didn’t let Old Nick anywhere near the room—she wanted it to be just the two of them. Ma tells Jack that she believes the spirit of the baby girl was Jack all along, and got “recycled” when she died to come back as Jack himself.

Ma and Jack sleep fitfully, and Jack even falls out of bed at one point. Ma suggests they use both beds in the room and push them together to make one large bed, but Jack insists on staying in the smaller bed with Ma. In the morning, Ma has caught Jack’s cold, and when Dr. Clay comes by to check on them, he gives Ma the okay for her and Jack to stop wearing their masks. Dr. Clay helps Jack with some art therapy, and they discuss Jack’s habit of counting when he’s nervous. Dr. Clay tells Ma that it’s good she got Jack out when she did—at five, he tells her, children are still “plastic.”

Later that day, Jack asks Ma what Dr. Clay meant when he called him “plastic.” Ma explains that Dr. Clay believes Jack might forget all about Room one day. Jack asks if he’s supposed to forget, and Ma admits she doesn’t know. Jack thinks about how often Ma has been saying she doesn’t know things lately—in Room, she never said the phrase.

After lunch, Ma and Jack go outside again for more fresh air. Jack is scared again, but Noreen is with them, and encourages Jack to pretend he’s watching their outside adventure on TV. Soon, Jack is excitedly exploring the parking lot, marveling at the cars, flowers, grass, and small insects all around. When Jack points out a helicopter overhead, Noreen and Ma hurry him inside, and explain that the helicopter is full of paparazzi. 

Later that afternoon, Grandma arrives with Ma’s brother Paul and his wife Deana. The visit is intense and emotional—Paul cries repeatedly as Deana comforts both him and the confused Jack. Deana tells Jack that she and Paul have a three-year-old daughter, Bronwyn, who is “psyched” to meet him soon. As Jack listens to the adults converse and catch up, he struggles to keep track of who and what they’re talking about. The visit passes in a blur, and Jack’s ears soon grow “tired.” Even after Paul and Deana leave, though, Grandma stays—and brings Leo into the room to spend time with Ma and Jack. Grandma tells Jack he can call Leo “Steppa,” since Leo is his Stepgrandpa.

Jack, who is tired of visitors, asks Ma if he can “have some.” Ma tells him he can later on. Grandma asks what Jack means, and Ma tells her he’s talking about breastfeeding. Grandma is shocked to realize that Jack still breastfeeds, but Ma explains that “there was no reason to stop,” and curtly admonishes Grandma for judging her. Steppa suggests he and Grandma leave and let Jack and Ma rest, and Grandma bids them goodbye. Ma falls asleep soon after they leave, but Jack isn’t tired.

Jack picks up a newspaper and reads the headline: “HOPE FOR BONSAI BOY,” it says, and the article below describes Jack and Ma’s ordeal in sensationalized detail. Ma wakes up and snatches the paper from Jack’s hands. He asks her what a bonsai is, and Ma explains that bonsais are tiny trees that people keep inside and cut every day “so they stay all curled up.” Ma tells Jack not to take the paper seriously and urges him to come to sleep. She takes some painkillers for her headache and Jack strokes her hair as they fall asleep, disturbed by the fact that Ma is “still […] hurting in Outside.”

Jack has terrible nightmares all night, and when he wakes up in a sweat, Ma lets him breastfeed. Afterwards, he confesses to her that he kept six toys, not five. Ma says it’s all right, and she urges him to go back to sleep.

In the morning, Ma and Jack lie in bed counting the friends they have made in the world: they list Noreen, Dr. Clay, Dr. Kendrick, Pilar, and Ajeet, as well as Grandma, Paul, and Deana. Jack includes Steppa, but Ma calls him a “rebound.” After counting friends, Ma and Jack head down to breakfast, and then meet with Dr. Clay for therapy. Jack tells Dr. Clay about his frightening dreams, and Clay hypothesizes that Jack’s brain is “doing a spring cleaning”—working through all his unneeded “scary thoughts” from Room now that he’s out. Jack, however, believes that Room was the safe place, and Outside is the scary one.

After therapy, Ma and Jack use the computer for a little while. Ma looks up some of her old friends on a social media website, and then lets Jack watch some Dora videos on YouTube. When they get back to their room, Ma finds a present Paul has sent—it is a device with a “million” songs on it, and Ma starts listening to music happily. When Jack roughly grabs the device, Ma urges Jack to be gentle with her present—Jack is disturbed, because in Room, “everything was [theirs.]”

The next morning, Jack asks what day it is. Ma tells him it’s Thursday, and Jack asks her if they should start thinking about what to request for Sundaytreat. Ma simply shakes her head in response.

That afternoon, Ma and Jack are driven in a van to a dentist’s office—the clinic has arranged a “special visit” for Ma and Jack, with only the dentist and an assistant present. On the drive over, Jack looks out the window and marvels at all the “hes and shes on the sidewalks.” When Jack asks about people’s hair and why it’s not all long like theirs, Ma explains that some people have short hair. Jack says he doesn’t want to get rid of his hair and “lose [his] strong,” like Samson in the Bible.

At the dental appointment, the dentist checks Jack’s teeth and finds that they’re in good shape. Next, the dentist moves onto Ma while Jack plays with some toys and reads some books. Ma’s appointment takes a very long time.

That night, while Ma and Jack eat dinner, Noreen knocks at the door and tells Ma that her father has arrived from Australia. Ma runs off, leaving Jack behind. Noreen stays with him while he finishes his meal, and then brings him into the common room where Ma and Grandpa are. As soon as he sees Jack, Grandpa jumps out of his seat and shakes his head. Ma tries to introduce Jack to Grandpa, but Grandpa says he can’t bear to be in the same room as the boy. Grandpa hurries towards the door, promising to call from the hotel. Ma begins screaming and banging on the table, urging her father to accept Jack and warning him that if he doesn’t stay, he won’t get another chance with either of them. Grandpa comes back into the room and politely greets Jack.

Later, back in their own room, Jack asks Ma why Grandpa didn’t want to see him. Ma says that Grandpa thinks she’d be better off without Jack. Jack points out that without him, Ma wouldn’t be Ma—and Ma agrees. Ma promises that soon Grandpa will behave better.

The next day, Ma tells Jack that while he’s taking his afternoon nap, she is going to go downstairs to Dr. Clay’s office to talk to some TV people, and later that night, she will be on TV. Jack asks her why she’s going to talk to the “vultures,” and Ma tells him that if she answers their questions just once, they’ll stop asking. Jack seems nervous about the plan, and so Ma reminds him that tomorrow they are scheduled to go on an adventure to the Natural History Museum with Paul, Bronwyn, and Deana. Jack wraps his arms and legs around Ma and begs her not to leave their room. As Ma tries to push Jack off of her, his head hits the edge of the bedside table, and Jack begins screaming.

Dr. Clay comes into the room at the sound of Jack’s screams. Ma holds Jack and strokes his face, trying to calm him down. Dr. Clay tells Ma that she can still “pull out” of the interview, but Ma insists she needs to go ahead with it for Jack’s college fund. Ma tells Jack that he can come downstairs with her if he stays silent, and Jack agrees. Dr. Clay warns Ma that plan might not be the best idea, but Ma ignores him and helps Jack put his shoes on.

Downstairs, Jack enters Dr. Clay’s office to find it full of “persons and lights and machines.” Morris is there, and he barks orders and reminders at the television crew. Ma shakes hands with a woman with “puffy hair” whom Jack recognizes from TV. He is shocked to meet an “actual person from TV,” and watches intently as Ma sits down and the interview begins. 

Over the course of the interview, the puffy-haired journalist asks Ma probing, invasive, and sensationalist questions about whether she experienced Stockholm syndrome while living inside Room, about “the tragedy of [her] stillbirth,” and about Jack. Morris pushes back against the questions that go against Ma’s contract, but Ma presses forward and attempts to answer as many questions as she can. The interviewer presses Ma about her decision to breastfeed Jack throughout his childhood, about “deceiving” her child about the reality of the world outside Room, and about whether Ma believes Old Nick cared “in a warped way” for her and Jack.

Ma begins talking about how irritated she is by all the media attention. She tells the interviewer that even as difficult as her life in Room was, there are people suffering worse all over the world. Ma invokes the injustice of the prison system and the practice of solitary confinement, as well as abuses in orphanages and child-labor-run factories in other parts of the world. Ma says she wants to shine a light on “people [who] are locked up in all sorts of ways,” but the interviewer quickly redirects the interview and begins asking more invasive questions. She asks if Ma misses being “behind a locked door.” Ma calls the question “stupid,” and Dr. Clay suggests ending the interview. Ma insists on getting it over with.

The journalist resumes the interview and asks Ma whether she ever considered giving Jack away, “so he could be free.” She accuses Ma of knowing what Jack was missing and yet keeping him with her out of selfishness and a desire to put an end to her own loneliness. Ma begins crying, unable to answer the question. Jack runs over to the couch and leaps onto Ma’s lap, and Morris quickly orders the camera people to shut their devices off and stop the interview.

In the morning, when Jack wakes up, Ma is having a Gone day. Jack is surprised that she has days like this even outside of Room. Noreen comes into the room, and Jack explains Ma’s Gone state. Noreen tries to ask Ma if there’s anything she can get her, but Ma answers in a monstrous voice that she just wants to sleep. Noreen helps Jack get dressed and tells him that Paul is waiting downstairs.

Noreen brings Jack to visit Dr. Clay, who greets him happily and asks him if he’s okay going out to the museum with just Paul, Deana, and Bronwyn. Jack is worried that if he doesn’t go with them today, the dinosaurs at the museum will disappear, so he agrees to the outing. Noreen brings Jack to meet Paul in the cafeteria, and they eat breakfast. Paul says it’s probably good that Ma isn’t coming with them today, because “after that TV show last night, everybody knows her face.”

Paul leads Jack outside to the parking lot, where Deana is waiting in the car. Bronwyn is in a car seat in the back, and Jack sits in a booster seat beside her. As the four of them begin driving, Jack reminds himself not to be scared—he is on an adventure. Paul tells Jack they’re going to make a stop at the mall to pick out a present for Bronwyn to take to a birthday party later. Paul plans on going in by himself, but once they get to the mall, Bronwyn insists on going in, and Deana says they should all go together.

Inside the mall, Jack is amazed by how big the building is, and he almost immediately seizes on a Dora bag at a department store. Deana helps Jack put the backpack on and offers to buy it for him. Deana pays for the backpack but hurries the family out of the store when Bronwyn begins throwing a temper tantrum. Jack takes his shoes off as they walk to the next store, and a woman picks them up and gives them to Deana. Deana becomes nervous that someone is going to recognize Jack, and says as much to Paul. Jack, sensing the tension, asks if they can return to the clinic. Deana assures Jack that they’ll soon be leaving for the museum.

On the way to the toy store, the group passes the food court and stops for snacks. Jack asks to use the bathroom, and Deana takes him and Bronwyn. They all go into a stall together. Jack pees into the toilet, and then Deana flushes, lowers the seat, and sits Bronwyn down. Intrigued by Bronwyn’s private parts, Jack reaches out to touch her—Deana hits him, and her wedding rings scrape his hand. Jack begins screaming. Deana apologizes profusely, and after wiping Bronwyn, she helps Jack wash his hands and put some pressure on the little cut. Deana leads Jack and Bronwyn out of the bathroom and tells Paul they need to leave—they can find a gift for Bronwyn’s party later.

Jack, however, spots his favorite book from Room, Dylan the Digger, in the window of a nearby book store. He runs toward it, and the whole family goes into the store. Deana shoves a book for the party in Paul’s hand and asks him to go pay for it—meanwhile, Jack shoves the Dylan book into his Dora bag. On the way out of the store, a man pulls Paul aside and tells him that Jack has the book in his bag. Paul reprimands Jack, but at the same time, tells Deana how bad he feels about how little of the world Jack understands. 

Paul brings Jack back to the clinic right after the mall. Noreen leads Jack back up to his room, and Jack snuggles into bed with Ma. He notices right away, though, that the pillow smells bad. Jack realizes Ma has vomited and tries to shake her awake, but she doesn’t move or respond. Jack runs to get Noreen and brings her back to the room. As soon as she sees Ma, she calls for a code blue, and nurses and doctors swarm into the room. Jack notices that almost all of Ma’s painkillers are gone from the bottle. “Bad idea,” Jack screams at Ma as a nurse pulls him out of the room.