MDIA 1020: Your Harmatia is Showing (25pts)

In my story, a girl fresh out of college and looking for a job must deal with the death of her father and her stepmother after a horrible car accident. Her parents had divorced when she was young leaving her with her mother and her father had gone on to make his own family creating resentment and a rift between him and the protagonist. She now has to come to terms with her confused feelings toward her father while taking in her now orphaned half-brother while the government decides who takes custody over the boy. She had left her hometown to get away from her problems but now memories, feelings and old friends are starting to all rush back into her life.

In this story, the protagonist’s tragic flaw is that she has a tendency to run away from her feelings and avoid the issue. And while she tries to make close connections with people, she some how always manages to put up walls around her. Her past has scared her and as a result has left her with low self-esteem and a need to prove her capable of success and independence. This is her way of making her loneliness into a personal vendetta to show that she doesn't need anyone to be happy.

The turning point comes when her father dies and she has to take in her younger brother. She had only ever been in charge of herself and now she needs to take care of a child who may or may not be taken away from her by the end of the summer. Struggling with the loss of a father she loved but couldn’t open up to, she is back at home after being away an entire year. Now everywhere she goes and everyone she sees brings back old pains and problems. Not to mention that her father’s several attempts to reconnect in the past can be connected to practically every spot in town.

The Anagnorisis in the story is when she realizes that she never let her father in for fear of him leaving again. She goes through an emotional break down as she blames him for doing just that, leaving her again but come to terms with the fact that he never wanted to, then or now. He continually tried to be a part of her life in the past but she was the one who forced him out. This time, he left someone behind, a bit of him that she now sees as a way to redeem her past failures. After an entire summer with her brother, she as learned a lot about their father and about how much the three are alike. She is unwilling to give up her last connection and only sibling.