How It All Goes Down
Alive and Alone
- After six and a half months, Mr. Black quits the search.
- Oskar goes to Grandma's apartment, but Grandma isn't there.
- It's the first time Oskar's been in her apartment without her. He snoops around, and finds a drawer full of empty envelopes, some addressed "to my unborn child" others "to my child."
- He hears a sound from the guest room and realizes it's the renter. He's real!
- He's a strange old man named Thomas (like Oskar's dad) who doesn't speak.
- (We know what Oskar doesn't: that this man is his grandfather.)
- Oskar decides to tell the man his whole story, from the beginning, starting with the broken vase…
- We learn about a few more Blacks – Fo Black, Georgia Black, Ray Black – but things get really interesting when we get to Ruth Black.
- Her address is the observation deck of the Empire State Building.
- Even though Oskar is super scared to go up that high, he does it.
- He enjoys the view through the binoculars, but has no idea who Ruth might be.
- As he and Mr. Black are about to leave, they notice a woman with a clipboard. Oskar asks her name. It's Ruth (hooray!) and she gives them a tour and some history about the Empire State Building.
- Mr. Black is smitten!
- Ruth confesses that she lives in the building, in a storage room, ever since her husband died.
- Mr. Black says that's fine. They can spend an afternoon up in the clouds.
- When they get home, Mr. Black says he's done searching with Oskar, and Oskar runs over to Grandma's apartment, bringing us back to where we were before the flashback.
- Then he decides to share one more thing with the renter: the messages his Dad left on the phone.
- He runs home and gets the phone and brings it back to play them.
- Oskar tells the renter that he just wants to know how his Dad died, so he can stop inventing how he died.
- He even wonders if his Dad might be the man in the video of a man falling from the building that he found online.
- Oskar takes a photo of the old man's hands—with the YES and NO tattoos—and goes back home.
- The renter gives him a note, asking him not to tell his grandmother that they met. Oskar agrees, and the old man says to throw pebbles at the window if he ever needs him.
- That night, Oskar has an idea: he wants to dig up his Dad's coffin.