My Thoughts on Chapter 24:

Oh my God!! How cruel can you get? She broke up with him because of those reasons!! Those weren't even reasons for a break up. She was just being a cruel b*tch. >:-(

She practically incapacitated him in high school and college. Then she just shows up suddenly like nothing ever happened.

Read it people...

That's true, but I think another reason why she wants to leave is that the three characters are starting to get too close for comfort. I've been in relationships before, and I can totally relate to the fact that intimacy is a difficult thing. Whenever I get too close -- whether it is with the opposite sex, or with a mentor who is teaching me -- the tendency to want to pull away gets really strong. It's so much easier to maintain a certain lonely autonomy, especially if one tends to work/think with a great deal of meditative contemplation.

The closest thing I can imagine that is similar is one's state of mind before marriage. Many questions can move a person away -- will I be successful? will I meet expectations? am I being too selfish? is my partner/mentor happy with me?

Doubts and questions like this are tortuous to experience. Loneliness is much easier because expectations are clearer, and the future is so much more easier to predict. Being sure about sadness is easier than the anxiety of not knowing if one will become very happy or sad.

Yeah, i agree it was very cruel. I read baby leaf though and it was so evil, i felt very sad. I wanted them to make up and get togethar in honeymoon salad.. looks like i was hoping for too much.

[img]http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2777/4207527145_31aa2e1471_m.jpg[/img]

It amazed me that he could still talk to her after that given his tendency to distance himself from things and people that hurt him. Not only that, he actually went to get her back when she moved out. Maybe he had already distanced himself from her when he got hurt so it didn't affect him as much when he learned the truth.

Just too cruel.