
A Goodreads user
asked:
I don't understand how Dannie could mistake grief for love. She'd experience it before with her brother, hadn't she?
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In Five Years,
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Lisa
No but she wasn't 12 years old when she had the vision, and she completely perceived it as love. I also thought that was a stretch. Yes, true that she didn't have all of the context about Bella's illness, death, etc., but I don't know. In my experience, that giddy feeling of new love or new passion feels absolutely nothing like acute grief.
Dale Rosenberg
True, and she was completely torn apart by her brother's death. But she was also 12 years old so the idea of sex as a life-affirming gesture (which I believe is what happened between her and Aaron) was not something that was likely to happen then.
In the "real" time of 2025 she doesn't mistake grief for love. She knows what's happening - they both do. And as she says they set a boundary afterwards - they'll have lunch weekly but they aren't going to be lovers. When she "mistakes" it it's in her dream or premonition. She has one hour of December 2025 and none of the context. She doesn't know Bella is dead; she doesn't know Aaron was Bella's boyfriend; she doesn't know she broke up with David. So she has sex with Aaron and knows she's feeling something really strong and really different, but she doesn't know why. When it all happens "again" in real life, she has the context to understand it.
In the "real" time of 2025 she doesn't mistake grief for love. She knows what's happening - they both do. And as she says they set a boundary afterwards - they'll have lunch weekly but they aren't going to be lovers. When she "mistakes" it it's in her dream or premonition. She has one hour of December 2025 and none of the context. She doesn't know Bella is dead; she doesn't know Aaron was Bella's boyfriend; she doesn't know she broke up with David. So she has sex with Aaron and knows she's feeling something really strong and really different, but she doesn't know why. When it all happens "again" in real life, she has the context to understand it.
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