Why Is It Wrong To Dump Melinda Unjust?

Melinda isn't speaking to anyone, and no one will talk to her, except the new girl, Heather, who moved from the state of Ohio. Realistically, Heather being the new girl just wants to make friends. Heather doesn't know what is really going on with Melinda because she just moved to town. Heather has no idea what happened the night when Melinda called the police, which busted a summer party. In fact, no one knows, except for Melinda, what happened to her at the party? She is convinced that because she is a victim, no one understands her. The whole world, including her world, is out to get her and so it is best for her to remain silent.

One of MElinda’s ex-friends starts dating the guy who raped her. She sent anonymous letters trying to make her stay away from him. That proves she has grown, and she doesn’t want others to suffer because of him like she did. “I dig my fingers into the dirt and squeeze. A small clean part of me waits to warm and burst through the surface. Some quiet Melinda girl I haven’t seen in months. That is the seed I will care for,” (chapter 86, page 188-189). Melinda is facing her fears. She went to the place where it all happened. She wanted to have peace. She was ready to move on from the situation. The bottle was now open, and her feelings were flying

Melinda debates whether to tell Rachel that her current boyfriend was an assaulter. “I could talk to Rachel. (Yeah, right.) I could say I'd heard bad things about Andy. (It would only make him more attractive.) I could maybe tell her what happened. (As if she'd listen. What if she told Andy? What would he do?) (…) I need to do something about Rachel, something for her. Maya tells me without saying anything. I stall. Rachel will hate me. (She already hates me.) She won't listen. (I have to try.) I groan and rip out a piece of notebook paper. I write her a note, a left-handed note, so she won't know it's from me.” (151-152). Melinda finally confronts Rachel and tells her what exactly happened to her, but Rachel did not believe Melinda as she really liked Andy. Rachel apologizes to Melinda when she realizes when Andy attacks Melinda again because he got to know what she told Rachel. Melinda was brave even though she was unexpectedly attacked by Andy for the second time. This time, she fought back before Andy could do anything that was seriously harmful to her and she threatened to stab him with a piece of sharp broken glass. This shows us how Melinda developed from a scared girl to a person who threatened to kill her

On page 188, something in Melinda takes her to the barn where she was raped. She must be very courageous to do this, anyone would have to be brave to. When she is there she realizes that none of this was her fault, she survived, and she is still here. She realizes that something inside of her is still good, she starts to forgive herself. She somehow finds that little part inside of her that is happy, and she lets it grow. “Some quiet Melindagirl I haven’t seen in months. That is the seed I will care for.”(Anderson 188-189). She has the courage to go back there, and forgive

They first met at an end of the year party. At the time, she was entering ninth grade and this was her first high school party. He met up with Melinda after she had a few drinks not long after they encountered they left the party to have a little fun of there own. Melinda feels like she is worthless and not needed. She wasn't able tell him to stop, "’I thought it was a little rude, but my tongue was thick with beer and I couldn't figure out how to tell him to slow down’" (134). Andy raped Melinda and that was only the beginning. He makes her life miserable. All she thinks about is Andy and how he wouldn’t stop. Her influences her life in ways that are not positive. He has her shut out of the world because she doesn’t want to be noticed by anyone. Melinda

Although she did have one friend, Heather, who came over to her house a few times. Her mother’s first reaction to seeing Heather at the house expressed that she realized that Melinda and her best friend Rachel weren’t friends anymore, but didn’t proceed to convey why. Instead of asking what had happened between the two of them, she just implied that “it was about time she saw a friend of Melinda’s come over” (indirect quote in Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, 15.5). Consequently, this lack of interest to know what had happened between the two friends showed obvious uninvolvement and unimportance creating an emotional

Melinda and her friends decorated their rooms to show who they were, Melinda stole a little bit from everyone else. The only part that is really her is a stuffed rabbit collection from when she was younger. You can see that Melinda doesn't know who she is. "My stuffed rabbits crawl out of their burrows,noses awiggling, pink bunny, purple bunny, a gingham bunny from my grandma, all excited to have company"(177). She obviously doesn't usually get company because her stuffed rabbits are excited to see Heather,even after she dumped Melinda. Melinda is lonely and this just adds to her feelings of helplessness.

Another indication of Melinda’s self-destructive behavior is her loss of concentration. This can proven by Melinda’s declining grades which started off as “Playing Nice- B, Social Studies- C, Spanish-C, Art- A, Lunch- D, Biology-B, Algebra-C+, Clothes-C, English-C , Gym-C+.” After, her grades ended at, “Social Life-F, Social Studies-F, Spanish-D, Art-A, Lunch-D, Biology-D+, Algebra-F, Clothes-F, English-D+, Gym-D.” these quotes demonstrate that Melinda puts little effort into her work, meaning she is distracted and that her school isn’t her main priority. Certainly, her distracted behavior is because she is constantly rewinding the memories of what happened to her; she unable to get this out of her head. Seen from the evidence it is good to say Melinda is having difficulty stay focused. In addition, Melinda has found numerous ways to isolate herself from others. Throughout the book, Melinda takes us to her place of choice, being the abandoned janitor’s closet at her

The days are suddenly shorter, and chirpy colors have faded to darker shades without notice. Trees begin to lose their leaves, and they helplessly detach from their branches and plummet to the cold ground. This season is not anything like the previous season, like Melinda is no longer the happy-go-lucky child she was. Similar to a leaf that has been dropped and forgotten, everyone has renounced a Melinda growing isolated and withdrawn. Anderson writes, “Her [Rachel’s] eyes meet mine for a second. ‘I hate you,’ she mouths silently. She turns her back on me and laughs with her friends” (Anderson 5). Rachel does not bother to interrogate Melinda on why she called the authorities or stick up for her, which displays how Melinda’s supposed best friend does not truly care about her. This action lays the foundation of betrayal has causes Melinda feel alone and abandoned. It is later revealed through her thoughts that this is exactly what she believes, that “all that crap you hear on TV about communication and expressing feelings is a lie. Nobody really wants to hear what you have to say” (Anderson 9). This dreary kind of thinking adds onto the notion that Melinda has to deal with her troubles all on her

In Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson, Melinda Sordino experiences something that is almost impossible to forget: rape. After sexually assaulted by a senior as an 8th grader, the one thing she needs, someone to talk to, becomes absent in her life when all of her friends leave her. Many other turning points occur during the story that change and affect her identity. The major turning points that affect her identity are being raped in a field at a party, being attacked again in a closet at her school, and everyone finding out the truth about what happened in the end.

Andy found her closet and he went to visit her on one of the last days of school. “No. a sound explodes from me. NNNOOO!!!”(194). Andy tried once more to rape her. Melinda wouldn’t let him overwhelm her. Melinda said no, as she started to speak again to more people she said no to the one person she hated most. If melinda had not made noise and broken the glass he might have done it again. She finally got the courage to fight and stand up to Andy. Melinda may have let him rape her again but talking to Rachel increased melindas courage to stand up to Andy and others in the

Melinda not opening up and speaking out really has an effect on her friendships, because she is

Him always doing this to her has helped her talk more, and be able to talk to her dad and mom without it being so weird for her. It has also helped because Melinda started to warn more people about Andy, by writing the bad things he does on the bathroom stalls, then she was supprised when she found out that she was not the only one that feels the same way about him. And even though they are not friends anymore, Andy has made Melinda want to help her old friend Rachel, because she started dating him and is going to go to the prom with him. BUT Rachel did not believe that what Melinda was saying is true, because she thought she is just upset that he dident ask her to go instead of

Just before school ended, she started communicating with her lab partner and friend, David Petrakis. She also met Ivy, a kind girl in her art class. As Melinda finally met people that she felt comfortable and happy around, she gained confidence. Her teachers and parents were pleased to discover that this also improved Melinda’s attendance and grades. Melinda finally opened her mind enough to think through the events of the party. She had blamed herself the whole time, just like the rest of the school. As Andy pointed out, Melinda never explicitly told him, “ no” during her rape. She thought it was wimpy that she called the cops. She let her friends and peers convince her that she was an idiot and a wimp. Melinda eventually allowed herself to figure out that she was a victim. She never gave permission to Andy, and she was right to call the police because she was in pain and in danger. Once Melinda opened up and let herself and others in, she was able to defend herself. Melinda proved her confidence and power when she told Andy, “No!” when he tried to attack her in her closet. With Melinda’s new found confidence, she was able to drastically improve her life and save herself from her

The main character Melinda, is a character that I have underestimated in the beginning. Melinda is not completely mute, therefore occasionally will talk to some classmates. Before the trauma was revealed, I’ve always believed she was exaggerating small things. Melinda holds a strange power throughout the novel, which makes me wonder whether to pity her or not. Melinda doesn’t try to get what she wants, however acts like she wants to