Study Guide

Dancing on the Edge Chapter 24

By Han Nolan

Chapter 24

Miracle and Casey go to therapy with Dr. DeAngelis. Casey tries to get Miracle to sit on the sofa with her, but Miracle refuses because she can't tell what color it is. This gives them an opening to talk about Gigi and the knowledge of colors she forced on Miracle.
They also talk about Miracle's fear of the wig heads and Dr. DeAngelis gets some information out of her about why she was so afraid of them. To Miracle, they didn't have faces or identities and were dead—which is exactly how she feels.
Out of nowhere, Miracle remembers what Granddaddy Opal said to her at his house about how if her mother was dead when she was born, then she never existed. Casey begins to cry, knowing she's talking about the accident.
Casey revisits the account of the accident with Dr. DeAngelis, who suggests that it's possible that Miracle's mother actually walked out in front of the ambulance on purpose. Casey refuses to consider this, but Dr. DeAngelis says that sometimes, suicide runs in families as a natural response to depression.
Aunt Casey tells him that she and Gigi made a pact that they would make Miracle's birth into something good rather than focus on the bad of her mother's death. Dr. DeAngelis says that sometimes, the thing you try to keep from children is the thing they end up doing.