Never Let Me Go - Part 3 - Ruth Reformed

I'm not really sure what to write for this one. The end of this book was just so sad that I think it stands out, overshadowing the rest of the story. I can hardly remember how Part 3 starts, and nothing seems as significant as the final few chapters.

I suppose I should start by saying what happens to Kathy after she leaves the Cottages. She becomes a carer, and the life seems very solitary, so lonely: she drives around from place to place, sleeping in bedsits and looking after donors. She talks about how it feels when one "completes" (they don't call it dying, which makes them sound subhuman: as though they're merely machines built for a task that they must complete), how you feel guilty and yet relieved that their suffering is over.

Ishiguro lets us aclimatise to this new way of life, and in a way new narrative style, as Kathy doesn't talk directly to us as she did before, and the tone is a lot more subdued and quiet than during Parts 1 and 2. A few years after she left she meets Ruth who has just done her second donation and is not doing so well for it. This is the bit where I started to warm to her. She still had a little of the stubborness that used to annoy me, but she - like the narrative - was very subdued, very meek. The two seem to have got over their differences that distanced them at the Cottages, and they reminisce about their years together. They decide to take a trip to a boat that had appeared in the middle of a field (yeah I found that weird too) and of course, Tommy just happens to be situated near there too.

The trip they take, and their meeting with Tommy really highlights how things have changed - or rather not - between the three of them. Maybe it's because of Ruth's new, quiet, almost submissive manner, but now it seems that she, rather than Tommy and Kathy, is the odd one out. Those two have some kind of easy relationship that instantly brings them together again, whereas she struggles to participate and becomes almost a 'third wheel'. On the way back though, she shows exactly why she has been so quiet. She begs Kathy to forgive her. I initially thought it would just be for her being domineering, but then she reveals that it should have been Kathy and Tommy together from the start (I KNEW IT!!), that those two made more sense than she and Tommy ever did, and that she deliberately tried to keep them apart. Ouch. That was spiteful. Anyway, she begs them to try now, even though she knows it's nearly too late (Tommy's had his third donation, and people don't often last much mre than four), but she believes that if they apply for a deferral, like those rumours said, they will get to stay together for longer.

I was torn between great happiness for Kathy and Tommy, who I've been rooting for since the beginning, and sadness, because Ruth (even though I don't like her) is obviously full of regret and pain at what she did. She's dying slowly and painfully and this is her one last chance of righting the wrongs she did throughout their relationship. I also thought it was interesting reading Kathy's reaction. Before now we are never told by Kathy her feelings towards Tommy: almost as though they're irrelevant. I've said before that in many ways she distances herself from us, and this is evidence. We only know for certain now that she has felt this way for years. Maybe she didn't know herself, maybe she only just understands now, but the point is that although she seems to draw us into her confidence, we don't really know her deepest feelings until near the end.

Ok so there is so much to talk about in the next section that I've decided to do it as a separate post, because otherwise this one will be insanely long, and I've already talked enough today. So I'll probs do it tomorrow, but until then byyyyyyye!