The Bodyguard

In these chapters, Hannah becomes aware of the differences between her expectations of Jack and his family and the realities that dominate their interactions, recognizing that Jack especially is not the typical Hollywood celebrity she thought him to be. When she meets the other Stapletons, Hannah becomes even more aware of how absurd it is that she, an ordinary woman, is pretending to date a celebrity, despite Jack’s parents seeming to like her immediately because she is different from Jack’s previous famous girlfriends. This comparison becomes especially poignant when Hank and Jack fight about her staying at the ranch. Jack begins to fight back only when Hank refers to her as “some Hollywood bimbo,” arguing that Hannah is “as un-Hollywood as it gets [...] She’s a totally plain, unremarkable person. She’s the epitome of ordinary” (192). While Hannah is at first offended by Jack’s words, she quickly realizes that, to Jack, this is a compliment. After witnessing this altercation, Hannah starts to realize how tired Jack has become of his fame and the ways in which it poisons his life with inauthenticity, for it is quickly brought home to her that despite the professional nature of their relationship, she is one of the few “ordinary” and genuine people in his life. In this way, Center inverts common assumptions about ideas of being famous and being ordinary, complicating even Hannah’s thoughts on the matter. Once Hannah recognizes this dynamic, her manner with Jack and the Stapletons becomes easier, and she realizes that, despite Jack’s celebrity, the Stapletons are an average loving family like the one she always wished to have. For the remainder of the story, she behaves much more sympathetically toward her clients.

Another aspect that allows Hannah to humanize Jack is seeing him in the wilder, less-public environment of his family’s ranch. The ranch itself holds very different symbolic meanings for both Jack and Hannah, but with both characters, Center does make it a point to use the picturesque authenticity of this country setting to illustrate what is real versus what is merely an illusion or a performance. For Hannah, the ranch becomes a place to embrace novelty and authenticity, and after finding out that her best friend and ex-boyfriend are dating, she refers to this assignment as “[a] purge. A cleansing. A new frigging start” (182). In contrast to Hanna’s excitement to be at the ranch, however, Jack is much less thrilled to be back in his family home. While the ranch symbolizes a clean slate for Hannah, for Jack, the ranch is full of memories of his deceased brother and the rift in his family. Yet despite these negative connotations, the ranch also brings out the real side of Jack: the issues from which he had been hiding in North Dakota after his brother’s death. Thus, the sojourn at the ranch forces him to confront his guilt just as it forces Hannah to take a break from the distractions of her work.

In an intensification of this theme, Hannah and Jack’s experience at the nearby Brazos River continues to bring out unconfronted truths that ultimately bring them closer. It is revealed in later chapters that the Brazos is the same river in which Drew drowned and is a place about which Jack has recurring nightmares. These connections to the river bring out Jack’s terror and anxiety when he has to rescue Hannah, and their fight at the riverbank shows her an emotional layer that Jack has previously kept hidden.

Much like these locations, physical objects also play a particularly important role in revealing unknown details about the characters throughout these chapters. In earlier chapters, we see Hannah’s joy at rediscovering the safety pin she meant to give to her mother and how she uses it as a good luck charm. Even so, these earlier feelings are somewhat disproportionate to her panic at losing the safety pin along the river, and the sheer intensity of her reaction to the seemingly insignificant loss foreshadows the pin’s much deeper meaning as a way for Hannah to honor the lost connection with her mother. Her reaction to her loss and Jack’s recognition of its significance shift the tone of the chapter from a bitter argument to a tender moment as he begins to comfort her and shows his growing feelings for Hannah by searching for the safety pin every morning.

Jack’s unusual level of dedication to his search for the safety pin mirrors the sentimentality that he attaches to Drew’s leather necklace, which he never takes off, indicating just how deeply he understands the importance of physical items that serve as reminders of a lost loved one. Though it is not revealed that this necklace was Drew’s until later chapters, the necklace also serves as a practical plot device that triggers the unresolved friction between Jack and Hank when Hank sees him wearing it. Like Drew’s boat, which Jack offers to help Hank fix, Jack’s involvement with anything belonging to Drew elicits nothing but anger and resentment from Hank, and these emotional displays demonstrate just how profoundly Jack’s status within the family has been diminished by the car accident that killed Drew. Thus, both Jack’s necklace and Hannah’s pin serve as physical reminders of their complicated histories and continue to link them together as characters who are struggling to overcome the tragedies of their pasts.