Lydia Lee

"Lydia is dead." This is the first line of Celeste Ng's novel, Everything I Never Told You. From this one line we assume that we will learn only about her life and how she was murdered. The twist is that we never get to know who Lydia could have been. Her life was molded by the expectations of her mother and father, Marilyn and James. Her life was not her own.

Before Hannah, Lydia's younger sister, was born Marilyn decided to runaway to pursue her dream of becoming a doctor. She left Lydia and Nath behind to wonder what could have happened to their mother. When she was not able to complete her studies she decided she would live through Lydia. "It was a sign, Marylin decided. For her it was too late. But it wasn't too late for Lydia. Marilyn would not be like her own mother, shunting her daughter toward husband and house, a life spent safely behind a deadbolt (Ng 147)." Lydia would have all the support to become a doctor and not become the stereotypical housewife that Marylin's mother wanted her to become.

This kind of emotional trauma led Lydia to promise to do everything her mother told her to do because she was convinced this was the only way she would stay. Marilyn would quiz Lydia every day with random math questions and read her books such as Why There Is Weather and Fun with Chemistry. Lydia at a young age knew in what direction her mother was pushing her in. The answer for Lydia's future was a) doctor, b) doctor, or c) doctor. Marilyn and James also tried to manage Lydia's social life. Marilyn wanted Lydia to be just like her, perfect and popular. She gave Lydia diaries in which to keep her "secrets" in, but she never wrote in them. There was no evidence of Lydia's own life. She only wrote one word in a journal the year her mother disappeared, "gone." She wasn't given the opportunity to develop into being her own person. James would buy Lydia clothes right off the mannequin. If he saw girls Lydia's age dressing a certain way or wearing the same kind of jewelry, he would buy it for Lydia. They didn't understand Lydia at all, but tried to make her into a generic everyday girl. Lydia had to continue this charade because she was, "the reluctant center of their universe- every day, she held the world together. She absorbed her parents' dreams, quieting the reluctance that bubbled up within (Ng 160)."

When the police are interviewing all the members of the Lee family they doubt every answer they give. Was Lydia a lonely girl? Does Lydia have a boyfriend? Was she sad? Marilyn and James came to realize that her daughter was not living the life that she said she was. "She will find out everything she doesn't know. She will keep searching until she understands how this could have happened, until she understands her daughter completely (Ng 120)." Marilyn knew nothing about her daughter. She only knew that she would be taking advance classes, getting straight A's, and becoming a doctor. Marilyn only knew about Marilyn, Marilyn's dreams and goals.