Okay I might be showing my biases here but Stebbins’ “Oh Garraty” and Olson’s “I did it all wrong” hurt me in the same way </3
Just filled with so much regret and ache from everything they’ve gone through. and the fact Ray had turned to Stebbins to tell him he was going to give up only for Stebbins to reach out and die in Ray’s arms like. Did he feel himself dying and realised that even if he had “won” it would be just barely and that he’d die anyways. No money, no wish? That he can’t even beat Ray who’s just abt ready to give up.
Ough
First of all, I need y'all to know that I'm v e r y normal about " Oh Garraty " ( or about both of those quotes, really), and I can definitely be trusted with Bookbins' death scene in particular </3 ( genuinely though, I actually l o v e this ask)
Also, I agree that there's a similar pain to both quotes, actually </3 It's almost a little wild that both of those quotes a r e rather short, and almost seem a little " simple " at first ( although I feel like the latter is actually part of the reason w h d they hit as hard as they do, at least for me), yet there's still a whole lot to both of them ( and both of them more or less emphasise the point where both characters reached their ultimate limit/ breaking point, which they themselves realise too. There's just. So much despair/ defeat, and exhaustion to them, along with s o m e sort of terror, that comes with the realisation that this" is it".
There's also the way there w a s probably quite a lot to regret for both of them towards the end, when they eventually realised that they won't be able to make it despite it all🫠 there's actually something particularly cruel about the way both of their death scenes seemed to" drag on" quite a bit in the novel, with the way Hank wasn't immediatly killed by the soldiers/ kept o struggling for a while, while Bookbins literally walked himself to death. Both of them might've had just enough time to realise their failure/ the way they " went wrong", and to realise that there's nothing that can be done about it anymore now.
I feel like this is also a part of the reason why Stebbins' death scene from the novel seems more cruel to me than the one in the movie ( along with the fact that the boy literally ended up walking himself to death, which seems like such unnecessary suffering to me, in a way. I'm not too sure about how aware he was of both, his mental a n d physical pain in the end, considering that there probably would've been a point where everything would've started to just feel " numb", however. He probably still felt a l o t of it/ of the way his body slowly began to fail him up until he actually got to that point, which is something I cannot think about for too long, because it pains me too much 🫠)
The fact that Bookbins basically died clinging to Ray/ basically in Ray's arms will always be i n s a n e work to me, actually </3 also insane work, that this happens after they basically had a little " fallout" im relation to their dynamic after Pete's death, and the both spent their last few miles completely on their own again, up until this point, only for Stebbins to still reachh out for Ray/ pretty much the only person who was somewhat close to him on the walk, and who could've been considered as something sinilar to a friend ( only a little more complicated) to him, in his dying moments. And for Ray to still bother to check wether he is still alive/ breathing, shortly afterwards. Something that pains me quite a bit is the a lot though, is the fact that said fallout I mentioned before, is actually their last " real" conversation. They never really get to talk again afterwards, because Stebbins is literally on the verge of death, the next time Ray's about to go approach him.
Also- there has always been something almost jarring to me about the way he his facade falls completely apart at the end, and in a way, fails him in the same way his nody falls him. He ends up crying out for, and clinging to Ray, aka reaching for some last type of comfort during his last few moments. It's just such a sudden contrast to his detached/ mostly collected behaviour throughout most of the book, and it basically feels like a final emphasis of the fact that this isn't some emotionless robot, but just. You know. A scared/ dying 17 year old, at the end.
And yes </3 there's something so ironic about the way things turn out in thecend. Because there's this scene shortly after Pete's death , where Stebbins' comment spites Ray into continuing the walk, after he told the former how he'll " walk him into the ground ", only for him to only finally get to win, when saud spite gas long worn out, and he himself has reached a point where he was ready to give up, and actually let Stebbins win ( only for Stebbins to literally drop dead, just when Ray was about to approach him again🫠)
There's just something about the way the idea of " walking Stebbins down" kept him going for quote a while/ seemed to be something he thought of as this big " finale ", in a way- and then it wasn't.
There's also something about the way Stebbins was pretty much determined to outlast Ray too, in the end, only for him to literally die when he would've technically achieved it. There's also the fact, that he literally lost not only to aomeone who was way less prepared than him/ who barely understood anything aboit the walk, while he understood too much ( yet, not as much as he himself would've liked to believe), but also. To the o n e person he actually had a connection with. Raybins' dynamic i s rather complex, however, Ray was still the one person who was some sort of companion/ friend to him, on the walk. I'm not too sure about how lucid Bookbins was, towards the end, and therefore, how much he would've been able to reflect on all that, however. I always wondered wether this might've felt particularly bitter/ like some type of betrayal, to him ( despite the fact that I like to believethat there was a l s o some sort of comfort about the way said person was the one who was around for his last few moments). Not too sure about how aware Bookbins was of anything anymore either, at the end of the novel, and I feel a little inclined to believe that he perhaps didn't even fully realise that he was d y i n g, but just that something felt. Very, very wrong, if that makes sense.
This turned out pretty long again, I'm sorry😭 also, I hope this was somewhat coherent, since I wrote it rather early in the morning today </3
