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‘hullo’ or ‘pass the salt’ at dinner. Dad acted like he wasn’t there and it made Luke feel funny and insubstantial, as if perhaps he wasn’t there.
It made him walk in a different way when he was inside the house, treading lightly, as if he had no right to be there. Perhaps he wouldn’t
be there soon; if Stringer chucked him out perhaps Dad would chuck him out as well. He might 43.
His parents’ pretence on his non-existence is getting clearer due to the feeling of worry and distrust he gets from his mum when Luke is trying to take Naomi to go
with him 154. He feels so meaningless as he can sense his being unable to make his parents happy as well 163.
Having such negative self-esteem does not only build the figure of Luke as being inferior, it somehow brings up several indefinable feelings within,
such as fear, doubt, and anxiety. As a consequence, those paranoid feelings are often mixed in Luke’s head, flow together frustrating his mind.
“He could simply be anxious. Anxiety can do that to you, paralyze your mind, make it difficult to work properly. Haven’t you ever felt so
worried about something that you can’t concentrate, can’t think straight?” 103
Luke’s being anxious is again shown as he is waiting for the coming of night train 167. However, what makes him mostly worried is Stringer’s threat
of his being expelled from school, particularly his parents’ reaction towards it. 19, 77. A stab of panic due to the letter of expulsion seems extremely frighten
him thus. Luke still couldn’t stop worrying. He couldn’t figure out if Stringer
really did mean to expel him or if he was only bullshitting, like Caro said. Luke couldn’t be sure, either way; and not knowing was almost
as bad as having the thing happen; the uncertainty made you feel like
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you were walking through tricky undergrowth, holding your breath so tight your chest hurt, waiting for a trap to spring 88-89.
At any rate, such anxiety has given another impact towards Luke’s personality likewise. He is on doubt about himself in some ways. In terms of
intelligence, Luke is not quite sure about his being smart in the past, considering the school problems he is facing 10.
Had he been fooling himself? Had he really been clever when he was in Primary School and later on, at Riversdale? Or had the work just
been easy, kiddy stuff that anyone could do? Even his poetry – couldn’t that have been some kind of fluke? Because if he’d really
been good he’d have been able to do those poems for the Writing Folder. No matter how nervous he was about exams and stuff, he’d
have been able to manage if he was any good 138.
His hesitancy thus goes on Luke’s being skeptical of the night train. He wonders whether the sound of the night train he used to hear in the middle of the night
does really exist or merely on his imagination 125, 164.
3. Self-Estrangement
As pointed out in the characteristics part formerly, Luke is a type of an introvert person, as the specific trait for being a loner instead. Generally speaking,
an introvert person tends to lock himself out of his society, as if he is living on his own world. This claim is thus supported by the theory of personality proposed by
Carl Jung as follows: There are two major personality orientations a person might have:
First is introversion, in which the person withdraws interest from the external world and consequently is quiet, reserved, and cautious.
Second is extraversion, in which the person primarily oriented to the
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external world and thus is outgoing, sociable, and excitement seeking 413.
From the theory presented above, Luke can be classified into those who posses the first type of personality, which is introversion. Apparently, his
being introvert is reflected from the sense of loneliness found in the deep character within, whereby Luke keeps such chronic state of disappointment and
estrangement. “Loneliness occurs at those times when one has a feeling of desolation, of isolation, of being cut off and estranged” Parsons 119-123.
However, this circumstance does not merely bring about a change into the usual pattern Luke is managed to socialize, but also to his further personality
as having such feelings of unwanted, unvalued, and unloved by all. As Parsons straightened out in his book, being cut off from their parents and socially isolated
from peers with no close friends, the youth feel totally abandoned and doomed to continue their pained existence in isolation 134.
The lack of social relation Luke experiences in going through his severe life is apparently described by his being reclusive from others. The
reluctance inclines to appear in the sense of silence while he is walking down with Ms Brennan. He walked beside her because she’d asked him and he’d been
too polite to refuse, but it was like walking with a balloon that bobbed and tugged at its string, longing to get away into the sky 110.
Luke is not even able to hide his fondness of solitude, keeping himself away from the crowd. The moment when he half-heartedly skins out from home
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all of a sudden without knowing where to go rushes his mind to feel like being the only person left in the world 139.
4. Changing of Attitude
The problems Luke mostly encounters at home and school put himself on such deep pressures, which eventually distract his psychological life as a
whole. The effects grow much further along with the changing of attitude the boy experiences.
Having such negative self-esteem and being burdened by the pressures out of him, Luke is on his effort to find a sort of acknowledgement from his
society, namely social acceptance. According to Parsons, in addition to acceptance, the adolescent needs to feel “prized” and valued, and quite often they
bring to an interpersonal encounter feeling of negative worth and minimal self- esteem 17.
Since Luke sees himself as valued, prized and respected only under the conditions of fulfilling others’ expectations, in this case is his parents and
teachers; he becomes rebellious then, trying to fight against the authority at which they put those expectations.
It is firstly shown from the way he forcefully enters The Hamiltons’ house for an uncertain reason 9. And as a result, Luke has to drag himself into
the consequences he never expects for; Mr. Stringer accuses him of being a trouble-maker, skipping a class and trespassing on private property 18. His
