Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close-- Post 4

Within the next few pages, we learn that Oskar’s father called the house five different times before he died and left messages on the answering machine. Oskar listened to these messages, and in an effort to protect his mom from sadness, he removed the phone and replaced it with the exact same model so that she wouldn’t know. We get to hear one of the messages that his father left. His father said things like, “I just wanted you to know that I’m OK. Everything. Is. Fine. Hopefully the firemen will be. Up here by then. I’ll call.” Just the fact that Oskar listened to the messages that his father left is very scary to me, but the fact that the messages were his father telling them that he loved them and that he was okay is something that I cannot even imagine. Part of me wonders if Oskar’s father would be happy that Oskar hid these messages from his dad or if he would have wanted her to hear them too. Oskar made this decision quickly without really weighing the pros and cons of his decision, but I wonder if he made the right decision by hiding these messages from his mom and not showing them to her. Oskar continues on his journey to find the lock that matches the key that he found as he goes to many different houses and businesses, asking if he can try his key in their lock. I wonder if in the chapters to come, if Oskar will eventually find the lock that he is searching for or if it was for something that was in his dad’s office in the World Trade Center and he will never find it.