I am posting this from my blackberry while I am vacationing (?) in Russia, so forgive any errors in typing.

Something that I’ve always found confusing is the character of Ben Hobart. When he and his family move in, he and Mallory begin dating and it is so cute! He has red hair and glasses too! Plus an accent, which is always hot, even when it is rendered annoyingly on the page and the speech includes words people only use in the copy for menus for Outback Steakhouse. Mallory and Ben do four basic things together: library, movies, school dances, eating Ben’s mom homemade cake (jealous!). He doesn’t seem to be a Chin-Tipper like Quint, which is a good thing. Sure, he does seem to show his Logan-y dark side occasionally–witness the fights over caroling and the proper way to use the library card catalog–but he is only eleven, after all. Ben and Mal’s relationship chugs along in its innocent sixth grade way for quite some time.

But then. Something totally weird happens. Ben stops being mentioned in chapter two as Mal’s boyfriend. He starts being mentioned not as an equal and paramour to a BSC member, but begins to be treated as a charge. Witness the bathing cap contest at the country club, which Ben enters and Mal judges. There is no mention of their history at all. You’d think someone would cry foul–totally a conflict of interest. Worse still is that he is just lumped in with the clients, like he hasn’t turned the magical age of eleven. Did Ben perhaps sustain a head injury which reversed the effects of the Age of Maturity?

When Mal has her “spaz girl” issues, it’s mentioned that Ben tried to reach out to her and she pushed him away. Yet Ben had been relegated to attending BSC events as a charge before that ever happened. The answer to the question, “What happened to Ben Hobart?” will never be truly answered.