They Forget Your Name, You Lose Your Status
From “The Specialist’s Hat,” by Kelly Link:
It is hard to tell how old she is — at first they thought she must be a grownup, but now she hardly looks older than them. Samantha has forgotten the babysitter’s name.
…
Mr. Coeslak won’t stay in the house after dark, but he agreed to find someone to look after Samantha and Claire. Then their father couldn’t find Mr. Coeslak, but the babysitter showed up precisely at seven o’clock. The babysitter, whose name neither twin quite caught, wears a blue cotton dress with short floaty sleeves. Both Samantha and Claire think she is pretty in an old-fashioned sort of way.
In Kelly Link’s short story, “The Specialist’s Hat,” you experience the world through the lens of two girls, Samantha and Claire. Although the third-person narrator reveals the action, how you feel about the girls’ situation extends directly from the experience the girls have in their world. You explore what they choose to explore, and you ignore what they choose to ignore.
You walk and run with the girls; you play games with them. It’s clear that they are the primary characters in the story.
Link uses this lead-and-follow to her advantage. It helps her build the secondary characters as well. In particular, she uses the girls’ attention to remove one key aspect of the babysitter character: her name.
Samantha and Claire tell you the babysitter is a girl not much older than them. You learn from the narrator that the babysitter is punctual and responsible. In parts of the story not shown in this selection, you learn that the babysitter plays card games with the girls and is fun and allows the girls to be a little mischievous.
What you never learn, however, is her name. Samantha and Claire have decided it’s not necessary for you to know. Perhaps they forgot it or never heard it. This effect— of having the name omission come from the viewpoint of those two characters — presents a different look at the babysitter than what otherwise would have been if you were simply never presented the topic of her name at all.
It lowers the importance of the babysitter character, but only a minimal amount. The babysitter has a name and is important enough to carry one. Perhaps Link even had one in mind when she was writing the story. Yet for this point in the babysitter’s life — her time with the girls — she becomes a background character. Her traits of caring and responsibility are enough to get her through this day.
It enhances the personality of each of the girls. They forgot the babysitter’s name together, so they are of a similar mind. They may be seen as flighty for not having paid attention to the name of their caretaker. You could also say their lack of memory here cements their personalities as 10-year-old girls. They care about themselves most of all and don’t have time to deeply consider anyone else.
These effects carry throughout the story. The development of Samantha and Claire’s personalities (or personality) informs how you expect them to act in the timeline of “The Specialist’s Hat.” Meanwhile, the downplaying of the babysitter has you underestimate her importance and capability. So as the girls grow in their self-centeredness and the babysitter stays downgraded in their eyes, you approach each new situation with the expectation that the girls will take the lead. If they don’t, it was their own mind that betrayed them, and betrayed you.