One theme emerging from the short story “Ashes” by Susan Beth Pfeffer is manipulation is evil. After five years of the mother and father being together they had a baby named Ashleigh or Ashes. Then two years later they got a divorce and split up. The father only has Ashes on certain days and when he does have her, he’s not really a father. He always picks up ashes late from school and makes compliments like you're one in a million, or you're just like your mother to make up for it. But he really give her those compliments because he wants to get her to steal $200 from her mother because he is in a desperate need of money. He manipulates her by taking her out to a brand new restaurant, even though he can’t afford it. And saying the money will be back by thursday or friday by the latest, and giving. He tells Ashes that if she does this they would be set for life and telling the little girl that he can afford it. This is significant because it shows that evil can come from manipulation.
In this scene Pfeffer uses long and short sentences and descriptive language very well to show how manipulation the dad is to his daughter. The dad need money from his divorced wife and he wants Ashes to steal it for him. “It’s me she’d be angry at,’ dad said. ‘Which is why she’ll …show more content…
She is nervous and put into a bad situation because of her father. “What should I do? I looked out the window and saw only ash-gray sky. In the cold stillness of the night, I could hear my father's car keening in the distance. ‘Your one in a million,’ it cried.” This clearly shows that Ashes is catching up to everything and finally seeing what her father is doing to her, Although we don't know the ending we can kind of see that Ashes is turning on her father and doesn't know what to do. It seems as if the car was a sign that he has done this to a million people and he is “one in the million” if we take the quote