This article contains spoilers for The Summer I Turned Pretty season 2.
It feels like summer has finally arrived as Cousins Beach officially invites us back for a second season of The Summer I Turned Pretty, and love is at the forefront of everyone’s minds. From love triangles to love affairs — there’s romance on the horizon, but another heartbreaking idea is taking place, too; the idea of lost love.
While one way lost love will transpire has a lot to do with that love triangle, another is in the way that all of our favorite characters will be experiencing the first chapter of their lives without the most important person to them: Susannah Fisher.
Talking about her in the past tense still seems impossible to fathom, and we’re big book lovers here, so we knew her fate before the series debuted. Of course, we were hoping against hope that she would survive somehow; that a television miracle might make the clinical trial work, that she would survive because of the love from those around her, and the love that grew and held her together in her darkest moments.
Alas, teaser trailers proved that our hopes were in vain and that season 2 would heavily involve the loss of Susannah, creating a heartbreaking future for each character in their own way.
Susannah was like poetry in motion; everything from how she seemed to float through a room to how eloquently she spoke made her feel like the kind of magic you could reach out and grab if you were lucky enough.
The Fisher and Conklin families were lucky enough, and as viewers, we were too. We got to see Susannah’s magic up close and personal, but no one felt it more than her best friend and soul sister, the love of her life in friendship form — Laurel.
Laurel and Conrad were the only two people who knew about Susannah’s cancer returning during the most epic summer of Belly’s life, and they weren’t aware that the other knew, so both characters carried immense grief with them as the episodes continued; all of it is coming to a head during an essential night. Susannah promised to try a clinical trial at the urging of Conrad and Jeremiah.
As season 2 kicked off, we were reminded that the trial didn’t work and Susannah passed, but we were given insight into the fact that she did get more time with them, and that’s all anyone who loved her could have asked for more time.
Han’s books don’t detail treatment or the trial, and it appears that the series might follow suit, sans a few details that the boys share and that audiences see.
In December, when Belly and Conrad sneak to the beach house for one of the most beloved scenes in The Summer I Turned Pretty‘s story, Conrad is full of hope and light, remarking that Susannah is doing really well.
Conrad tells Belly that his doctors are changing up his mom’s medication around prom, and while she says it might be a positive thing, he’s not so convinced. Belly says, looking back, she started to lose Conrad then, and it’s evident that it had a lot to do with Susannah’s health.
Prom and graduation usually happen pretty close together. As Laurel took prom photos of Belly, Conrad, and the rest of the group, we heard Susannah asking for specific pictures via a video call. Sometime between that moment and Steven’s big graduation ceremony and valedictorian speech, Susannah passed, and the bonds between the families were changed forever.
Another moment in season 2 lends more information about Susannah’s passing: Jeremiah cries to Belly, telling her it all happened so fast. The woman who raised him was there one moment, and she was gone the next, shaking the very ground they all stood on.
Susannah valiantly fought breast cancer not just once but twice, and while she ultimately passed away from the disease, the magic within her exists in the hearts of those she loved the most. The hope she had for the future lives in the dreams of those she leaves behind, and as season 2 progresses, we find her in memories, flashbacks, and moments that the characters share, proving that those we love never really leave us.
You can see the first three episodes of The Summer I Turned Pretty streaming on Prime Video now, and may we all feel and then share a bit of the magic Susannah had; the world would be a better place for it.
