Carys Last

Quick Facts

• Role: Estranged twin of Aled; secret muse for Universe City; runaway who reinvents herself as “February”
• First appearance: In Frances’s memories and neighborhood lore; on-page reentry when Frances finds her at the National Theatre in London
• Key relationships: Aled Last (twin), Carol Last (mother), Frances Janvier (former friend/crush), Daniel Jun (Aled’s friend)
• Aliases: February; February Friday (within Universe City)

Who They Are

Bold, wounded, and incandescent in her absence, Carys Last is the book’s quiet center of gravity. Though offstage for much of the novel, she shapes the plot as the unspoken addressee of Aled’s Universe City—a living absence that turns into a map back to him. As a teen, Carys radiates intimidating self-possession that masks an untreated despair. As an adult—now “February”—she’s self-fashioned and steelier, a survivor who has made a life beyond harm. Carys embodies the cost and power of reinvention: a refusal to be defined by an abuser, and a determination to author her own story.

Appearance & Style

Carys’s changing look is character work: her teenage “majestic elf” aura (platinum hair, heavy fringe, “large and soft and somehow powerful”) signals a charisma that both awes and frightens her peers. Burn scars on her hands literalize the violence of her home. In London, her peroxide-white hair, sharp eyeliner, and red lipstick project adult control—a deliberately curated armor that says she won’t be made small again.

Personality & Traits

Carys’s character is split between past and present, with each phase refracting the other. As a teen, she’s fearless in presentation but unheard at home; as an adult, she chooses boundaries before letting compassion pull her back.

• Confident, even intimidating (teen): Frances remembers her “posh London” cadence and the way she never smiled to make others comfortable. The confidence functions as protection—performative power against a powerless home life.
• Openly queer (teen): “You know I’m gay, don’t you?” Her ease about her sexuality destabilizes Frances’s closeted certainty and foreshadows Carys’s broader refusal to perform for institutions—school, family, expectations.
• Academically alienated (teen): Failing GCSEs places her at odds with Carol’s metrics of worth, entrenching Carys as the family’s scapegoat and sharpening her rage at being graded instead of seen.
• Desperate to be heard (teen): “I just want somebody to listen to me.” Beneath the bravado lies a plea for witness; silence from those closest to her becomes its own kind of harm.
• Independent and self-sufficient (adult): As February, she builds a home and job in London, proving that escape isn’t just flight but construction—rent, friends, routine.
• Guarded, with chosen boundaries (adult): “I’ve put that life behind me.” Her detachment isn’t indifference; it’s a trauma-informed perimeter that keeps her safe until she decides when and how to reengage.
• Empathetic, fiercely protective (adult): Once she grasps Aled’s situation, she pivots from distance to action—proof that healing can coexist with responsibility.
• Pragmatic, unsentimental about kin (adult): “Family means nothing...” isn’t nihilism; it’s an ethical stance forged in abuse, rejecting obligation without consent and critiquing blood-as-destiny thinking.

Character Journey

Carys’s most dramatic transformation occurs off-page: she runs from an abusive home and, over two years, forges a new identity. That reinvention frames the novel’s on-page pivot—her shift from self-protection to courageous reentry. Initially, Carys refuses to reopen wounds for a family that never listened. But Universe City functions as Aled’s serialized SOS, and Frances’s dogged search forces Carys to confront the past she tried to cauterize. Choosing to return is the arc’s hinge: she doesn’t regress into the family system; she enters as a different person with boundaries, allies, and a plan. In doing so, she embodies the book’s argument about Finding Your Voice and Pursuing Passion: voice is not just artistic expression; it’s the right to define yourself—and then to use that defined self in service of someone you love.

Key Relationships

Aled Last As twins, Carys and Aled Last were divided by their mother’s narratives: Carys the failure, Aled the “golden child.” That imbalance bred resentment and silence. Universe City recasts their bond—the podcast is Aled’s long-distance love letter to a sister he couldn’t protect, and a coded invitation to come home on their terms. Their reunion doesn’t erase harm; it reframes it, giving them a chance to build a siblinghood outside the script that hurt them.

Carol Last With Carol Last, Carys is the family scapegoat in a house ruled by performance metrics. Carol’s punishments—like burning Carys’s belongings—weaponize “success” into violence, a stark portrait of Abusive Family Dynamics. Carys’s departure is both survival and critique: it exposes the home as uninhabitable and refuses the lie that endurance equals loyalty.

Frances Janvier Carys is the person Frances Janvier both idolized and misunderstood. Frances’s ill-timed kiss becomes a focal point for her guilt, but Carys’s flight was bigger than one moment—it was the culmination of years of not being heard. Their reunion is bracing: Carys interrogates Frances’s motives and academic tunnel vision, catalyzing Frances’s honesty about who she is and what she wants beyond achievement.

Daniel Jun Carys and Daniel Jun barely interact, but her gleeful reaction to his secret with Aled reveals her enduring rebellious streak. She’s not invested in scandal; she’s delighted at tiny acts of liberation that defy Carol’s control. For Carys, any rupture in the family’s oppressive script is a victory.

Defining Moments

Carys’s key scenes compress years of backstory into sharp, character-revealing beats.

• The school fire: “Well, I guess the school burned down… Seven-year-old Carys’s wish came true.” Her deadpan satisfaction indicts an educational system that graded her into despair; it’s defiance from someone who has already been burned.
• “The Incident” and the runaway: After failing GCSEs and being kissed by Frances, Carys explodes—“I thought you were my friend”—and vanishes. The blowup is less about the kiss than about chronic unheardness; leaving is her first act of radical self-preservation.
• Reinvention at the National Theatre: Frances finds “February” at work, immaculate and unflappable. The setting matters: a public, creative institution that values voices like hers signals she has built a world that doesn’t punish her for existing.
• Naming the abuse: In the bar, Carys details Carol’s tactics—systematically destroying what she loved. Testimony converts private pain into public truth, reframing Carys not as rebel-without-cause but as a credible witness.
• The rescue and confrontation: Carys joins Frances, Raine, and Daniel to reach Aled at university and face Carol. Choosing action over avoidance shows growth: she uses the autonomy she fought for to help someone still trapped.

Symbolism & Meaning

Carys is a study in identity as authorship. Renaming herself “February” and living as February Friday inside Universe City literalizes a break from the story written for her by others, aligning her with the novel’s meditation on Identity and Authenticity. As the offstage presence at the heart of Universe City, she also embodies Loneliness and Connection: the missing addressee whose absence gives Aled’s art its ache, and whose return transforms art into action. Her arc insists that escape can be ethical, and that love chosen freely is stronger than love demanded by blood.

Essential Quotes

“Well, I guess the school burned down… Seven-year-old Carys’s wish came true.”

• Carys’s flat delivery is both gallows humor and critique. She names the institution as a source of harm and claims a child’s thwarted desire out loud, revealing how long she felt crushed by expectations she could never satisfy.

“You know I’m gay, don’t you?”

• Casual and unhidden, this line shows teenage Carys’s refusal to apologize for who she is. It becomes a mirror for Frances, whose closeted uncertainty is jolted by Carys’s plainspoken self-knowledge.

“I just want somebody to listen to me.”

• The thesis of her adolescence: Carys isn’t asking for rescue, grades, or fixes—she wants witness. The tragedy is that the people with the most power to listen refuse, pushing her toward flight as the only path to being heard.

“Family means nothing. You have no obligation to love your family. It wasn’t your choice to be born.”

• Brutal and clarifying, this is February’s ethic of consent applied to kinship. It rejects coercive loyalty while making space for love that is chosen, not extorted—precisely the kind of love she later extends to Aled.

“I’m scared... That if I see him, I won’t be able to leave him again.”

• Vulnerability breaks through the armor. Carys understands that reconnecting will rebind her to pain—and she chooses it anyway. The fear underscores that her courage isn’t absence of dread but commitment despite it.