What are Bella's Blue Pills?

In her early days at Westish, Pella is dependent on a blue pill that symbolizes her troubled past, not the release or serenity that might be expected from its soothing color. This pill even has a somewhat ironic name: "a tiny sky-blue pill called Alumina, presumably to connote the light it would bring into your life, though Pella couldn't help seeing the word Alumna and interpreting it as a snide remark on her failure to finish high school" (85). Pella herself makes a pointed observation about what the pill symbolizes: it is in indication of a personal failure that she is trying to medicate her way past. However, as Pella settles into Westish, she accesses the possibility of becoming a true, fulfilled alumna--and of breaking her dependence on the pills.