Thomas. Nobody talked to Thomas because he told the same damn stories over and over again. Victor was embarrassed, but he thought that Thomas might be able to help him.

Victor only talks to Thomas because he needs the money. Thomas is aware of this and willingly places himself in a position to spend some time with his former friend despite knowing that Victor is using him.

During the trip, however, Victor realizes that Thomas has always been there for him. He saved Victor from a wasp nest when they were young, and now he volunteers to go into a trailer which reeks of death in order to help Victor go through his father's belongings. Victor learns that as a child, his own father had helped Thomas and had then asked him to look out for Victor.

In some ways, Victor hasn't changed at all by the story's conclusion. He has no real plans to transform his attitude or to be the friend that Thomas needs:

Victor knew that he couldn't really be friends with Thomas, even after all that had happened. It was cruel but it was real.

Yet after their trip, Victor is ashamed of the way he feels about Thomas, and this is a change from his callous attitude at the story's beginning. He realizes that Thomas deserves something for his loyalty, and so he gives Thomas half of his father's ashes and agrees to stop and listen to Thomas's stories sometime. With these gestures, Victor demonstrates a compassion that he lacks prior to the trip.

The short story "This Is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona" by Sherman Alexie tells of a young Native American man named Victor who lives on a reservation near Spokane, Washington. He hears that his father died in a trailer in Phoenix, Arizona, and he has to go collect his father's ashes and his pickup truck. His former friend Thomas Builds-the-Fire, a spaced-out storyteller that nobody listens to, lends him some money and accompanies him on the trip.

The story takes place in several settings, and each setting suggests something further about the impact of the trip on Victor. First of all, the setting of the reservation in the beginning focuses on the poverty and hopelessness of most of the Native Americans living there, but it also suggests how the residents help each other in times of distress. For instance, although the Tribal Council doesn't give Victor all the money he needs, it gives him a donation to help him on his way. Afterwards, Thomas Builds-the-Fire supplies the rest of the funds.

The next setting is the airplane. Victor and Thomas have now left the reservation and are on neutral ground. Thomas displays his depth in comfortably engaging in conversation with the white Olympic-class gymnast sitting next to him. Victor begins to realize that there may be more to Thomas than he had thought.

Victor and Thomas then arrive at Victor's father's trailer, the place where he died. It still stinks like a corpse because his father stayed there in hot weather for a week after he died before anyone found him. Thomas accompanies Victor into the smelly trailer to help him, and Victor learns that Thomas had a special relationship with Victor's father and had promised his father that he would look out for Victor. The impact on Victor here is twofold: he learns something new about his father and further bonds with Thomas.

There is a short scene in the midst of a barren stretch of Nevada while they are driving the pickup home. Victor has been driving for many hours, but as soon as Thomas takes the wheel, he runs over a jackrabbit. Victor learns that Thomas is too ethereal to handle practical things like driving.

The final setting is the same as the first. They are back at the reservation, and they feel the ennui setting in again. They realize that they will not be able to outwardly be friends as they were on the trip. Nevertheless, it is evident that inwardly they have become more intimate.

We see, then, that at each stage of the story, the various settings contribute to the impact of the trip on Victor in different ways.

Victor is conflicted between the desire to be a secularized, future-oriented modern American who drives cars and listens to a stereo—a person who has left behind the tribal ways of his Native American ancestry—and the pull of that native heritage. This heritage is represented by Thomas Builds-the-Fire, a visionary who believes in the old ways.

When Thomas agrees to lend Victor the money to fly to get his father's ashes and his belongings as long as Thomas can come along, Victor is confronted with the tribal past he has tried to sever himself from. Thomas has promised Victor's father he will look out for Victor, and he takes that role seriously. In fact, during their time together, Thomas "lights a fire" under Victor that opens up the possibility that he can change and grow.

Victor is impressed by Thomas's ability to connect to people. Victor realizes, too, that Thomas connects him to his father and his native past. As they talk, childhood memories come flooding back to Victor. When Thomas, driving Victor's father's truck, runs over a rabbit, Victor is able to agree with the native wisdom that the rabbit chose suicide. He begins to see that he too can make choices, as the rabbit did, and that perhaps instead of putting his two identities in conflict, he can embrace his heritage and integrate it into his modern-American life. Although Victor does not change much during the story, through Thomas, he is beginning to contemplate new possibilities.