[DavidPiper]

For most of the story I was assuming Michelle was an allegory for drugs (particularly with the reference to Jane's Addiction).

But by the end I was getting a distinctly "inter-generational trauma" read.

Michelle is the coping strategy personality that doesn't always work, and when Jeff's sister (the narrator) becomes part of the problem - and when 'Michelle' has to become a parent himself - Jeff's last option is to disappear completely.

[gwd]

This is science fiction. Good science fiction uses alternate reality to explore the human condition: "Given how human beings' experience, and how they behave in our current world, how would they behave differently if this new technology / capability were available? What are the philisophical / moral / social ramifications of that?"

So, there are immigrant Asian parents. Such parents often have high expectations for their kids. These kids feel the pressure to meet them, but often can't (or feel they can't), leaving a problem to be solved. Also, parents often try to live vicariously through their children.

In the Real World, people might turn to drugs: Alcohol to numb the pain, amphetamines to increase performance, etc; they also put their kids in expensive schools and coach them in everything they wish they'd been taught growing up. In the story world presented here, some people turn to "puppeteers": One particular second generation child first relies on a puppeteer to be a "success", and then becomes one himself to live out a "success" through his child.

The fact that people do have this problem, but don't have the solution, and turn to other solutions, is why so many of the "allegory" attempts here are close but ultimately fail: Yes, drugs are a different way people sometimes deal with these problems; no, drugs are not the same as puppeteering, which is why it's not a 1-1 match.