Quote 4
My mother has a wounded sound in her voice, as f I had put the list up to hurt her. I think how to explain this, recalling the words Harold and I have used with each other in the past: "So we can eliminate false dependencies…be equals…love without obligation…" But these are words she could never understand.
So instead I tell my mother this: "I don’t really know. It’s something we started before we got married. And for some reason we never stopped." (III.1.84)
Lena can’t hide behind fancy English words, and so has to tell her mother a version closer to the truth.
Quote 5
I was still screaming after two laughing men grabbed this man and, shaking him, said, "Joe, stop it, for Chrissake. You’re scaring that poor little girl and her maid." (II.2.38)
Seeing an Asian woman and what appears to be a white girl, people’s first conclusion is that the Asian woman is the girl’s maid.
Quote 6
"Lena, you’re really extraordinary," Harold said after six months of dinners, five months of post-prandial love-making, and one week of timid and silly love confessions. We were lying in bed, between new purple sheets I had just bought for him. His old set of white sheets was stained in revealing places, not very romantic. (II.4.20)
This is called symbolism – they’re lying on sheets that Lena has bought for Harold, just like their lives are built mostly on what Lena has sacrificed and worked for. Also, notice that one of the most important things about the sex in this scene is the sheets, not the action that just took place.