How we cite our quotes: (Story.Section.Paragraph) or (Story.Paragraph)
Quote #10
(My husband's convictions notwithstanding, I suspected marriage could not keep me from being, in some ways, exactly the woman Laurel remembered.) (Laurel.78)
In some ways, the narrator of "Laurel" is a lot like Imani from "The Abortion": she feels out of control of her sexuality. The fear she has is that she can't be loyal, even though she's now in the most committed relationship she's ever been in. There's nothing, she worries, that can stand in the way of chemistry if it's there. Fortunately for her, it isn't there. But her ambivalence toward commitment and her sense of guilt where Laurel is concerned team up to knock her down pretty hard by the end of the story. She can't help but think that if she'd been more selfless, Laurel wouldn't have succumbed to despair.