"I feel awkward around them, I don't know what to say. I know the unspoken rules of boys, but with girls I sense that I am always on the verge of some unforeseen, calamitous blunder."
Here, Atwood suggests something about the pressure girls put on other girls to behave a certain way. Some women, she suggests, hinder the feminist movement by making other women feel inadequate. There is a suggestion here that there is a sinister side to girls, an opinion which has arisen from Elaine's experience of being bullied by a group of girls.
"Really it’s Cordelia I expect, Cordelia I want to see. There are things I need to ask her. Not what happened, back then in the time I lost, because now I know that. I need to ask her why."
Elaine has a very complicated relationship with Cordelia throughout the text. Cordelia plays a main part in bullying Elaine throughout her childhood. In High School they reunite, but this time Elaine is cruel towards Cordelia. Throughout their lives they cross paths, until Cordelia is admitted to a mental facility by her parents and asks Elaine for help. Elaine refuses to help her, and this is the last time they see each other. However, throughout the rest of the novel Elaine grapples with her feelings of guilt towards Cordelia. She feels that there is unfinished business between them and wants Cordelia to explain why she was so cruel when they were children.
“There are days when I can hardly make it out of bed. I find it an effort to speak... I feel I am without worth, that nothing I can do is of any value, least of all to myself. What do you have to say for yourself? Cordelia used to ask. Nothing, I would say.”
This quote describes Elaine's experiences with depression. We see that Cordelia still has an impact on Elaine's self-esteem, even though she bullied her as a child. Atwood is suggesting that even small acts of cruelty, like childhood bullying, can have a huge impact on a person's self-esteem and sense of identity.
