The Weight
Metaphorical references to weight pepper the narrative. The cumulative effect is to build upon the idea that guilt is too heavy a burden to bear without the relief of confession. But confession is not always directed implicated in the references to the weight pressing down upon the narrator’s existence:
“We bought and bought; we bought without joy. There was a heaviness in Mother that I had never felt before, and that weight spilled over into the house and into our lives.”
Familiarity
The strength of the comparative quality of a simile is dependent upon familiarity. The more one can relate to the known quantity of the comparison, the more it facilitates understanding the other side of the comparison. In this case, almost anyone who goes to movies regularly will get the feeling being described:
“It was like going to see a scary movie in the afternoon and just when you start believing that the darkness of the theater and the action of the film are endless, and true, the lights come on, and outside the sun is brighter than the lights in the movie house and the terror goes away and becomes fun.”
Guilt
The presence of guilt is pervasive throughout the narrative. It creeps up on the narrator in metaphorical form so often and to such a visceral degree that it almost threatens to leap from figurative to literal:
“It was a strange silence. The feel of my house was not quite right. A dark invisible movement was somewhere, but the memories of the river overshadowed any other concern I might have had.”
The Damned Spot
The narrator and her friend Victor are too young to fully comprehend what they have just witnessed. Though immature and lacking experience, the narrator’s innocence is pierced in a way she cannot fully understand. The concept of rape is an unknown and the act produces a reaction equally misunderstood. Lacking literal comprehension, what they witnessed becomes a murky hell of literal ugliness and Shakespearean metaphor:
“Her voice startled me. It was rough and husky. For some reason I felt terribly close to her. I wanted her to hurry back to the bar, but she stood there brushing some invisible stain off her dress.”
Good for the Soul
There is a saying about confessing; something to do with the soul. Of course, by definition, that would be mean that not confessing is poisonous to the soul. The only way to determine if this is true from an outsider’s perspective would be to analyze the behavior of others:
"The sun was setting. At the bottom of the church steps Victor hopped like a rabbit. He saw me and smiled happily…I just wondered where to hit him. He was beaming from inside out.”
