Triptych

“It pissed him off to see the cars the bangers drove. In the last month, Michael’s kid had shot up about four inches, outgrowing all his jeans, but new clothes would have to wait for Michael’s next paycheck.”

The bitter tone of this quote captures Michael’s perpetual frustration with his current lot in life, and he also projects an aura of resentment upon seeing the relative wealth of the very people whom he is tasked with policing. While the early chapters imply that Michael is simply a cynical, overworked member of law enforcement, the intensity of his anger foreshadows the eventual revelation that he is more criminal than hero himself.

“If Gina ever answered the door for Phil dressed this way, Michael would have fucking killed her.”

While previous passages have shown glimpses of Michael’s anger at the wider world, this scene indicates that he is just as willing to turn his violent thoughts and impulses inward, toward the contemplation of his own household and family. The misogynistic tone of his thoughts also stands as an early hint that he does not see women as people—not even his wife.

“He lacked the presence of somebody who was on the job, the ‘fuck you’ attitude that came from arresting every type of scum the earth has to offer.”

In this scene, it is clear that Michael immediately judges and mistrusts Will, coming to the unsupported and instinctive conclusion that Will does not possess the same authoritative demeanor that he himself has learned to project. The passage therefore indicates that Michael prizes aggressive displays of attitude and dismisses those who do not feel the need to express their dominance quite so overtly.

“If only these monsters had horns. It would be so much easier finding them.”

The offhand irony of this comment underscores the novel’s thematic focus on monsters who hide in plain sight, reinforcing the treacherous thought that even the most innocuous of passersby might be concealing deep corruption or heinous crimes beneath a genial, non-threatening veneer. While Will is very aware of the pervasiveness of corruption in law enforcement, he does not yet realize that the killer he seeks is right in front of him, but this line serves as an oblique reference to that fact and gains an even deeper aura of dramatic irony upon a second reading of the novel.

“Even in the real world, find some woman who’s doing well for herself, being successful, and there’s always going to be a handful of other women standing around saying she’s a bitch or she slept her way to the top. That was just how the world worked, and it was no different in the microcosm of Decatur High School.”

John reflects on the environment that surrounded him and Mary Alice while they were still in school. The cynical tone of his observation portrays a deeply misogynistic world in which a woman’s successes are marginalized, minimized, and dismissed beneath layers of offhand slander. By citing the “microcosm” of high school, John also suggests that such behaviors are pervasive throughout society and are internalized at a very young age.

“She had talked to him, really talked to him, because she wanted to, not because of the fifty bucks.”

John’s longing for meaningful human connection takes center stage in these contemplations as he recalls his conversations with Robin. By repeating the phrase she “had talked to him, really talked to him,” his thoughts take on a tone of incredulous wonder, and he is so starved for kind attention that he willfully overlooks the essentially transactional nature of this interaction.

“She had a brother somewhere. She’d grown up in a neighborhood with a pool. Her parents had spent some money on orthodontics, maybe taken her to ballet lessons so she’d have that lean dancer’s body or perhaps she’d been like Joyce.”

Because Robin is beautiful and does not share many physical characteristics with the other sex workers, John believes that she might have come from an affluent background. Here, his unexamined biases become apparent, as he finds a sense of kinship with her based on his assumption that her childhood was similar to his.

“Ms. Lam would be going through his stuff now, and even though John knew there was nothing for her to find, he felt guilty, terrified she’d toss him back in prison. Guys back in the joint talked about parole officers, how they planted stuff on you if they didn’t like you, how they were especially hard on sex offenders, looking for any excuse to send you back inside.”

This scene invokes the motif of surveillance as John warily endures his parole officer’s latest inspection of his living space. Because the past two decades of his life have been ruined due to a wrongful conviction and circumstances beyond his control, he now lives in deadly fear that a similar whim might condemn him to return to prison. His thoughts illustrate yet another angle of the potential Corruption in the American Justice System.

“John had learned a long time ago that the reason the middle class had it so good was because they expected things to be better. They wouldn’t settle for less than they’re worth. They’d just get into their shiny cars and go where they were appreciated. Poor people, on the other hand, were used to just taking what was given to them and being grateful for it.”

Though John’s adulthood has been shaped by his time in prison, he still carries many of the prejudices that he learned in his youth, and his background influences his thoughts when he asserts that the middle class possesses a form of tenacity that the lower class lacks. While this sentiment is clearly an oversimplification, it also serves as a reference to John’s 20-year stint of “taking what was given to [him] and being grateful for it.” Even though he is now technically free, he finds himself a member of society’s more disadvantaged classes, and his thoughts reflect his frustration at his inability to forge a better path for himself.

“‘Don’t say anything,’ his mother shushed, putting her fingers to his lips. Emily Shelly, PTA sponsor, den mother, baker of brownies and master of Halloween disguises, straightened her back and addressed the three men in the room. ‘If that’s all?’”

As the young John is handcuffed to the hospital bed after being accused of murdering Mary Alice, he is shocked to see the transformation in his conventional mother, who rises to the occasion and proves herself to be a staunch protector of her son. By adorning Emily with multiple domestic epithets, Slaughter creates a deliberate contrast while simultaneously demonstrating the many forms that Emily’s love for her son can take.

“Everybody had a persona in prison, a different personality they adopted that helped them survive. The thugs got meaner, the Aryans more cruel, the gays gayer and the loonies absolutely fucking nuts.”

John cynically reflects on his time in prison, and as he contemplates the various inmates’ strategies for survival, his thoughts invoke a new angle of The Tension Between Outward Appearances and Hidden Realities. By admitting that everyone in prison must craft and wear a “persona,” he also draws attention to the fact that when he was no more than a small, terrified, 17-year-old boy, he did not have this option and had no hope of blending in or protecting himself.

“The rube hadn’t done too bad this time, though. In the few seconds Ben’s face had been pressed close to his, John had been able to tell him all he needed to know.”

While in prison, John relied heavily on his cellmate, Ben Carver, for protection. During that time frame, Ben often commented on John’s immaturity and lack of street smarts, but now John has learned the skills he needs to transmit important information to Ben despite the ever-present surveillance of the setting.

“There was lying and then there was what he thought of a survival instinct. He was the last person on earth who could fault her for that.”

Angie frequently lies, but John and Will both forgive her for this character flaw, and this passage makes it a point to discuss the difference between lying for deception and lying for survival. Because both men have survived their own harrowing experiences in life, they understand that Angie’s survival is predicated on her ability to create a new identity for herself.

“It took him about six hours to read the morning newspaper, but he could take apart an engine and put it back together blindfolded. Whether it was a pocket watch or a piano, he could repair just about anything that had moving pieces.”

This passage succinctly conveys the stark differences between Will’s talents and his challenges, proving that he is a much more nuanced person than his pervasive inferiority complex leads him to believe. Angie is in awe of Will’s technical prowess, but despite his outstanding competence in a wide range of areas, he feels deeply insecure due to his dyslexia. Thus, the novel makes it clear that Will is a man of many parts, and while some help him function in the wider world, others hinder his progress no matter how much time and energy he invests in finding accommodations.

“Will did love her. She was certain of that. Even when they fought, they were careful not to go too far, not to say that one thing that would cut too deep, hurt too much, and make it all final. They knew everything about each other—or everything that mattered.”

Angie and Will have a complicated relationship that mixes the dynamics of sibling bonds with those of a deeper romantic connection. Because the two grew up together and weathered a barrage of tough times by supporting each other, their long-term commitment to each other is unshakeable despite the often-problematic nature of their interactions. In this passage, Angie reflects that although they continually wound each other, they are conscious of the boundaries necessary to protect their relationship.

“Will’s story wasn’t exactly the same but it was close enough. His body served as a map to pain, whether it was the long, thin scars on his back where the skin had been rent by a whip or the rough patch of flesh on his thigh where they had made a graft to close the electrical burns.”

This scene delivers a quick barrage of suggestive yet ultimately vague clues as to the true intensity of the physical abuse that Will endured as a child. His trauma, unlike Angie’s, is quite literally mapped out on his body, and seeing the evidence of his pain causes Angie considerable anguish. Because Angie does not have these same kinds of scars, she feels that Will’s body contains the history of their shared trauma.

“His scars were not his own, they were souvenirs from their childhood, symbols of the men who had abused her, the mother who had chosen a needle over their own daughter.”

As Angie continues to contemplate Will’s many scars and wounds, she clearly sees them as symbols of her own abusive childhood as well. While her own scars are purely psychological, Angie’s oblique reference to her mother’s addiction delivers a wealth of brutal imagery in the space of a single line. In this way, Slaughter uses strategic details to create an impressionistic painting of her characters’ backgrounds, relying on the fact that suggestion is often a more powerful writing tool than outright exposition.

“No one hated men so much as a prostitute. They spent hours talking about what low-life scum men were, and then they had to go off with the first asshole who flashed a little green in their face.”

Due to her experience working in Vice, Angie has developed an in-depth understanding of the hatred that many sex workers hold for the men on whom their livelihood depends. This passage, while deliberately overgeneralized, is designed to draw attention to the harmful aspects of sex work, particularly when underprivileged women are compelled to endure oppressive circumstances and rely on the money of those who willingly exploit them for personal gain.

“Angie remembered her days in uniform, recalled vividly how she had once peeled a bloody restraining order from the hand of a woman who had been beaten to death by her husband. He had used a hammer. Their kids were watching.”

With the brutally short, stark sentences of this passage, Slaughter conveys the depths of Angie’s work-related trauma and her resulting lack of faith in the system’s ability to protect those who are most vulnerable. She knows that even when the proper steps are taken, women with abusive partners are still very much at risk of suffering violence or death.

“Of course, Angie had lied to the therapist about her relationships, about Will. She wasn’t about to tell a complete stranger the truth. Hell, she had told so many lies by now that she wouldn’t know the truth if it bit her on the ass.”

This passage renders Angie an even more complex character, and her acknowledgement that she frequently lies in therapy further emphasizes the novel’s thematic focus on the tension between outward appearances and hidden realities. The tone of her thoughts also indicates that she has trouble quantifying her relationship with Will for her own benefit and is therefore ill-equipped to describe it to someone who has no understanding of all that the two have survived together over the years.

“Dr. Monroe and I realized very gradually that drug addiction is a terminal disease. It is a cancer that eats families alive.”

With these powerful metaphors, Aleesha’s mother, Miriam, describes to Will the devastating effects that Aleesha’s addiction had on their family. By equating addiction to a “cancer,” Miriam reflects on the widespread ripple effects that Aleesha’s struggle with addiction set in motion. However, while Miriam’s words are bitter, she also conveys an element of empathy for her daughter by naming Aleesha’s addiction a “disease.”

“Richard had always been certain that he knew the difference between right and wrong, good and bad. Whoever crossed that line was as easily cut out of his life, as the cancerous tumors he removed in the operating room.”

This passage makes it clear that John’s father held as uncompromising a view of the world as he did of his own medical practice. Seeing things in stark binary terms, Richard was incapable of finding a middle ground for the sake of his family’s unity, and he therefore abandoned his son rather than supporting him and seeking to help him improve his life.

“Nothing like unburdening your sins to someone who wouldn’t live to tell them.”

John and Joyce realized that Emily was on her deathbed when Lydia confessed her role in ensuring that John would be wrongfully convicted of Mary Alice’s murder. Lydia was motivated by her need to protect her own son, Michael/Woody—the real murderer. This belated revelation turns both John and Joyce against their aunt Lydia, who exploited the judicial system and lied to protect herself and her son.