Greenwich Park

“The girl who came in late appears at my side. She is holding two enormous glasses of what appears to be cold white wine, clouds of condensation on the side of the glass.

‘Do you want one? I thought you looked like you might need a real drink. One a day can’t hurt, surely.’

She holds out the glass in front of me. Her painted fingernails are short and chewed. She looks very young—perhaps she just has one of those faces. Round, dimpled, babyish. Yet when she smiles, there is something wolfish about it, her canine teeth protruding slightly, small but sharp.”

This quote describes when Helen first meets Rachel at prenatal class, and it develops the complexity of identity because Helen’s first impression of Rachel is almost wholly wrong. Part of this is due to intentional deception on Rachel’s part; for example, she’s not really pregnant. However, Helen’s faulty first impression of Rachel is also due to Helen’s own prejudices and misplaced detection of danger. There really is a dangerous “wolf” lurking, but Daniel is actually the one who identifies as a wolf and poses a threat to Helen’s life.

“‘Shall we have another coffee?’ she suggests, even though I haven’t actually had a coffee yet, just watched her drink the one she had already. ‘You could even risk one with actual caffeine!’ Rachel smiles, taps her leopard-spotted bump. I can’t work out whether she is making fun of me or not. She seems to believe the babies only exist in abstract.”

Helen is disturbed that Rachel breaks so many pregnancy rules, but in reality, Rachel is not pregnant, so it doesn’t matter as much as Helen believes it does. This quote foreshadows the later revelation that Rachel is only pretending to be pregnant because it’s literally true that Rachel’s baby only exists “in abstract.”

“I gasp again and recoil, my spine pushing against the back of the chair. In my mind’s eye I see my baby floating in utero, Rachel’s alien hand pressing through the red, glowing walls of his universe.”

Throughout the text, several objects and people are described as “alien” to emphasize their strangeness and potential danger, from Helen’s perspective. For most of the novel, Helen suspects Rachel of being dangerous, more than she suspects any other character of being dangerous. Ironically, Rachel has no obvious ill intentions toward Helen, while some of Helen’s close family members do intend to harm her.

“I’d thought then about what the counselor had told us, about us grieving at different rates. How she had made me understand that his grief was not less, but different […] My grief is raw and bloody, tearful, and surfacing often. It is kinetic, feverish, greedy. It makes me impatient, makes me clutch at hope, at progress, at the anticipation of the new baby, the expectation of healing. Daniel’s is the opposite. A sort of paralysis of the heart. It makes him withdraw. Makes him terrified to hope, to plan, to believe in the future […]

But for me, this is all part of it. Sitting in a circle and talking about the opening of the pelvis, like all first-time parents do. I want to be able to tell funny stories about it, like other mums.”

This quote develops The Meaning of Parenthood because, for Helen, her previous miscarriages are deeply related to her current situation as an expectant mother. This passage highlights her blend of grief and hope—not only hope that her child will arrive safely but hope that she’ll get to experience the full scope of pregnancy and childbirth. Even though Helen refers to herself as a “first-time” parent, the novel suggests that Helen is already a mother before her son, Leo, is actually born, illustrating the complexity of parenthood as an identity category. The description of Daniel’s grief in these passages is complicated by the fact that Helen does not yet know he’s been having an affair with Serena for the past decade—his withdrawal and hesitance to plan for the future are not solely about Helen’s pregnancy.

“When I get home that night, I see Daniel’s sneakers on the dustcovers in the hallway, where the builders have been traipsing in and out with drills and spades, preparing for the basement dig. Normally it would annoy me—how many times have I asked him to put them away?—but tonight, instead of being cross about it, I think again how lucky I am to not be Rachel. How grateful I should be to have a loving husband. Imagine being pregnant and going home to an empty house. The thought makes me shudder.”

This quote develops The Illusion of Safety and includes ironic foreshadowing, both because Daniel poses a threat to her and her unborn son and because the basement will be the site of Rachel’s murder, although she doesn’t realize either fact yet. Notably, Helen refers to Daniel as “loving” in a situation that usually annoys her, primarily emphasizing her gratitude that she isn’t alone and won’t be a single parent. Initially, Helen thinks single parenthood is an inferior arrangement, but ultimately, she changes her mind because a murderous, lying, cheating spouse is worse than no spouse.

“I often find myself wishing Helen wouldn’t be such a stickler for the rules. […] It’s not her fault, of course. This time, she is taking no chances. I think she believes that if she follows the rules, she can make a bargain that way. With God, the universe. Whoever. If she follows the rules, the rules will keep her baby safe.”

This quote illustrates how pregnancy rules support the illusion of safety. Serena observes that because of Helen’s previous miscarriages, she’s now even more adamant about following the pregnancy rules, believing this will keep her unborn child safe. Ironically, Serena herself is more of a danger to Helen and Leo than prohibited foods or drinks would be, as she later drugs Helen with benzodiazepines, which are implied to impact Leo’s growth in-utero.

“I try to think back to those days, two students in an attic room. How I used to watch him sleep, just to drink him in, like a drug. His chest going up and down with his breath. His curled hand resting on the pillow. Are we really the same two people? Is it possible to be?”

This quote develops The Complexity of Identity by calling into question whether someone remains static over time or whether identity is mutable. Helen notices that her relationship with Daniel has changed with time, but she thinks this is probably normal. Ironically, Daniel may have changed, but this does not fully account for Helen’s inability to see who he truly is. In reality, he’s been intentionally concealing his true self from her since college (which is the time she’s remembering fondly).

“I suppose it is wrong of me to feel so involved. But if Rory is up to something, if he is having some sort of affair with this W, whoever she is, then I can’t help but feel he is violating something that involves me, too—the four of us, Daniel and me, Rory and Serena. The only family I’ve got left, unless you count Charlie, but he’s hopeless. My mind leaps ahead, imagines it all coming out, the horror of our family falling apart. Of separation, even divorce. That would spoil everything between Serena and me—all the things I’ve planned. The maternity leave coffees, walks with our babies, yoga classes. All gone. She won’t want to see me now, will she? Not after my brother betrayed her. The thought makes me feel sick, as if there’s a guillotine hanging over us all, and only I can see it.”

This quote is wrought with foreshadowing. Rory really is having an affair, but it’s with his secretary, Lisa, not “W.” Helen may still feel like this is a violation of their foursome, but the more obvious violation of the foursome is the affair between Daniel and Serena, about which Helen and Rory are still ignorant. Also, there is a “guillotine” hanging around, but it’s in the hands of Serena and Daniel, who are soon to be plotting a murder together. They are not the potential victims, but rather the perpetrators of a crime.

“I look again at her neck and find myself involuntarily touching my own. Someone did that to her. I can barely comprehend it. A young, pregnant girl. In my world, such a thing feels unthinkable. But elsewhere, apparently, things are different.”

This passage develops the illusion of safety because Helen thinks domestic abuse is something that only happens “elsewhere”—it exists outside of her world, not inside it. Ironically, the person who abused Rachel was Helen’s own husband, Daniel, and furthermore, Daniel abuses Helen later in the novel. This is foreshadowed here when Helen touches her own neck as if afraid for her own safety, too.

“The thought of them together, at Haverstock—conducting some secret affair in the offices of the company Daddy built from nothing, while Serena sits clueless and pregnant at home and Daniel slaves away trying to save the company—makes my stomach sick with fury. How could Rory do something like that? […]

Then, of course, there’s the most horrifying thought of all. Rachel’s baby. If they have been having an affair, could the baby be Rory’s? A child of my own flesh and blood?”

This passage contains more irony and foreshadowing because, although Rory really is having an affair, so are Daniel and Serena. Helen’s suspicion that Rachel’s baby might be Rory’s is also ironic because Rachel is not actually pregnant, and Serena’s baby is really Daniel’s and not Rory’s, and therefore not related to Helen via “flesh and blood.” Helen knows something is amiss for most of the novel, but she goes through several faulty theories before finally learning part of the truth (if not the whole truth).

“The raven perches on the hedgerow, folds its wings, and cocks its head at him against the moon. There is silence. Its eyes are ink black, its feet red raw. A hunchback. Its head moves all the way around. In the background, four roses stare at him, their faces blank and pure.

He looks at the raven and lifts his glass in salute.

Nevermore, he says to the Raven.

And the Raven speaks back.

Nevermore, the Raven says.

Nevermore. Nevermore. Cellar Door.”

This quote occurs during a “Greenwich Park” chapter, as an unnamed man (Daniel) keeps watch while Serena kills Rachel in the cellar. The text doesn’t directly explain what’s happening at the time, although it’s revealed later. However, the allusion to Edgar Allan Poe’s poem “The Raven” through the repetition of “nevermore” clues the reader in, because “The Raven” is about grief and loss. Also, the four roses in this quote are planted above the buried ashes of Helen’s four miscarriages. Since Rachel’s body will be hidden under the wet concrete in the cellar, there will now be five corpses buried on the property.

“A few months after we lost Mummy and Daddy, I lost the first baby as well. I’ll never forget how they took him away, a ripped piece of blue NHS towel over a silver kidney dish. […] They told me that I wouldn’t want to see. But I did, I did. I told them I didn’t care what he looked like. That he was mine. That to me, he would be perfect.

But they shook their heads and gave me a liquid that tasted sickly sweet, and I drifted away on a papery pillow. […]

When I was on the drugs, things were easier, mostly because I didn’t feel very much at all. But sometimes that would frighten me, the feeling nothing. And I didn’t want to feel nothing about my babies. I wanted to grieve for them. It was all I had left of being a mother.”

This passage further complicates the meaning of parenthood and emphasizes that Helen is already a mother before her son is born. She views her grief over her previous losses as “all [she has] left of being a mother,” suggesting that the babies she lost are still her children. Through its detailed imagery and focus on Helen’s grief, this passage also emphasizes the magnitude of Helen’s losses and informs her dedication to playing by “the rules” in her current pregnancy: She has been through this four times now.

“I’d been barely aware of Charlie and Katie’s breakup, of him finding someone else, Maja. Then suddenly, they were having a baby. […] I started looking for excuses not to see them. When Ruby was born, I tried to go a few times. […] I got as far as the car. But I couldn’t do it. […] I couldn’t bear the ugliness of my thoughts. This accidental baby. My useless brother. Undeserved. It still sits between me and Charlie now, those missed months. I missed so much of her.”

This quote develops the meaning of parenthood because initially, Helen—informed by her grief over her own losses—thinks Charlie does not deserve to be a father because he and his then-new girlfriend Maja had Ruby by accident. Only later does Helen finally realize the error of her ways and that Charlie’s lack of intention does not negate his ability to be a good father. Furthermore, she comes to regret the time she lost with her niece Ruby because of her resentment and grief.

“His radio crackles, and he glances down. None of this seems real, I think. None of it belongs in our kitchen, on our quiet Sunday evening, with the sounds of the washing machine, a car outside, the next-door neighbor’s girl doing her clunky piano practice.”

Through imagery that evokes a quiet, suburban evening, this passage develops the illusion of safety. Helen believes her house and neighborhood are “safe” and that, therefore, police shouldn’t be there, disturbing the peace. In reality, the police have every reason to be there, because Rachel was murdered on Helen’s property by her sister-in-law who was conspiring with her husband, although Helen doesn’t know this yet.

“‘They want you to think that. That it won’t matter if you change your story, that you can tell them anything. Trust me, it doesn’t work like that. The worst thing you can be is inconsistent. They’ll make something of it, if they want to.’

[…]

‘I’m just saying, they twist things. Think what they were like with me.’”

Charlie evokes the “good cop/bad cop” trope by explaining that police don’t always seek the actual truth or do the right thing. At times, like when Charlie is caught bringing cocaine into the club (for Rory), they may charge people with worse crimes than they deserve, whereas other times, they may fail to apprehend the culprits in murder cases. The truth is not always at the heart of the matter, which seems counterintuitive to Katie, who is interested in truth above almost all else.

“I start to become desperate for it—for the drama of birth, the cataclysm everyone talks about—the end of one part of your life, the beginning of another. Nothing will ever be the same, people say. And that’s what I want, more than anything. To be transformed, to shed the skin of this dead time I am stuck in, with nothing to fill my time but thoughts of Rachel.”

This quote develops the meaning of parenthood because Helen still longs for the moment of birth, which according to cultural myth, instantly transforms someone from a non-parent into a parent. In reality, the process is more gradual, with things like pregnancy losses and current pregnancies contributing to the slow process of becoming a parent. Helen does not yet realize that her most significant transformation will actually happen because of Rachel.

“‘I don’t know why you insist on living here. Not when you have all that money. You could live somewhere better. Somewhere with a garden. That roof terrace isn’t even safe…’

[…]

‘I live here, because Ruby lives here,’ he says. ‘Her school is here. Maja and Bruce live here. […] I don’t know what you want, Helen. Normal children don’t live in mansions in Greenwich Park with seventy-foot gardens. Normal families live like us.’

[…]

I look at my younger brother. I see that there is a sticky chocolate smudge on his jeans, bags under his eyes. I think about the homemade pasta sauce, the pajamas on the radiator. And I realize I don’t know how to do this. Any of it. And my brother—my useless, naughty little brother—he is doing it already.”

This quote complicates the illusion of safety because Charlie explains that his home in Hackney is safe, secure, and happy, despite not being fancy. He emphasizes to Helen that it is actually her lifestyle that is “abnormal” compared to the way average families live. The passage also complicates the meaning of parenthood because Helen finally realizes that Charlie is a better and more skilled parent than she’s given him credit for. Helen realizes, too, that she lacks the practical skills and knowledge about raising children that Charlie possesses.

“The next photograph […] is an image of a slender man, almost in silhouette, leaning against the wall of their upstairs balcony. Behind him the city is a mass of light, and his face is in darkness, a plume of smoke escaping from his lips. It takes me a moment to recognize the outline as Daniel’s. He doesn’t look like my Daniel. He looks strange, unknowable.”

In the narrative, photographs symbolize the complexity of identity. The photo, captured by Serena, is nearly unrecognizable to Helen. This emphasizes the level of deception that the real Daniel is exercising toward Helen.

. “It is cozy in Katie’s flat. Of course it’s silly to envy Katie her place—after all, it’s barely the size of our living room—but I do sometimes wonder what it would be like to have a little space that is just mine, not Daniel’s.

[…]

It occurs to me how much safer I feel here in Katie’s apartment than I do at home.”

Even though Helen inherited her house from her parents, Daniel takes control of the space—such as insisting on renovations—using his role as an architect as leverage. Her envy suggests that Helen has more feelings about this than she expresses. Furthermore, this passage foreshadows the fact that Helen is actually unsafe in her own home because Daniel will soon attack her and her unborn child in their home. Furthermore, it foreshadows that, after Helen discovers Daniel’s murderous actions, Helen will move out of her old house and into Katie’s place.

“In some of the dreams, I become Rachel. I am chased by a wolf through the trees in the park, a woodcutter, an axe swinging at his wrist. Or I am drowning, and then I see myself from above and I am not myself, but her. It is her pale face bobbing in the shallows of a pebble beach, her black hair splayed in the gray-green surf.”

This passage recounts a symbolic dream of Helen’s wherein she, or Rachel, is chased by a wolf or a woodcutter, both figures from fairy tales. This is significant because due to the college play he was in with Serena, Daniel identifies as a wolf. He’s attacked Rachel in the past and will soon attack Helen as well. The imagery of the “shallows of a pebble beach” foreshadow that Rachel’s body will be found in the cellar, where wet cement has recently been poured.

“I think about Rory when he was a little boy, bullying Charlie, throwing firecrackers at Helen, even though he knew she was scared. But then I think about him at his wedding, when Serena walked down the aisle. […] How his eyes had filled with tears when he saw her in her dress. I can think of times when I have disliked Rory intensely: the way he lords it at his parties, sneers at my job, belittles Charlie. But then I can think of moments when he has been kind to Helen, or when his love for his wife has been plain for all to see. I have known Rory most of my life. But do I know him, really?”

Katie thinks this after Rachel’s father, John, asks if Katie knows Rory and if it’s possible Rory could have hurt Rachel. This quote develops the complexity of identity because Katie questions whether it’s possible to truly know another person and what they’re capable of, even after decades of frequent interaction.

“I’m already anticipating the familiar, woody smell of him, the smell of his pencil shavings and ink, the smell of books and clean sheets and safety. But then I see there is something strange about his face. The bags under his eyes are so deep now he almost looks like someone else. But it’s not that. It’s something in the eyes themselves. Something I have never seen before.”

This quote emphasizes the complexity of identity. A few times throughout the text, Helen reflects that Daniel does not look like himself, illustrating the layers of identity that he’s been hiding from her, which are now becoming more apparent via physical manifestations, such as bags under his eyes. Here, right before he attacks her, he finally allows her to see one of the worst parts of him.

“He pulls my face closer to his, so I can see his eyes, the deep hollows underneath. And in that moment, I wonder if I have seen this before, this ugliness in my friend’s husband. If I have detected this in him, before now. And deep down, I know the answer is yes. That I have seen it in the pencil lines of his face, in the blankness behind his eyes. And I did nothing. Because he seemed normal. And because you don’t. Because it’s awkward. And because how do you say? How can you?”

This quote develops the complexity of identity because, like Helen, Katie sees something dark lurking inside Daniel. Unlike Helen, Katie reflects that she sensed this before but couldn’t bring herself to point it out. This suggests that people sometimes purposely look past the undesirable parts of others for the sake of social ease and normalcy. Thus, deception can be something of a two-way street.