The narrator describes S.’s thoughts: “He knows that he has gone mad . . . you can’t just whistle and summon sense and order back into your mind. All you can do is button your coat, lace your boots, and trudge though the frigid business of being.”
Jen comments that “Straka’s trying to tell Filomela that he realizes his life is emoty without her.” She adds that she is “so sick of this martyr pose. He made his choices. . . it feels like you [Eric] don’t get that.”
Eric responds that “What happened w/ them was tragic + it was his fault.” And “maybe he realized too late what was important, but you know what? That happens.”
Jen and Eric are projecting fears and insecurities about their own relationship to F.X.C. and Straka’s relationship.
S. wears clothes inside: a heavy greatcoat, boots, gloves and woolens, “all of which still feel as if they belong to a stranger.” Dorst highlights how uncomfortable S. feels in his identity, and how although he knows nothing of himself, he still feels like an imposter.