“Now, the Center was a unicorn—a small rectangle of a structure painted a fluorescent, flagrant orange, like a flag to those who had traveled hundreds of miles to find it.”

The novel’s opening paragraphs use rich detail and other devices to describe the Center as a character in its own right. Though it is initially described as a squat, determined “bulldog,” now the Center is a “unicorn”—a mythical creature often associated with magic and hope. The bright orange center is sought out by those who see it as a source of help and also a “flag” to those who want to shut it down.

“She knew that other fifteen-year-old girls romanticized the idea of dying for love, but Wren had read Romeo and Juliet last year in eighth-grade English and didn’t see the magic in waking up in a crypt beside your boyfriend, and then plunging his dagger into your own ribs.”

Wren’s skepticism about Romeo and Juliet reveals important aspects of her character: Though she is young, she is practical and logical. She sees past the romance into the tragedy and wants her own teenage relationship to involve safer practices. Ironically, her search for birth control so that she can responsibly have sex leads her into the crosshairs of George’s crusade.

“Born again. She didn’t think it was any coincidence that the term for letting God back into your heart had, at its core, birth.”

Janine has intense religious convictions that lead her to join the anti-abortion protesters. She sees birth as a central issue both politically and morally and sees the metaphor of salvation as connected to the crusade for birth. Her own trauma around her previous pregnancy and abortion also informs her commitment to this issue.