“She didn’t mean to kill him; she wanted to warn him off, but he wasn’t scared of her weapon. He was over six feet tall and she must have looked like a doll to him, with her small frame, long eyelashes and rosy, full lips.

(Her description, not mine.)

She killed him on the first strike, a jab straight to the heart. But then she stabbed him twice more to be sure. He sank to the floor. She could hear her own breathing and nothing else.”

Korede recounts Ayoola’s report of Femi’s death; he’s the third man Ayoola has killed. In the midst of the crisis, Ayoola finds ways to flatter herself and neutralize the perception of the power she wields. The fact that Ayoola stabbed Femi, a sensitive poet, in the heart is symbolic; that she then stabbed him twice more is overkill and belies her “fragile” state. 

“For the average male, this wouldn’t be all that peculiar—but this man was meticulous. His bookshelf was arranged alphabetically by author. His bathroom was stocked with the full range of cleaning supplies; he even bought the same brand of disinfectant as I did. And his kitchen shone. Ayoola seemed out of place here—a blight in an otherwise pure existence.”

Korede perceives Femi as a thoughtful, organized man, a perception that will haunt her. Femi, in fact, in Korede’s eyes is the type of man who could like Korede; his shining kitchen and the shared brand of disinfectant prove this. Her evaluation of Femi foreshadows Tade’s reaction to her sister and Korede’s surprise at Tade’s shallowness. The otherwise beautiful Ayoola is out of place in his clean apartment, and she has brought death with her.  

“Ayoola is draped across my bed in her pink lace bra and black lace thong. She is incapable of practical underwear. Her leg is dangling off one end, her arm dangling off the other. Hers is the body of a music video vixen, a scarlet woman, a succubus. It belies her angelic face.”

Korede’s description of Ayoola, almost naked and in an alluring pose, shows us how much Korede, probably subconsciously, resents what her sister represents. She uses gradation in imagery (from a model to a seductress to a fiend) and contrasts images of a succubus (a seductive female demon) with an angel to emphasize how much Ayoola’s looks contrast with what she is on the inside.