“People know that Marianne lives in the white mansion with the driveway and that Connell’s mother is a cleaner, but no one knows of the special relationship between these two facts.”

Marianne and Connell have different socioeconomic statuses, which complicates their friendship. At the same time, being from separate worlds also gives them privacy and freedom, and they may never have become friends at all had Connell’s mother not worked for Marianne’s mother.

“Everyone is so convinced of his attraction to Miss Neary that sometimes he starts to doubt his own instincts about it. What if, at some level above or below his own perception, he does actually desire her?”

Connell is a herd animal at the beginning of the book, formed by the opinions of those around him. He can’t talk about difficult topics like Miss Neary’s inappropriate behavior toward him, which causes him to second-guess his own reactions. Marianne, the opposite of a herd animal, helps Connell to become more fluent emotionally and to trust more in his own deep feelings. 

“When he talks to Marianne, he has a sense of total privacy between them. He could tell her anything about himself, even weird things, and she would never repeat them, he knows that. Being alone with her is like opening a door away from normal life and then closing it behind him.”

The freedom that Connell experiences with Marianne both exhilarates and frightens a boy accustomed to boundaries and clear codes of behavior. It is one reason why he balks at committing to their relationship and making their involvement public.