“I say ‘her’ because I don’t recall having been present, not in any meaningful sense of the word. I and the girl in the picture have ceased to be the same person. I am her outcome, the result of the life she once lived headlong.”

This quotation occurs in Part V, when present-day Iris reflects on the disconnect she feels when looking at a photo taken on her wedding day. Iris has become someone radically different from the sheltered and trusting girl she was on the day she got married. The woman she is now is much wiser but also more cynical and embittered. When Iris describes her younger self as a girl who lived “headlong,” she implies that she was once more willing to take risks and believe that things would work out. At this point in the novel, by describing her present-day self as the “outcome” of her choices, Iris paints a bleak portrait of how her past traumas have scarred her. However, as more information about her life comes to light, this picture becomes more complex. The choices she made as a young woman did cause significant pain, but they also gave her the opportunity to experience true passion with Alex and helped her to make a significant creative contribution to the world by writing her novel.