Our narrator shows this want to give up entirely, and it goes back to the last line in the first chapter with the mom's dog Greta. Machado has gotten to the point where she believes death is her only option of escape. How would she leave her girlfriend and still live. This relevance to Greta is symbolic as one there is a door open to go, she doesn't know what to do. Like Machado says, it's as if she doesn't know what the outside even is. Machado's self has become very dependent on the girlfriend so she deems death as the only viable option, because would she know what to do next after leaving.

This is extremely interesting as the "you" seems like this sweet and kind and courteous character which will not be the case.

I noticed he has only referred to Elvis's wife as "his wife", and I doubt we'll be given a name. We don't even get the name of his daughter. Was this done intentionally? It's as if a female's name is only important enough for Yunior to mention when it's someone he considers "serious" enough. If Elvis is his good friend, you'd thinkg he'd have the decency to respect his wife and child unless elvis doesn't even do that himself.

So I spoke about this in my discussion group. Miss Lora is about twice Yunior's age, and their whole relationship is considered rape. I find that if your read between the lines, Yunior is not happy with their relationship and that it's actually a traumatizing experience for him that he will never actually admit to it because of his machisimo aspect. He tells her "I have a girlfriend" seemingly like yeahhh this should stop. But Miss Lora doesn't care, and when hass Yunior ever cared about cheating on his girlfriend so far? And Miss Lora treats him like a son and uses and emotionally abuses him like he's a prize that she won. She says how much he's like his brother and fawns over Rafa while she's with Yunior. Not only is this older woman messing with his head and having sex with him, but she's also implanting in the back of his mind that she wouldn't have chosen him and hes there becasue Rafa isn't

This entire chapter gives an insight into Yunior’s life with his father before he becomes absent in their life. The way that the father treats them after bringing them to America for a better life is very interesting being that he almost makes them out to be prisoners in their own home. He’s almost embarrassed, and burdened by his family, ultimately limiting their experiences in this new country. These said experiences that were in fact limited back in the Dominican Republic as well.
On the other hand, Rafa and Yunior’s own experience and view of their father varies slightly. Yunior sees his father in America and considers him just to be an average man, whereas in DR he imagined someone seven feet tall working and making loads of money. He had created this idealized version of his father, only to be disheartened when he thought of him as nothing more than ordinary and controlling. Rafa on the other hand seemed to want only to please the father and began to treat Yunior the same way his dad did.