Unspoken secret (metaphor)
Laurel’s mother’s secret became for her [Laurel] something much more than just an event that happened many years ago. Throughout her life, Laurel “felt that all the absences in her own life, every loss and sadness, every nightmare in the dark, every unexplained melancholy, took the shadowy form of the same unanswered question, something that had been there since she was sixteen years old— her mother's unspoken secret.” This secret became like an invisible metaphorical guide through all her life.
The house (metaphor)
Many years have passed since Laurel was in their house in the country again, the house where the awful event took place. With the first steps in, Laurel felt that “the house remembered her”. She was not a person of romantic character “but the sense was so strong that for a moment she had no trouble believing that the combination before her of wooden boards and red chimney bricks, or dappled roof tiles and gabled windows at odd angles, was capable of remembrance.” The house becomes a metaphorical secret keeper as well in the novel.
Love story (simile)
Jimmy and Dorothy fell in love during very difficult times, and it was a hard work to make their relationship work. No matter what, Jimmy was mad about Dorothy: “She was the sort of person who needed to be kept happy, he realized. Not as a matter of selfish expectation, but as a simple fact of design; like a piano or a harp, she'd been made to function best at a certain tuning.” This comparison to musical instruments show how romantic and impressive Jimmy was.
