17;s thoughts and actions, one completing the other. “They found relief in each other’s personality”(53). Nel was always the calm one, in control, while Sula was uncontrollable. To save Nel from harassing boys, Sula once cut the tip of her finger off to scare them away, and when Sula accidentally threw a neighborhood boy into the water, Nel remained calm after they watched him drown. Once they grew older, Nel and Sula drifted apart. Nel chose the more conventional path and married a popular young man. Her attentions focused on him and “greater than her friendship was this new feeling of being needed by someone who saw her singly”(84). Sula decided to go away to college and explore the city life. She became more independent, focusing only on herself and not wanting to conform to social expectations. When Sula returned to the Bottom, the two girls were almost as opposite as their mothers were. Nel was with her husband and children, taking on the role of wife and mother. Sula was too involved in herself and what she wanted to raise a family. She said to Eva, “I don’t want to make somebody else. I want to make myself”(92). Eventually Sula was labeled as being evil, because of her actions. She put Eva in an old folks home for no reason, she slept with Nel’s husband, who soon after left her and her children, and it was rumored that she slept with white men. The people of the town began to hate her, blaming her for everything wrong in their community, even though it made them better. Wives treated husbands better and mothers took better care of their children, careful not to become one of Sula’s victims. But Nel was a victim of Sula’s selfishness and the two were separated, one having wronged the other.It would be three years until the two friends were reunited. Nel went to visit Sula while she was on her death bed. After a half-hearted reconciliation, Sula ask...
