Abigaila's Character In The Obsession

Negative character development of Delilah in the book The Obsession

Many people make bad choices. These choices are often made by instinct to protect oneself before thinking of the consequences of their actions. Delilah, the main character of the book ‘the obsession’, makes many impulsive decisions which lead to many long term problems later on in the novel. However, Delilah does not seem to care about the consequences and continues on living her life without many worries about the part. Therefore, Delilah makes many bad choices which lead to her becoming a more and more disastrous human being as time goes on. In the obsession, Delilah’s negative and violent character development is caused by her constant struggle to break free of being controlled

First off, a way that Delila’s struggles have affected her is by turning her into a person of violent nature. When Delilah saw that there was no other way to report Brandons abuse, she killed him to rid him from her life. “I walked towards the back door. as I passed by the jack that was holding his car up, I swung my foot out and tripped the lever. the car said to the floor with terrifying swiftness. Despite the loud music, I heard the crunch as three and a half thousand pounds of solid metal sank into Brandon, crushing his bones.” (Sutanto 60) Delilah did not feel sad about Brandon's death. She did however feel a small amount of guilt. At first, she was so traumatized from Brandon that she had almost refused a simple act of service from officers as she was used to doing everything by herself and staying quiet around the house. As Delilah sat down to think, she wondered how her ‘rotten mind’ could think up such irrelevant thoughts even after she had just committed murder. She didn't feel bad about her decision nor did she feel any remorse. Delilah observes, “I was just now releasing that if I had the chance to do it all over again, I would.” (64) She also comments,

Due to being wrapped up in Logan's blackmail, Delilah’s relationships with her friends were broken. Aisha comments, “That’s funny, because all I saw was you hanging on to Logan and ignoring me.” (Sutanto 154) Delilah stopped talking as much to her best friend Aisha after her first date with Logan which led Aisha to thinking that Delilah only cared about boys. Delilah kept many of her interactions with Logan a secret from Aisha only because she was afraid of what Logan would do to her if someone else knew the truth about their fake relationship. However, Delilah later learned that if she had just gone to Aisha earlier, she could have received help and support from her friendship. In order to frame Logan, Delilah also broke her trust with Lisa the librarian. “Lisa hesitated, but I held my ground, gazing at her until she moved to the computer. She typed in her access code and did as I asked, logging me in on the roster from 6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. “Thank you.” she swallowed and refused to look at me. “Get out.” it stung a little. we worked so closely for so long, and she wasn't even the least bit grateful that I'd saved her ass.” (Sutanto 304) to make her plan work, Delilah had taken drugs from Lisa’s stock without permission. Delilah remembers, “There would be grave consequences, emphasis on the grave,” .(301) However, contradicting her own statement,