It's ironic that Marcus decided to go to Liberia when all he wanted at home was to be with Rita. Marcus saying, “he would not return until he knew, until he really, truly understood what darkness was” (75-76). Apparently, Rita was aware of Marcus's characteristics long before they became invested in each other, but she said, "Sometimes it made me fear him." Sometimes I think it made me love him more” (74). “He hugged me, kissed me longer than I could stand, said goodbye, promised, he would change, we would make it, he would be reborn, we would get married and raise babies large, tanned and not rarefied” (76). Rita managed to create an image of the ideal man she would have liked Marcus to become and convinced herself that this was the man she would settle down with. Marcus was first attracted to Rita, not for her "frizzy, unmanageable black hair, nor for her heavy breasts, but for her face that no guy on campus could forget, and he insisted that her legs did not resemble those of a bird” (73). Due to Marcus' personality traits, he didn't seem to notice that he was sabotaging any possibility of having anything serious with him.