A Bouquet of Red Flags

A Bouquet of Red Flags is the image Amber uses for Brendan when they meet at the Activities Fair at the start of her sophomore year. It captures the gap between her clear-eyed recognition of traits she distrusts and the attraction that overrides her resolve, making the phrase a compact emblem of her recurring conflict between political conviction and romantic desire.

Meaning and Context

Amber understands herself as an intersectional feminist, an advocate for people with disabilities, and an ally of the LGBT community. She is conscious of her own social advantages and opposes forms of oppression ranging from patriarchy and racism to homophobia, transphobia, bullying, and microaggression. That political awareness coexists uneasily with her romantic pattern: she is repeatedly attracted to athletes, particularly privileged men whose attitudes and behavior do not reflect her convictions.

The pattern has left Amber feeling used and dissatisfied. She wishes she were drawn instead to men whose politics and commitments better match her own, but attraction has not followed that preference. By the summer before sophomore year, she has resolved to choose partners more carefully or abstain from casual encounters rather than repeat a cycle that leaves her unhappy.

The Expression Applied to Brendan

At the Activities Fair, Brendan presents himself to Amber as a familiar warning sign: he is a lacrosse player, handsome, self-confident, broad-shouldered, inarticulate, and politically oblivious. The bouquet image gathers these traits into a single, pointed judgment. Brendan is not merely someone Amber finds attractive; he resembles the very type she has decided to avoid.

The force of the expression lies in its immediate reversal. Amber’s attraction arrives despite her judgment, and she likens her inability to resist it to the difficulty of keeping a promise to quit smoking. The image therefore registers both discernment and frustration: she can identify the pattern as it begins, but recognition alone does not undo its pull.

Resistance and Narrative Significance

Amber responds differently to Brendan than she would have in her first year. Rather than immediately texting him or arranging to spend time together, she hangs back and waits for him to make the first move. She does not engineer a chance encounter at the Higg or add him on Facebook, although she does look through his posts. His shirtless pictures reinforce her attraction even as his other qualities confirm her misgivings.

The expression foreshadows the tension between Amber’s intentions and her choices without suggesting that she has already abandoned her resolve. Her restraint marks a change in behavior, but her interest in Brendan shows that the underlying attraction remains. The phrase thus frames their meeting as a test of the decision she has made: whether recognizing a familiar pattern will be enough to help her act differently this time.