In Joyce Carol Oates, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” The character Connie, is a fifteen year old girl who is self-absorbed. She is often hardheaded and creates these illusions caused by the fantasy world she lives in. She does this in order to gain more sexual experience and seek her independence. Fantasy and reality are distorted through Connie’s hidden desires for attention from the opposite sex. The author interpretation of Connie’s character is direct. Throughout the story her personality is shown through series of descriptive traits, physical and mental. One of the most evident traits is how self-absorbed she is. The author also emphasizes the lack of attention from Connie’s father, the constant bickering she has with her mother, and the continuous comparisons with her 24-year-old perfect sister. This all leads Connie to a very dark path and sudden death. The fact that Connie’s father comes home from work late, without any interest in interacting with his daughters unconsciously affects Connie. Children need attention from their parents. She might not say how badly if may affect her but actions speak louder than words. Her father would rather read the newspaper during dinner than talk to his daughters. She forms this adult appearance through her image and overall behavior to get the attention from men, the attention she does not receive at home. She goes out of her way to look a certain way. “Everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one for anywhere that was not home” (324). These two sides being that Connie would dress and act a certain way depending on where she was.” Her mouth which was pale and smirking most of the time, but bright and pink on these evenings out” (324). The reason why her mouth would be bright colored at night was because she wanted to bring attention on herself, bright colors symbolize boldness and sexiness which is exactly what Connie wanted to portray. T