Friendship with Sula offers Nel a more positive perception of herself. She no longer feels it necessary to "pull her nose," a habit her mother insists that she do in an attempt to make Nel's nose look more sleek and slender, and less broad like her father's. Around Sula, Nel feels thoroughly accepted, especially when the two girls walk the gauntlet of leering young and old black men whom they must pass by on their way to the ice cream parlor. Much to the girls' secret delight, Ajax, one of the young men, sensuously pronounces that the girls are "pig meat." The Bottom's black males are now beginning to view Nel and Sula as young women and no longer as children.
An even greater concern to Sula and Nel than the young black males is the band of white, Irish Catholic boys who continually harass them. As children of newly arrived immigrants, these white Catholic boys are themselves victims of ethnic harassment. Because the town's white Protestants treat them with contempt, they in turn harass Sula and Nel in order to feel superior. However, Sula has had enough; she intends to confront them.
As opposite halves of one another, Nel acts passively, and Sula acts spontaneously and aggressively, always doing the unexpected. Whereas Nel's behavior is solid and consistent, Sula's is unpredictable and disturbing. For example, when Sula slices off the tip of her forefinger as a warning to the gang of white Catholic bullies, the act is not born out of desperation or fear: It is a result of Sula's on-the-spot decision to end, once and for all, her and Nel's victimization by these boys.
