The apple that Emma gives Jacob is an interesting symbol of the fragility of life between the loop and the current time. Not only does it foreshadow the issue facing the peculiar children, who are essentially stuck in the loop lest they want to die, but it also demonstrates the difficulty of connecting the past with the present. Things from the past are forgotten, die, or are replaced. In many ways, although Abraham is not forgotten, he is replaced by the man Jacob becomes by the end of the novel.

The Waiting Woman represents a guardian, looking over the ocean in anticipation of lost sailors. She awaits their safe return. The Waiting Woman is curiously not in the loop—she was created later. Instead, the loop requires its own guardian. Jacob refers to both himself and his grandfather as watchdogs, and, in many ways, this is accurate when one considers Jacob’s own role in saving Miss Peregrine from the sea. While the statue in the present is waiting, Jacob is watching. While the statue is female, Jacob is male—more binary oppositions with different implications.