Throughout the novel, Philip often feels lonely and isolated. Philip’s loneliness makes him vulnerable to being exploited and manipulated because he craves connection and becomes desperate to achieve it. As a young boy, Philip’s innate shyness and awkwardness are exacerbated by the fact that he is sometimes teased and bullied due to having a disability. He has few friends but nonetheless craves connection: “[T]hough he did everything to alienate the sympathy of other boys he longed with all his heart for the popularity which to some was so easily accorded” (67). Even when Philip does eventually form a close friendship with a boy named Rose, he sabotages the friendship because of his jealousy and need for control.

This pattern of Philip acting against his own best interests due to his desperate loneliness and belief that he is unworthy of love appears most prominently in his relationship with Mildred. Mildred quite transparently manipulates and uses Philip: “[I]t was only when he gave her anything that she showed any affection” (293). Philip cannot stop himself from abasing himself and indulging Mildred’s every whim; even when she confides that she is in love with his friend Griffiths, Philip goes so far as to give her money so that the two of them can go away together.