The main focus of both short stories is that they both revolve around fourteen year old girls. Both girls being at the limit between the end of childhood and womanhood, however they both have their own unique way of transitioning and experiencing this stage of their lives.
In Marigolds, the principal character lives in a poor area during the Depression where she is described to be spending her summer playing with pebbles and throwing them at some marigolds cultivated by her neighbor Miss Dottie who is jokingly accused of being a witch by the neighborhood kids. During this period of time she overhears her parents talking about the financial struggle they're facing due to the crisis which leads her dad to break down in tears due to exasperation of having to make his wife the sole financial backbone of the family, which crumbles her world since she always looked up to her dad and in her eyes her mom was a frail woman. Because of this situation she becomes enraged and feels like her world is collapsing. In a rage, she walks over to Miss Dottie's marigolds and tramples whats left of them before realizing the owner had actually watched the scene. The sudden realization of her actions help her understand how her neighbor is not a witch but an old broken lady who had pour her soul and heart into growing the marigolds she had now ruined which led her to feel compassion for the first time. In that moment she realizes how she has lost her innocence.
The characterization is direct, for she names her feelings towards her own behavior and her situation.
In First Love the narrator also loses her childish innocense due to a collapse of her world, but quite in a very different way. She falls in love with an Italian-American older boy, which at first she believes the age factor to be the reason why she's invisible to him as she tries to catch his attention. After a play she starred in she receives a surprise kiss which sends her over the moon. Later that day she is informed that due to his father's job she will have to move to Puerto Rico which breaks her heart as she realizes she will no longer be able to see her crush however, shortly after she finds out this older guy is no longer interested in her and simply kissed her for self gratification, still she is able to appreciate the experience. Through the realization of how mistaken and innocent she was to think the boy was in love with her, she too ceases to be a child.
The journey from childish infatuation to feelings of unworthiness to the thrill of her first kiss, to the realization of how innocent she was is a metaphor used by the narrator to describe the transitioning to adulthood.
The characterization is indirect, through her actions and thoughts and through the impression she causes on the boy.
Hope this helps and I apologize if its too long, I did try to refrain myself but I adore this topic :)
