Characters
I've fallen in love. I didn't think such violent things could happen to ordinary people.
— Laura · Brief Encounter
Behind the line May contain spoilers.
Our reading
An editorial interpretation.
The speaker announces, with some astonishment, that they have fallen in love. They had assumed such a forceful, upending experience belonged to other kinds of lives, not to ordinary people like themselves. Love here feels less like gentle affection than a jolt that disrupts a settled, unremarkable existence.
Context reviewed