A suspected informant’s past generosity becomes retroactively suspicious to the betrayed.

Evidence

Wisam and Ra’ed were not so lucky. Lina couldn’t help but soften her attitude toward Wisam, and she started worrying about him while continuing to resent and curse Ra’ed. Suddenly everything the older brother had done seemed untrustworthy to her. He worked at a dry cleaner in Manhattan, but he had a love of electronics. Where did he get all the money to buy the miniature cameras, the latest mobile devices? she wondered. He had shoes up the wazoo. What was he, a Ba’athist Imelda Marcos? His extravagant sense of style had now transformed into a costume of suspicion. — Moustafa Bayoumi, How Does It Feel to Be a Problem? Being…, 666

Categorization

• CANDY: ‘Ba’athist Imelda Marcos’ is a darkly funny line worth sharing for its unexpected cultural mashup describing a dry cleaner with too many shoes.