Every Exquisite Thing

by Matthew Quick

  “Who’s Pat Benatar?”

  “You just managed to make me feel extremely old, Nanette. Look her up on iTunes. You’ll like her.”

  “Okay. But Nanette can’t stop talking in third person. People don’t like when she does this. She thinks this is why it is so pleasing to her. Maybe another rebel tendency?”

  “Ah, you’ll eventually stop talking in third person, Nanette. Feel free to do so at any time. You’ve made great progress. And I think the experiment is officially a success now.”

  “Why? How can you tell?”

  “You curse at me less, for one thing. Your parents say you are pleasant with them. You seem far less anxious. You’ve made up with Booker. You have a positive relationship with Oliver. And you no longer call me ‘the rapist,’ which I appreciate more than I should, considering that I’m supposed to be neutral and objective with my patients.”

  “What will Nanette do next year? What will she do after high school?”

  “Whatever she wants to do.”

  “What if she has no idea what she wants?”

  “Well, then she’s lucky, because she is young. There I go making references to Pat Benatar songs again. ‘Love Is a Battlefield.’ Anyway, hardly anybody knows what he or she wants when they are young. You’re just being honest about it, maybe.”

  Nanette says she wonders if she’s over Alex because she doesn’t think about him much anymore.

  “And yet you just brought him up when we were talking about your future. That seems significant to me.”

  “How so?”

  “You tell me.”

  But Nanette cannot. She realizes that she made some sort of unconscious connection between Alex and the subject of the future, but he hasn’t been in contact even once since he was sent away to reform school, which is perhaps even more unforgivable than the violence he unleashed. She had written a letter but never sent it because she had no address and didn’t know who would read her words if she just sent them addressed generically to the reform school.

  June says, “It’s okay to love people who aren’t perfect. People who still have work to do on themselves.”

  Nanette nods, but she’s not sure she agrees as she watches the snow fall lightly outside the therapy room window.

  “Wrigley at the end of the book, when he’s just floating on the water’s surface—when he says he understands Unproductive Ted and vows to quit once and for all. Do you ever feel like that?” Nanette asks.

  “Of course,” June says.

  “What keeps you going?”

  “My work—helping people. I’ve always wanted to go to Japan, too, which I haven’t done just yet but will. Also, ice cream.”

  “Ice cream?”

  “I really love ice cream. Especially coffee ice cream with chocolate jimmies.”

  Nanette doesn’t know what she wants or loves, so she remains quiet.

  June says, “I didn’t know I wanted to go to Japan when I was your age. I didn’t know I wanted to be a therapist, either. I thought I was going to be a surgeon, mostly because my father was a surgeon. You pick up goals and hopes along the way. Don’t worry, there are more in your future. You’ll see. And you will change. Change can be good. Caterpillar to butterfly.”

  Nanette wonders why her parents have to pay three hundred dollars an hour for her to hear such reassuring positive words, even if they are clichés.

  Why doesn’t anyone at her school say things like this?

  She fears that June is paid to lie—or say what everyone else cannot.

  Nonetheless, Nanette likes June.

  She really does.

  Later that night, June sends Nanette an e-mail with a link to a YouTube video. It’s Pat Benatar performing the song “Invincible” live. In the video, Pat Benatar is confident and brash and defiant and encourages Nanette to take control of her life. Watching Pat Benatar sing and move is empowering, and Nanette can see why June loves this performer. Nanette pictures June singing “Invincible” in the mirror all through her divorce, trying to channel Pat Benatar’s swagger.

  Nanette watches the video several times and then downloads Pat Benatar’s Greatest Hits.

  She spends the entire night listening to Pat’s huge voice.

  Pat Benatar has a rebel personality, and Nanette wonders if this means June does, too.

  Nanette sings to herself in the mirror a little bit and that helps.

  She likes singing “All Fired Up” best.

  23

  A “Purple Pleasure Bondage Kit”

  When Nanette wakes up on Christmas morning, her parents are in her room grinning at her. “What’s going on?” she asks as she rubs her eyes.

  “Merry Christmas!” they chime as they thrust a small wrapped box at her. She notices that their hands are touching, making a little nest for the matchbox-sized present, like it’s a small bird. The wrapping paper is white, and there is a sky-blue ribbon tied in a bow at the top. “Open it!” her parents yell, and she hasn’t seen them this happy in a long time, so she pulls the ribbon and peels off the paper and opens the box. Inside is a key. Written in silver on the key is the word Jeep.

  “What is this?” Nanette says.

  Her mother rushes to the window and pulls open the blinds.

  “Look,” her father says, so Nanette rises from her bed and looks down through the window at a green two-door Jeep. The soft top is down. Nanette asks if it’s really for her, and her mom says, “We knew how much you liked riding around in Alex’s Jeep, so we got you your own. You’ll need a car next year, whatever you decide to do. This will give you a little more independence.”

  Before she knows what’s happening, Nanette and her parents are bundling up in jackets, scarves, mittens, hats, and smiles. Nanette plugs her iPhone into the USB port, plays her new Pat Benatar mix, and then is driving her parents around in the Jeep, which is used and a bit more rugged than the one Alex had, but a lot of fun to drive. Nanette sees her father smiling in the rearview mirror, the ends of his scarf flapping in the wind. She looks over at her mother, who is also grinning ear to ear. Without really thinking about it, Nanette takes her parents to the field where she saw the hunter’s moon with Alex. She cues up “Invincible” and goes for it. The field’s covered by a few inches of snow, but that’s no problem for the Jeep, and so she blasts through the powder with four-wheel drive and feels a wonderful sense of power every time she pushes down on the gas pedal. Her parents apparently know Pat Benatar’s “Invincible”; they sing and laugh like teenagers themselves as Nanette circles around the field, fishtailing and spinning tires, occasionally sending dirt and grass flying up behind them.

  A police car arrives with sirens and lights going, so Nanette turns down Pat Benatar, drives over to the road, and the O’Hares all get out of the Jeep. Nanette hopes that it might be Officer Damon, but instead it’s just a regular old mustache cop with a flabby belly.

  “Christmas present,” Nanette’s father explains, pats the hood of the Jeep, and then shrugs.

  “Neighbors called,” the officer says, and points to the houses nearby. “Maybe take it somewhere else?”

  “Of course, Officer,” Nanette’s mother says. “No problem.”

  “Happy Christmas,” the cop says, and then tips his hat.

  When the cop pulls away, Nanette’s father says, “Just wait a second.”

  Once the cop car is out of sight, her dad says, “One more lap around the field before we go. Whaddaya say?”

  “Seriously?” Nanette says.

  “Live a little,” her mom says. “And put on ‘All Fired Up’ again.” So Nanette hits the gas and they make tracks through the snow, laughing and singing and feeling free, before making their exit.

  “So?” her parents say when Nanette pulls into the driveway.

  “She loves it!” Nanette says.

  “You don’t need a boy to have fun in a Jeep,” her father says.

  “Not that there’s anything wrong with having a boyfriend,” her mom quickly adds.


  Inside, they eat breakfast and exchange more gifts. For her parents, Nanette bought items from the local novelty sex store: naughty dice, massage oils, handcuffs wrapped in pink fuzzy material. She thought it would be funny, but she also thought maybe it would help them find a spark again. As her mom and dad open up a “purple pleasure bondage kit,” Nanette begins to regret her choice of presents, especially since the awkward in the room is now palpable.

  “How did you know that we were sleeping together again?” Nanette’s mom asks. “Can you hear us through the walls?”

  Nanette’s father must see the horrified look on Nanette’s face because he says, “She’s kidding.”

  “The hell I am,” Nanette’s mom says as she attaches her wrist to Nanette’s dad’s with the pink fuzzy handcuffs, which simultaneously sickens and amuses Nanette to no end, especially when her dad squeezes her mom’s thigh.

  “So,” Nanette says. “Does this mean you guys are sticking together?”

  Nanette’s father puts his arm around her mom and says, “Your scare—or whatever you want to call it—you… being in need… it really brought us closer together. Gave us a common goal. Made us remember that we have something pretty great going on here. Our love made you, after all.”

  Nanette has a moment of clarity—she realizes that she is indeed the product of her parents’ love and that is why she was so worried about that specific love failing.

  “I’m over the open-mouth chewing, too,” Mom adds.

  “I’ve been trying really hard to chew with my mouth closed,” Dad says. “Have you not noticed?”

  There is a knock at the door.

  All three of them look at one another.

  “Anyone expecting someone?” her dad says.

  “No,” Nanette answers. “But Nanette will get it.”

  When she opens the door, a tall, thin boy with a shaved head and dressed in a jacket and a tie appears and says, “I like your Jeep. But you might want to put the top up. It’s snowing a little out here.”

  It takes her a moment to mentally add the weight and hair so that she can recognize him, but then she says, “Alex?”

  “It’s the new slimmed-down, hairless, preppy, reformed version of me. The bastards make me run seven miles a day—and before six AM. It’s insane. And speaking of crazy, I only have fifteen minutes. My dad is watching me from the street.” Alex turns around and waves to his dad, who waves back from a black sedan. Alex is hugging a brown paper grocery bag to his chest. His fingers are clenched so tight they’re glowing white in the cold December air. “They gave me a choice once I earned it. Either I was allowed to make a ten-minute phone call once every ten days, or I was allowed to bank the time and leave for twenty-four hours on Christmas. I chose Christmas because it meant that I might get to see you for even a little bit. But my dad says it can only be fifteen minutes—no more—and he has to chaperone. He still thinks you’re a bad influence on me. I had to tell him I was officially breaking up with you today. I’m not. Duh. But I agreed to his terms just to get this chance, so the clock is ticking now.”

  “Nanette?” her parents call from the other room. “Who is it?”

  She is too shocked to speak.

  “It’s weird,” Alex says. “My just showing up after so much silence. And today of all days. I know.”

  Her parents are now standing behind her.

  “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. O’Hare. Alex Redmer here. Merry Christmas!”

  “Are you okay, Nanette?” her father asks.

  She nods.

  “We’ll be right in the other room,” her mom says, and then her parents leave them standing in the doorway.

  “I write you poems every day,” Alex says, and then tries to hand Nanette the bag. “These explain everything. Will let you know exactly what I’ve been through these last few months. I still love you, Nanette. We can be together in the future. We just have to make it through this last bit of our childhoods.”

  She doesn’t take the bag. She doesn’t know what to say.

  “You’re mad at me,” Alex says. “I understand. It must have been quite a shock for you. I just saw Oliver earlier. He says you two have been hanging out. He says you’re best friends now. Made me a little jealous. Told him not to move in on my woman while I’m locked up.”

  “You can’t do this,” Nanette says. “Just pop in and out of Nanette’s life. Go all vigilante and then leave Oliver and Nanette behind to pick up the fragments of their lives and then expect them to be okay with your coming back whenever you want.”

  “I heard about the third-person thing. I think it’s kind of sexy.”

  “Not sexy. Important. Part of her therapy.”

  “Oliver says the pretty boys have completely—”

  “But what about Nanette? And Oliver has no friends. He’d be all alone if it weren’t for Nanette visiting him every day. And Nanette is all alone since you got yourself in trouble. You were her rebel partner, helping her through her transition, but then you just vanished and now you’re gone! Not fair!”

  “The poetry explains everything,” he says, and then offers her the bag once more. “Just read them. It’s pretty much my manifesto. If you disagree with what I’ve written, well, then I’ll just have to accept that. That’s what rebels do. But I think you’ll get it. Booker put us together because he knew—the part of him who was once Wrigley saw the parts of us who still are. I have to survive reform school for another six months, but then after that we could do amazing things together. If you can only wait for me. We have the rest of our lives! We can do whatever we want! We’ll be entirely free!”

  “Theoretically speaking—what will Alex and Nanette specifically do?”

  “Change the world!”

  “How? Nanette and Alex are just teenagers living in average suburban towns. They have no power or influence.”

  “Everyone who ever did anything revolutionary was just an eighteen-year-old kid once. George Washington, Malcolm X, Che Guevara, Nelson Mandela, Nigel Wrigley Booker. Social status is just a social construct, the primary function of which is to keep regular people oppressed and rebels in line. Read the poems and letters. You’ll understand.”

  “And then? What should Nanette do after reading?”

  “Wait for me. I’ll be in touch. Trust me.”

  Alex’s father beeps the horn, and Nanette thinks there’s no way fifteen minutes could have possibly passed, although time always seems to speed up whenever Alex is around.

  “I’m going to kiss you now,” he says, and then does exactly that before she can protest.

  When his lips land on hers, electricity once again shoots through her entire body, short-circuiting every rational thought in her head, and before she knows what she’s doing, she’s kissing him back—rebelling against her own better judgment.

  “I love you, Nanette O’Hare,” Alex says. “Someday you will love me, too—enough to say it back. Read the poems and letters.”

  Alex winks at her and then he’s in his father’s car, and Nanette is looking at the taillights getting smaller and smaller down the road, wondering what the hell just happened.

  When she returns to the living room, her dad says, “Should we be worried about your purchasing sex toys now that Alex is back in your life?”

  Suddenly that joke isn’t funny anymore. “Alex isn’t in Nanette’s life. He’s going back to reform school tonight. Won’t see him again for six more months, if ever.”

  “That’s an eternity in teenage years, correct?” Dad says.

  “What’s in the bag?” Mom asks.

  “Nothing,” Nanette says, and then retreats to her bedroom so that she can read Alex’s words, which she does without stopping until Christmas is officially over.

  When her parents knock on the door and ask if she is okay, she requests to be left alone, and after several knocks and questions, her parents finally grant that request.

  She does not sleep.

  She rereads everything several times.

/>   There are no straight-up letters, just poems that are sometimes dazzling or interesting but always cryptic.

  Here are the central themes and repeated images found in Alex’s poetry: cages, keys, turtles, parents, youth, Jeeps, rebellion, Independence Hall in Philadelphia, the Liberty Bell, and “the pretty boys” who populate his reform school, which seems ironic, since all of them are there because they rebelled. You’d think that he would like everyone else who is “imprisoned” along with him, but it’s teachers and counselors who are the heroes of his poems. He refers to them as “freedom fighters” and recounts many of the lessons that they teach him as he progresses through a “self-selected curriculum,” which seems to revolve mostly around The Autobiography of Malcolm X.

  It seems as if Alex is hiding behind metaphors and similes and symbolism, and she wishes he would have just written her simple letters explaining everything instead of giving her poems that stir up emotions in her chest, challenge her to think deeply, but ultimately explain nothing at all. She starts to fear that Alex is a coward and that poetry is sometimes a mask people wear when they do not wish to be seen or reveal what they are actually thinking. The more she reads, the more Nanette believes that Alex might be losing his mind, and yet there is an undeniable elegance woven throughout the words. She thinks of Hamlet and how Ophelia seemed to make her madness appear pretty. Nanette is afraid of Alex, and yet she finds him more attractive than anything else in her life.

  There are no poems about Nanette, and while she is no narcissist, as June has officially determined, it is hard to “wait” for a poet to return when he writes about every emotion he has except his professed love. Nanette begins to feel as though he is punishing her, injecting his every thought into her brain with the needle of poetry but never offering the thoughts she’d most like him to have. And yet, he came on Christmas; he gave her his poetry, which seems weighty. He said he loved her.