Little Children Page #6

- No no.

- Yes or no!

- I'm saying no.

- No, nobody...

- Jesus Christ,

that little f***ing weasel.

Larry, slow down.

Slow down, Larry!

- What now?

- Good evening, Mrs. McGorvey.

We were wondering

if Ronnie was home.

You leave him alone.

We just want a little

moment of his time. Just a little chat.

This is my house.

I pay the mortgage,

and I say who is

and isn't--

Yoo-hoo, Ronnie!

- Get your perverted ass down here now.

- I'm calling the police.

I hear they're well-disposed

to child molesters.

It's okay, Mommy.

Can I help you, gentlemen?

Ronnie, you go

on upstairs.

Larry, let him go. I think he gets

the point. We can go home now.

You listen to me, you

little piece of sh*t.

You stay the f*** away

from the town pool.

- You hear me?

- You're a bully!

My Ronnie would

never do what he did.

That poor child

at the mall--

what you did to him.

Larry?

Larry?

Why did she

say that?

Oh, don't pretend you

don't know about me.

Everybody knows.

Everybody!

Look, h-honestly,

I-- I don't know anything.

I remember hearing

something...

a few years ago

when we first moved here, but--

something about

a-- a shooting

at the mall.

That's-- that's it.

That's all.

I didn't even

know you then.

I'm sorry.

Sorry.

It's okay.

Dispatch said there

was a shooter loose at the mall.

It was 10 minutes

from the end of my shift.

been someone else.

I can still see that

boy's face staring up at me.

Yeah, but--

but it was an accident.

You were trying

to stop a guy,

and the-- the boy

g-got caught

in the crossfire,

right?

No, I panicked.

There was no shooter.

Just the boy.

Antoine Harris

was his name.

He was big for his age,

only 13 years old.

He was a good kid.

Thought it was a joke,

waving around an air gun

at his friend

in the Big 5.

They were acting out some scene

from some movie they liked.

Shop girl saw it

from across the way,

called 911.

Jesus, that's terrible.

That...

well, you didn't know.

It could have

been real.

But it wasn't.

His parents...

uh, his parents--

I had to...

I was diagnosed with post-traumatic

stress syndrome

by three different

psychiatrists.

That's why I retired.

I couldn't do

the job anymore.

- So why don't you do something else?

- Like what?

Drive a forklift

at Costco?

Maybe you could

go back to school.

I loved my job.

I don't wanna do

anything else.

You ever think about the term

"homeland security"?

I mean,

really think about it?

The day that

you found out

that your father had

been killed in Iraq,

do you remember

that day?

Can you talk

about that?

You feel comfortable

talking about that?

After the men came

to tell my mom,

I cried,

but she didn't.

She just went up

to her room

and grabbed the pillows

off the bed,

cut the tops off of them

with a pair scissors.

There were feathers

all over the place.

That must have really

frightened you.

No, she was trying

to find the crown.

The crown?

The crown you leave

in your pillow

when you've slept on it

for a long time.

My--

my father had

two crowns.

Stop there.

- You hungry?

- No.

Mind if I get

some lunch?

No, go ahead.

Brad?

Honey, you there?

Pick up.

I know you're there.

It's Aaron's nap time.

Okay, I guess you guys

are out somewhere.

Um...

I love you both.

Bye.

I certainly did.

Here we go.

I don't know, Jean.

I don't think I'm up for this.

Well, now don't

be silly.

- It'll be fun.

- Really?

You're not the only

little sister here tonight.

- Oh, that's good.

- Oh!

Hi, would you

like a glass?

Did anybody like this book?

Because I really just hated it.

It's so depressing.

She cheats on her husband

with two different guys,

wastes all his money,

then kills herself with rat poison?

Do I really need

to read this?

Well, there is a lot

of good descriptive writing.

It's supposed

to be depressing.

It's a tragedy.

Madame Bovary was undone

by a tragic flaw.

What's her flaw?

Blindness.

She didn't see

that the men were

just using her.

She just wants

a little romance in her life.

- You can't blame her for that.

- It's about women's choices.

Back then, a woman

didn't have a lot of choices.

You could be a nun

or a wife.

- That's all there was.

- Or a prostitute.

She had a choice.

She had a choice not

to cheat on her husband.

I found it refreshing

to read about a woman

reclaiming her sexuality.

Is that a nice way

of saying she's a slut?

Madame Bovary's

not a slut.

She's one of the great

characters in Western literature.

I was a little puzzled

by some of the sexual references.

Look,

like this one.

Um...

"He abandoned

every last shred

of restraint

and consideration.

He turned her

into something compliant,

something corrupt."

Does anyone know

what that means?

It means

she's a slut.

Is he tying her up

or something?

Anal sex.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Did everyone get that

but me?

Let's set that aside

for now.

I'm really eager

to hear what

our other little sister

has to say.

I'm not sure if you know this,

but Sarah has a Ph.D

in English lit.

Just a masters.

I never wrote

my dissertation.

Well, you still have

a lot more expertise

than the rest of us.

I think I understand

your feelings about this book.

I used to have some

problems with it myself.

When I read it

in grad school,

Madame Bovary just

seemed like a fool.

She marries

the wrong man,

makes one foolish mistake

after another.

But when I read it this time,

I just fell in love with her.

She's trapped.

She has a choice. She can either

accept a life of misery

or she can struggle

against it.

And she chooses

to struggle.

Some struggle--

hop into bed

with every guy

who says hello.

Well, she fails in the end, but there's

something beautiful

and even heroic

in her rebellion.

My professors would

kill me for even thinking this,

but...

in her own

strange way,

Emma Bovary

is a feminist.

Oh, that's nice.

So now cheating on your husband

makes you a feminist?

No no no.

It's not the cheating.

It's the hunger.

The hunger

for an alternative,

and the refusal to accept

a life of unhappiness.

Maybe I didn't

understand the book.

She just looks

so pathetic.

Is she pretty?

Who?

Your wife.

Degrading yourself

for nothing.

It's a simple question.

She's pretty, okay?

Do we have to talk about this now?

I mean, did she really think a man like

that was gonna run away with her?

Possibly.

How pretty is she?

A knockout.

Beauty's overrated,

Sarah.

Brad had meant this

to be comforting.

But at 3:
00 in the morning, it had

precisely the opposite effect.

He had a beautiful wife,

a knockout, and she was sleeping

beside him right now.

Only someone who took

his own beauty for granted

would have been able

to say something so stupid

and with a straight face.

Weekends were difficult

for Sarah.

separating one happy blur

of weekdays

from the rest.

I'm going to the ocean.

- You are?

- I'm going to the ocean.

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