Chapter 2, Marching into something good [Part 1]

Recap:
Hello again Book Club members! Last time we finished chapter 1; it was... an experience. We met our protagonist, the Zero- a super humble, down to earth, God fearing country boy looking for love. We met his entire dysfunctional family and got to see the inner workings of his multi-million dollar business conglomerate. Okay we didn't see that last part, but that would have been neat- I'm still curious about his Jay Gatsbyesque wealth. The Zero was introduced to our heroine, the fair Meri Brown, a married polygamist in a bitterly unhappy situation- saddled with a man child for a husband, three extra spousal partners, and lifestyle that is bound to dry up once her reality show gets cancelled. Luckily, the Zero is enchanted by our leading lady and promises to free her from her life of hum drum misery; he has just promised to teach her how to fly from her metaphorical cage. Let's watch shall we?

Chapter 2: 
Onto Chapter 2, “Meri’s Seduction”- woops, it's “Marching into something good.” Six of the chapters in the book are arranged in chronological order and named for the month of the relationship in which the events occur. It seemed asinine at first, but it’s a really confusing relationship and I constantly found myself scrolling back to determine when something was supposed to be happening. So cheers Author, that was actually pretty handy. See, I’m capable of giving compliments.

This Chapter is forever long. Seriously, it’s 31 pages, which is 20% of the entire book, so I’m going to break this review down into three parts.

The Zero already told us how he started talking to Meri on Twitter in March (literally less than 10 pages ago) but since this chapter begins in March with the start of the relationship he states he has to be repetitive and tell you the exact same thing all over again, but slightly differently. You know, like he’s a robot and if he didn’t start at the beginning again he’d hit some sort of infinite loop error and be unable to proceed otherwise.

I’m going to spare everyone from rehashing too much and just share any new insights, few and uninteresting though they may be.

Hmm, at the beginning of March the zero was living in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and working in one of the offices of his many nondescript businesses. He was barely using Twitter and had all of ten followers, like he has any more than that now, but whatever, when he started talking to Meri. He gives a really boring speech about how he just doesn’t get Twitter or why strangers would want to follow strangers; I just don’t care. If you’re so above using Twitter then don’t use Twitter? Your ten followers will survive without you.

Forsooth, I hath nary a one

On March 1st the Zero tweets Meri about the Sister Wives finale; on the 2nd she followed his account because he was so gallant. When she messages him to wish him a happy birthday he responds with, “Thanks you are very intriguing,” and after rolling my eyes I about did a back flip because we are finally seeing some quotation marks. Seriously, people are going to talk to each other, stuff is going to happen, shit is about to get real.

He sort of changes the birthday story he told us earlier, again ten pages ago; now, instead of being so caught up in Meri’s charms that he doesn’t leave his house to attend his dinner, it’s also due to the fact that he’s busy throwing a pity party of his own. “I admit I was feeling sorry for myself. Another birthday with no parents, no little brother around. My immediate family had all passed away years before. I had no wife, no kids. No girlfriend. I was in full on pity party.” This is a really abrupt way to introduce that your entire family is dead, bummer. I'm sorry? I’m mostly sad that this means we’re never going to learn anything about the Zero’s mom other than that she existed. Farewell Zero’s Mom, we hardly knew ye.

When they talk the first day the Zero is surprised to learn that Meri has a “killer sense of humor.” He elaborates, “I did not expect that from her. I thought she was a conservative, quiet,kind woman,” because apparently those qualities are mutually exclusive from funny or something. Funny and kind, but that’s impossible!

They enjoy talking to one another and the Zero says, “She could have stopped at any time she wanted to.” And… I’ll take things a rapist would say for $1,000, Alex, to finish out the category. Bro, honestly, step back and listen to the crap that comes out of your mouth.

On repeat in the Zero's mind

They start exchanging childhood stories and discover that, “Both of us grew up being taken care of but not feeling completely sure of ourselves.” So pretty much, you grew up like average children. So interesting.

Their backgrounds were vitally different, obviously, since Meri grew up as a Mormon fundamentalist in a polygamist family and the Zero grew up Catholic to a degree that only the Pope could understand. He provides the reader with a very basic summary of what Mormon fundamentalists believe, which he pretty much boils down to if you feel called to live polygamy, you go find someone who feels the same, and you do it.

Meri felt called to polygamy; thus, she did it. She believed, and believes in it wholeheartedly, but, after 25 long years of marriage to an insensitive, self-centered jerk she was beginning to become disillusioned and “fall out” of love with her husband. Enter the Zero. “She needed me. She wanted to get to know me because I was everything he was not. I am the exact opposite of him. I'm kind all of the time. I'm thoughtful and sweet. I'm very affectionate and love saying sweet nicknames. I'm attentive and available 24/7. She was not at all used to someone being in her life like that. And there I was. All she was missing.” And there he was, so perfect, so modest, so not Kody, so convenient.

So the Zero and Meri quickly establish a routine where they are either constantly talking on the phone or texting. They talk about everything; “There was no topic off limits, including our sex lives.” Mainly, they talked about how they weren’t getting any. The Zero stopped having sex once the unnamed she-devil left that gaping hole in his chest where his heart used to be, and Meri had a fight with Kody about a month prior that had left her feeling averse to any more intimacy with him.

The Zero seems disinterested in being an actual friend to Meri, pretty much right off the bat. Instead of saying something like 'Gee Meri, that sounds terrible. You should do whatever you can to salvage your 25 year marriage- take a romantic trip, go to counseling, whatever it takes!' he just convinces her that he’s a hunk who happens to be the anti-Kody who can offer her anything she can imagine.

“She kept remarking how sweet I was to her. She didn't deserve my friendship.” Mmm. Because I’m sure you didn’t try to intentionally make her feel beneath you and undeserving of your attention when it should absolutely be the other way around right?

Perversely the douche bag of a Zero blames Meri for the direction their relationship was taking, “Meri was leading us into a really scary place.”  Meri was leading you? It's just Meri responsible for this now?

 You and me both

So they start flirting with the idea of crossing the line between friendship and adultery in the standard way, by flirting. “In my mind she was a divorced woman,” so the Zero rationalizes that it’s pretty much game on. Meri begs to differ, however, and says that, “she considered herself still married but it was complicated.” Much like her sister wives aren’t legally married to Kody, obviously because of bigamy laws, she is still spiritually married to him. And I think this marks the first official instance where Meri is like, um hey dude, no.

Meri starts sharing more about her marriage with Kody and it’s pretty much what you’d expect from a 25 year long marriage, even if you hadn’t seen a single episode of the show. Kody always picks where they go and what they do on their date nights; poor Meri is just along for the ride since her time with him is so limited. If Kody’s not busy sitting on his butt watching tv, he complains a lot. Common stuff.

Out of nowhere the Zero asks, “So when did we really start talking on the phone? Well here's my proof.” And the next two pages are screenshots of his cell phone bill along with a clinical description of what each call entailed. And they say romance is dead. Seriously, this is the strangest thing I’ve ever seen. Usually this stuff has no place outside of a non-fiction book about a murder, where this would be submitted as evidence or something. Maybe it’s just this era’s new version of the love letter, who am I to judge.

We’re back to talking about how funny Meri is, because Zero + Humor = 4 Eva. The Zero describes how dumb he is with, “She is so smart that when she says a smartass comment it hit me so hard I didn't catch it,” and “I told her stories about how dumb I had been. Or sometimes I would ask a really dumb question and she would just die laughing.” Nice, he’s that guy who laughs the loudest and has absolutely no idea what the joke means. Who wants to bet that Meri had to sit through that damn llama story, twice. Poor Meri.

The Zero then describes his laugh, because that’s super important, “I throw my head back and if it's really funny I hold my heart, bend over a little and crack up laughing almost folded in half.” Maybe it is important though, if it weren’t for the laughing part it would sound like he was describing a heart attack. Might want to get that checked out.

Zero laughing- visual approximation

 

The Zero is so narcissistic, self-absorbed, and obsessed with this humor concept that he has the balls to say, “When she filmed the finale from the latest season where she was crying remembering our time together. The reason why she was so emotional is because we honestly laughed every day.” What the actual fuck? No, you imbecile. She was crying because of the emotional trauma your brief little relationship inflicted on her and, by extension, her family. You actually think she was sobbing because she missed laughing about how you couldn't move a couch that one time? This cannot be for real. No one can be this oblivious.

Would you kindly, Zero?

That wraps up the first part of our three part series on Chapter 2. Hope to see you again for our next segment, where things are about to get sexy. Vaguely sexy. Well, an approximation of sexy. Okay, there will be sex. There will be someone's idea of sex.

Awww yeah.

-Kate