We Need To Talk About Kevin

Eva works at a travel agency in Nyack. She describes the drama of the Bush v. Gore case that is happening in Florida, the result of the contested vote count in the presidential election. She reminisces about their decision to have a child in 1982, a decision that would eventually lead to the tragedy of what she always calls “That Thursday” (20). 

She and Franklin had gone to brunch with a couple, Brian and Louise. She felt as if the evening was too nice, with too little friction. She remembers wanting Brian to touch her; they had had a quick fling in the past, but only once, before meeting Franklin. After the lunch, she and Franklin began talking about having a child.

Eva travels a lot for variety for the agency. She writes a series of travel guides called A Wing and a Prayer (AWAP). After talking to Franklin, she began thinking motherhood would be an exotic new experience. Franklin was not as ambitious; he only wanted to be happy and thought a child would make them even happier. Eva thinks she was always more selfish than Franklin. She unabashedly wondered if a child would give her more validation and love, making her feel even better than she does with Franklin.

Eva writes about the ongoing election drama in Florida. She is shocked by how distraught her coworkers are about the voting recount: “Only a country that feels invulnerable can afford political turmoil as entertainment” (38). She doesn’t understand how they can feel so safe or make so much distress out of a relatively small event.

Eva begins retracing her timeline. Kevin was born near the end of 1982. That Thursday happened in 1999. The word “pregnant” always had negative connotations to her. She never went into a maternal fever during which the idea of a baby consumed her, but Franklin had a void she wanted to assuage. He always said that he loved her in a different way than she loved him. His work—scouting locations for photography shoots for advertisements—never gave him the same fulfillment as Eva’s work.

She summarizes a brief history of AWAP, which became a success in the middle of the 1960s. Originally, it was a bohemian travel guide. She realizes as she writes that she always had a horror of being left behind, so she was always the first one to leave on a trip. This ensured she was never merely a part of someone else’s story.

While waiting to visit Kevin in Chatham, Eva handwrites a letter. A couple next to her is arguing about the ballot recounts. Eva lists many of the qualities she always thought her ideal man would embody. Then she describes Franklin, who had few of the qualities she thought she wanted.

She writes that she is surprised she married a Republican and an American. They met when he came to AWAP to discuss ads. Despite her political misgivings, she found his unconditional love of America endearing.

Eva visits Chatham frequently, though her visits initially embarrassed Kevin. Now he embraces his infamy. He says he hates Eva and sees through her visits. He knows she is only there to punish herself and to enjoy his incarceration. She says she often hates him too. She concludes the chapter by writing that Kevin has taken the idea of home from her. She is now an exile, and he has made her a foreigner in every way.

Eva gets off work early for the holiday and is “hysterical” at being home at five with an entire evening to fill. She realizes that she’s waiting for Franklin to come home, which reminds her of a night in May of 1982. Franklin was three hours late. When he finally called, it was to tell her his truck had broken down and he would be on his way soon.

That night, they made love and she did not use her diaphragm for birth control. They try to get pregnant for six weeks, and she finds the lack of spontaneity diminishes some of the enjoyment she gets from sex. Soon she starts to dislike her body and views it as little more than a carrier for an eventual host. When the gynecologist tells her she is pregnant she goes pale. Eva is not excited and quickly resents the fact that she can no longer drink.

Eva tells Franklin about a combative conversation in which Kevin accused her of not wanting to have him. She admitted she thought she did but eventually changed her mind. She had thought it would be easy to bond with him. Kevin mocks her profession, and she retaliates by asking him if he would want himself. She remembers staring at pregnant women with horror and pity before she became pregnant herself. She apologizes to Franklin as she compares her pregnancy to an infestation. 

Eva and Franklin made a deal. She hated Franklin’s surname, Plaskett. If they had a boy, he would have her last name. A girl would have Franklin’s last name. Eva then provides a list of recent school shootings, a list that she will add to each time a new shooter emerges in the story’s chronology.

Eva worries that blaming herself for Kevin’s crimes aggrandizes herself, which is not her intention. She knows some people blame her, like Mary Woolford, who lost her daughter. Eva wanted to tell her during the civil trial that winning the trial wouldn’t make her feel better about the tragedy. Eva believes that litigious people think bad things shouldn’t happen to them. 

Eva’s attorney, Harvey Landsdown, thought she should settle. He treated law like a game, and Eva says he didn’t care that she was a bad mother. She did not want to settle, but neither did she want exoneration for her role in Kevin’s life. 

Eva recalls a disturbing memory of the science fiction movie Mimic, in which a woman gives birth to a maggot. This reminds her of a woman she went to college with. When Eva saw her again, after the woman had had a child, all the woman talked about was the disaster pregnancy had caused to her body. She never mentioned the baby. It disturbed Eva because she feared she was just like her. 

Eva recounts the unbearable pain of the birth, which came two weeks later than the projected due date. She resisted an epidural and only pushed when threatened with a cesarean. During the birth, she focused on her loathing for Franklin, the doctor, and everyone who had slighted her. She begged for an epidural, but only when it is too late. She eventually came to see this as a moment of weakness and failure.

The election conflict ends. The subsequent mood in Eva’s office is like postpartum depression. Eva tells Franklin the story of her surprise 10th birthday party. She was disappointed by every aspect of it and cried afterward, even though her parents had gone to a great deal of trouble to give her a perfect party. She felt ashamed and didn’t understand why she was let down. As an adult, she writes that the party was too easy to imagine. When Kevin was born, she had wanted something she couldn't imagine. She had imagined having her own child as having a ticket to a country only she could visit. 

Kevin had resisted nursing instantly, gagging at the nipple as if Eva repulsed him. She kept waiting to feel love for the baby, but she never felt a breakthrough of emotion. Instead, she quickly felt bored and the mundanity of parenthood. As the doctors stitched her up after the birth, she promised herself she would never let anyone know how unmoving she found the entire experience.

Eva tells Franklin about her office Christmas party and describes her boss, Wanda, who hired her after Thursday. At the party, Wanda asks if she has gotten any help dealing with the aftermath of Thursday. Eva thanks her for her concern but knows that writing to Franklin is her only help. She describes the days after Kevin’s birth. He refused to nurse and wouldn’t take Eva’s breast milk from a bottle. Nevertheless, the doctor urged her not to let her milk dry up even though the lactating and pumping made her sore and uncomfortable. Eva could never get Kevin to smile, and she believed that he knew her smile was insincere. 

She reminds Franklin that he loved the idea of America more than the actual country. To help him understand, she says it was analogous to her feelings for and about Kevin. Eva contracted mastitis and stopped attempts at nursing.

This is when her struggle with Kevin truly began. The baby had shrieked ceaselessly with outrage when Franklin was away, then stopped as soon as he returned. She describes these quiet moments as “Fits of peace” (102). Soon, she irrationally began to mistrust Franklin since they had different perceptions of the baby, who was pitting them against each other by showing them two different versions of himself. Eva is convinced that even as a baby Kevin hated being alive. 

She accused Franklin of not believing her about Kevin’s crying and her own illness. She shows him a thermometer: she has a 104-degree fever. He apologizes and says they have to go to the hospital. While they are there, the doctor says she has mastitis. She wonders if Franklin still would have apologized if the fever had been any lower.