Kind of left poor Alys Kinsey seeming like the bad guy last week… sorry, Alys, it was a bit of a surprise when your ex actually showed she has the capacity to be domestic with someone.
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TRANSCRIPT
Panel 1 (down-shot of Alex, Imogen, and Kinsey’s dresses, Kinsey’s arms outstretched)
Alex: I didn’t let her, she needed a place to stay!
Kinsey: The whole with with Eris was that you didn’t want her to-
Panel 2 (Imogen, closeup)
Imogen: I-it’s not like that, really!
Panel 3 (Alex looks on in concern while Imogen looks ashamed/secretive)
Imogen: I’m… separating from my husband. The kids and I are only staying with Alex until I figure that out.
Panel 4 (Alex, explaining; Imogen, aaaaAAAA)
Alex: He was an asshole. Imogen’s going back to school.
Imogen: I mean, maybe! I’m looking into it!
Panel 5 (Imogen close-up, awkward)
off-panel: How good for you! It can be tough to start again.
off-panel: Best thing I ever did, though, even with kids.
off-panel: My husband’s non-profit works with battered women, do you want me to get you in touch?
Imogen: O-oh, that’s not necessary, thank you!
I’m loving it that Imogen met with support and enthusiasm instead of pity and shame. She might be feeling a bit embarrassed about her situation and she shouldn’t, but it’s nice that Alex’s friends were cool.
I think, even though everyone’s being supportive, it doesn’t fit in Imogen’s mental model, so she can’t *feel* supported?
Gonna take a while to de-Jonathan that self-esteem.
And suddenly lightbulbs went off over every woman’s head….
Imogen’s gonna need to learn that grace and love and support are good things that CAN happen to her without stipulations or catches, and she doesn’t have to feel weird or bad or distrustful about it. But I suspect that’s gonna take a long time. 😭💔🫂
Also, the whole *thing* with Eris was that Alex didn’t want her to… WHAT? Please finish that sentence, Kinsey. I want to know what specifically Alex was trying to avoid!
Alex didn’t want Eris to join her when she moved to the suburbs. It’s referenced way back in Chapter 5; Imogen asks if Eris didn’t want to move to the big house and one of the other friends said that actually, Eris *did* and that was the problem. Sounds like, for whatever reason(s), Alex hasn’t wanted to cohabitate with any of her previous partners (that we know of, anyway).
I thought there might be more details we didn’t get the first time around, but…yeah, that was probably what Kinsey meant. Ah well. Maybe more backstory later!
“The whole *thing* with Eris was–” PEOPLE CAN CHANGE, KINSEY.
Ah, I see my prediction was correct, but yeah, Kinsey, maybe ask Alex that kind of thing not in front of the person you’re talking about as if they’re not present, yeesh. Still, glad to see it wasn’t her digging at Imogen, specifically.
Wait, so Eris wanted to move in but has never come to one of Alex’s concerts before?