Chapter four: Heartburn

The same day I watched Suffragette, that evening, I curled up with my laptop to watch Heartburn. This one is another Nora Ephron film, and it's autobiographical, which sucks when you think about the plot. Poor Nora! The movie is about a woman named Rachel Samstat (Meryl) who is a cookbook author living in New York. She meets a handsome, notoriously single man at a friend's wedding named Mark Forman. He has a career as a columnist in Washington, and Rachel is taken aback by his strikingly good looks. (Clearly she and I do not have the same taste in men, but that's beside the point. Sorry Jack Nicholson.) When the wedding is over, Mark and Rachel grab drinks together where they each talk about their past marriage. Mark's past marriage was to a jewish woman named Kimberly, and Rachel's was to a man named Charlie who had two hamsters, Arnold and Shirley. He adores those animals, because Rachel says he would dress them up in tiny sweaters, prepare little salads for them, and act as Arnold's high, squeaky voice, while she portrayed Shirley's. Eventually the hamster thing became a little too much for her, and the marriage ended in divorce after nine years. After drinks, the two share a sidewalk kiss, and they go back to Mark's apartment for a date.

It's four in the morning, and Rachel walks out of the kitchen with a a bowl of spaghetti carbonara for the two of them."Rachel, this is the best spaghetti carbonara I've ever had." Mark says."You're making fun of me. You probably think it's very borshwa to cook for somebody on the first date. You probably think I do this for everybody." Rachel responds.

"When we're married," Mark continues, "I want this once a week."

"I'm never getting married again. I don't believe in marriage."

Rachel admits. "Neither do I." Mark agrees. This scene is quite ironic, because what follows is their wedding.

It's a small occasion, and Rachel is in the bedroom, sprawled out, having second thoughts, and spitting out statistics to the friends that come to relax her.

"Fifty percent of all marriages end in divorce."

"Not second marriages." A friend of hers comforts.

"Forty percent of all second marriages in divorce."

No one is able to get through to her, until Mark visits, holds her, and promises to love her - a promise which he eventually breaks. The two have a beautiful wedding ceremony, which got me emotional as weddings always do.

As newly-weds, the couple purchases a rundown home where a fire occurred and renovations are necessary. As they show off the house to their skeptical friends, Julie and Arthur Seagull, Rachel points out that they got the house for a good price, and the reason why they bought it in the first place was because it still has its original fireplace. Mark and Rachel hire a Hungarian contractor, and on their way home from a dinner party, they realize they have been swindled. As they try to get ahold of their contractor, he says he has cancer, and when Mark tries to track him, he has an unlisted address.

Rachel sits on her dusty couch as Mark's temper flares. "What are you angry at me for?" she whimpers. "I'm not angry at you," he says, still irate. "Well then what are you shouting at me for?" Rachael says in a loud cry. "Cause you're the only one that's here." Mark answers matter-of-factly. "I just- I hate it when you get angry. I'm sorry, I'm sorry." She wipes the tears from her eyes. "Jesus Christ. I'm not angry at you. I love you." Mark sits with her, and they hug. Rachel breaks the silence,

"We can't have a baby in this. It'll have asthma before its a month old."

Rachel sighs. "Well, we'll just have to wait until we finish the house to have a baby."Mark hypothesizes. She smiles and Mark says, "If this is your way of telling me that we've got less than nine months to finish this renovation, it's a really weird way of doing it.

"Well,"

Rachel pauses,

"We- we're having a baby. I think. I think, we're having a baby."

"We're having a baby?" he questions. "Oh baby!" That evening, the two of them eat pizza together, as they sing all of the songs about babies that they know.

When the house is fixed up, and the baby is born, Rachel loves motherhood, and her life, more than she expected to. Mark does too, but he's out a lot. He is always complaining about how his socks turn up missing, and he spends his afternoons going out to buy more. Meanwhile, Rachel has a friend named Betty Davis, who is the first in town to be aware of all gossip. She tells her that Thelma Rice, the town's tallest, well-known slut, is having an affair because, "She got her legs waxed for the first time." Rachel doesn't connect the dots until she is seven months pregnant with her second child, and in the middle of a hair appointment.

During the appointment, her stylist describes how her husband revealed his affair to her, but she should have caught on sooner because of all the long-hour errands he ran. Rachel realizes that the behaviors of her hair stylist's husband are similar to Mark's. Her eyes get wider and wider, and her facial expression grows more restless, as the camera zooms in closer on her face. It clicks. She leaves the salon and drives home in a frenzy.

Up to Mark's office she goes to rummage through papers in search of evidential proof. Just as he returns home, Rachel unlocks a drawer with credit card receipts and check memorandums stuffed in it. She pulls the drawer out and takes it with her into the bathroom where she pretends to be starting a bath. Over in the next room, Mark is taking off his suit, when the door bangs open.

"I know about you and Thelma Rice."

Rachel proclaims bluntly.

"I know everything. It's all here."

"Shit," Mark interrupts.

"You didn't even have the decency to hide the evidence you just- threw it in a drawer."

She drops the draw and kneels as she files through it. "Hotels, motels." "Shit." Mark repeats. "You couldn't even pay cash like a normal philanderer. You charged everything. I mean look at this. Flowers. Look at all these flowers that you bought her!"And you occasionally brought me home a bunch of wilted Zinnias. Her composure vanishes entirely.

"How can you do this?! If I'm such a bitch then tell me!"

She cries.

"Don't do this, we have a baby Mark. We have another baby coming! Don't you even care about them?"

"Of course I care," he says. "Do you- love her?" Rachel asks. "I can't do this. I can't do this right now." Mark gets up. He leaves the room and Rachel gives a facial expression that reads, 'Oh, you're the one who can't do this right now?' She sobs into her hands. That scene used to make me cry, but it's become one of my favorite scenes in cinema history. I love the raw, unapologetic, true emotions in it.

Rachel picks herself up, packs her suitcase, and takes herself and her daughter on a plane ride to her father's house in New York where she stays for a few days to drown her feelings in a bowl of mashed potatoes. She waits around the house for Mark to call, but realizing that he won't, she gets her own life on track. She has her old job back at publishing company, and she is back attending group therapy. On the way there, a man winks at her, at his eyes are focused on the ring she is wearing. It's a ring Mark gave her after she got pregnant for the first time. The man looks fishy to her, so she twists the ring inward. That way, he can't see the diamond. But, the man follows her to group, and right after Rachel tells them that Mark is in love with someone else, they are robbed. Rachel is forced to give up her ring.

On her way to the apartment afterwards, Mark is waiting for her outside.

"I want you to come back,"

he says.

"Is that a new blazer?" She asks.

"You belong at home. I love you."

Hearing this makes Rachel sob, and Mark inches closer to her. "I'm not coming home if you're gonna see her anymore."

"I'm not gonna see her anymore,"

Mark assures her. "Ever? Not even accidentally?" "Rachel I said I'm not gonna see her anymore, and I'm not gonna see her anymore. I know this difficult for you. It's difficult for me too."

"Alright, I'll come home."

Rachel relents "Good," Mark sighs in relief. "Now you can put the ring back on." She exhales. "Rachel, for god, sake put the ring back on." "I gave it away," she says flatly. "What?"Mark says. She repeats herself. "You gave the ring away?" Mark asks. "Not of my own free will." "Someone took it away from you?" "Yes," she nods. "Do you want me to guess who it was?"

"My group was robbed."

"By an outsider, or someone in the group?"Mark interrogates jokingly. "By an outsider, and it isn't funny. He held a gun to my head." "Well maybe I can get a column out of it." "It happened to me! It's mine! On top of which it was really awful. He twisted my arm-" Rachel tells him. "Awh, show daddy where." he teases. "Oh, shut up." It starts to rain."Well, if we get going, we can still catch the seven o'clock." Mark decides.

Rachel returns home, but she can sense that her marriage will never be the same as it once was. She knows something isn't right, but she hates waiting to figure out what it is. She hates this point in her life. At the grocery store one day, she meets her friend Betty who is cracking down on who Thelma Rice is having an affair with. She suspects it's Arthur Seagull Rachel tells Betty that Thelma isn't having an affair with Arthur Seagull, because she just saw her at the Gynecologist the other day, and Thelma has gotten a terrible infection from the toilet seat of a Vietnamese restaurant she ate at. (A lie to make Thelma mad.) Betty thinks this news is horrible, so she decides to throw a party for Thelma.

The next day, Rachel takes a plane to New York to fulfill a work commitment, and when she returns home, her baby is born. Her ring is also waiting for her in a return envelope because the perpetrator confessed. The diamond in the ring is loose. Oddly enough, Thelma's birthday is during the same week that Rachel is in the hospital.

When she is released from the hospital, Rachel goes to the jeweler to have the diamond in her ring tighten into place. While waiting, the jeweler asks her,

"So, how did you like the necklace?"

Rachel turns back around,

"The necklace?"

"I must be thinking of another customer." "No, no, you're not. I thought Mark had bought a birthday present when I was in the hospital. He shouldn't have done that." "I shouldn't have said anything." "Oh, no, it's okay Leo. At least I now know what to be prepared for. Nothing worse than opening a box with a necklace in it when you're not in the mood for a necklace." "When have you ever not been in the mood for a necklace?" "I can think of circumstances where I might not be really." "All done." "How much?" "No charge."

"How much would you give me for the ring?"

"You don't really want to sell it." "I really wanna sell it. Do you really wanna buy it?" "I always told you I'd buy this ring from you." "Well I love the ring Leo, but it just doesn't go with my life. now. I mean, it never would've been stolen in the first place if I hadn't been wearing it on the subway, and if you have a ring that you can't wear on the subway you pretty much have to take cabs all the time, and then, before you know it , you know, we're broker than we already are. Mark is such a romantic he must have spent every penny of the savings on that necklace."

"For the down payment,"

Leo nods in affirmation. Rachel's eyes fixate."For the down payment," she repeats. "It's a beautiful necklace," Leo confirms.

"How much for the ring?"

she asks.

In the last ten minutes, Rachel, Mark, Julie, and Arthur have all been invited to a dinner at Betty's that night. Rachel is making key lime pie to bring to the dinner. During dessert, she takes the pie, slams it in Mark's face, asks him for the car keys, and tells Betty she won't be able to make it to Thelma's party. She walks out of the house, and onto a plane with her children. She is leaving Washington. She is leaving Mark. Officially.

I love this movie. I suppose it really speaks to the feminine strength that a woman possess. Something personal that I realized while watching the ending of this movie for the very first time was how strongly I was rooting for Rachel. I was so happy when she left Mark. Then, I was reminded of my stutter that I have, and the role that it plays in my life. I am in a poisoned relationship with the stutter that I have, like Rachel was in a poisoned relationship with Mark. I thought of it as an impossible obstacle that I would never be able to gain control of, because it hindered me in so many ways I can't even begin to explain it. Yes, I am aware that the two entities are entirely different, so it's corny. But after watching this movie, I realized that If she could find the courage to leave Mark, I certainly should have no problem leaving my stutter behind, because you can leave any negativity behind you. I should be rooting for myself as hard as I was rooting for Rachel.

As always, thank you for the entertainment, Meryl.