A Visit from the Goon Squad

Bennie and Stephanie have moved with their son Christopher to a wealthy community called Crandale. At this point, Bennie and Stephanie are still married, and Bennie has just made a lot of money selling his record label. Stephanie finds the people of Crandale unwelcoming, and this wears on her. She thinks they are snobs, and their coldness bothers her, but she is confused by why she is bothered.

Bennie’s family joins the Crandale Country Club. In the locker room, a woman named Kathy says hello to Stephanie. Stephanie recognizes her because Kathy’s son goes to Christopher’s school. Stephanie notes that her body has been unchanged by childbearing. After leaving the locker room, Stephanie meets Bennie and Christopher by the snack stand, and hears people playing tennis, which causes a rush of nostalgia for her. Stephanie was a good player as a teenager. Later that evening, still at the country club, Bennie and Stephanie sip gin and tonics, and Bennie says, “so this is what it’s like.” Stephanie jokes to herself that there is no better way to mark one’s success than going to a place one doesn’t belong. Stephanie mentions buying a tennis racket.

Three weeks later, Stephanie and Bennie are invited to a party after a neighbor discovers that Bennie signed his favorite band, the Conduits. After tennis practice, Stephanie comes home and finds Bennie and the neighbor talking about the band. She feels good because she’d hit well at tennis practice. She also feels proud of how different she is than the other Crandale women, with her dark hair and tattoos—though she notes that she did buy a little white tennis dress to wear while playing.

At the neighbor’s cocktail party, Stephanie talks with Kathy, who introduces Stephanie and Bennie to her husband, Clay. Clay wears seersucker shorts and a pink oxford shirt, which Stephanie thinks would look ironic on a different sort of person. She senses Bennie looking at Kathy, which makes her uncomfortable. Kathy suggests they play tennis sometime, and Stephanie agrees. She feels that this is a victory, but also feels ridiculous for feeling that way.

Stephanie and Kathy soon become successful tennis partners, playing against other Crandale women. Kathy’s status in the Crandale community makes Stephanie feel at ease, in spite of her dark hair and tattoos. Yet despite their relationship, Stephanie does not like Kathy, who is a Republican and would be dumbstruck if she found out that Stephanie’s older brother, Jules had assaulted actress Kitty Jackson during an interview. Stephanie feels proud of herself when her tennis skills approach the level of Kathy’s.

As time passes, Bennie begins to sense that people in the community do not trust him. During the family’s second summer at Crandale, they attend a cocktail party where the conversation swerves toward Al Qaeda’s presence in New York City. One of the men in the conversation keeps glancing at Bennie, suggesting he may be a terrorist. They leave the party and Bennie asks Stephanie what he is doing living in a place like Crandale. Stephanie tries to defend the Crandale residents, saying that Bennie is paranoid, but Bennie calls her out, suggesting that everyone was racially profiling him. Stephanie hugs him, and suggests they move, but Bennie looks around at his home, thinking of all the work he has put into it. He says the other people can move, but he will not. Bennie says he will die in the house, and they both double over in laughter.

Bennie begins giving Stephanie a hard time about playing tennis with Crandale women, whom he calls fascists. Stephanie is unwilling to break the friendship that gives her easy assimilation in the Crandale community, however. She does not want to be like her outcast neighbor Noreen, who has awkward mannerism and shaky hands. None of the Crandale women talk to her.

Stephanie begins scheduling her tennis games later in the day so Bennie won’t see her in her tennis outfit. This is easy to do since Stephanie has begun working freelance for a PR woman named La Doll. Stephanie writes this deception off as protecting Bennie, instead of lying. She notes that Bennie has told his share of lies over the years.

The following spring, Stephanie’s brother, Jules, is released from prison, where he’d spent five years for the attempted rape of Kitty Jackson. In prison, he’d gone on medication for bipolar disorder, and made peace with a failed engagement. A writer, he’d also written a piece about the effect of 9/11 on the inmates, which won a PEN Prison Writing award. Stephanie has noticed, however, that Jules seems to be struggling.

One morning, Bennie asks if Stephanie is driving to the city for work. She has begun leaving her tennis outfit at the gym so she can go play without Bennie knowing. If Bennie asked, like he did this morning, she would tell him she was going to a meeting, which was partially true since the meetings were later in the day. Stephanie lies and tells Bennie she is going to see her client Bosco—the guitarist for the Conduits—at ten. Bennie is suspicious, knowing Bosco is an alcoholic and never awake that early. Bennie asks her to call him after the meeting, and Stephanie knows she will have to cancel her tennis game.

Stephanie cancels her game and, returning to the kitchen, finds Jules at the window. He asks what is up with the neighbor, Noreen. Stephanie says she is nuts. Noreen is doing something near their shared fence, but Stephanie can’t figure out what. Jules asks if he can catch a ride to the city. On the way out, Jules notes that he thinks Noreen is watching them. Jules fears she might be dangerous, and Stephanie jokes that it takes one to know one.

On the ride to the city, Jules mentions that he plans to join Stephanie in her meeting with Bosco. She wonders if this is some kind of punishment for lying to Bennie. As they drive on the expressway, Jules asks if she is having an affair. Stephanie says he is out of his mind, but then wonders why he is asking such a question. Jules tells her she and Bennie seem jumpy, different than he remembered them. Stephanie feels afraid that Bennie is cheating on her, despite his promise that he would stop.

Jules admits it may just be Crandale that is making Stephanie and Bennie seem different. The place is packed with Republicans, and Jules can’t believe Stephanie and Bennie spend time with them. He feels everything is different since he returned from prison. The twin towers have fallen, security is high, and everyone sounds stoned when they are talking because they are emailing at the same time. Stephanie asks what Jules’ plan is, and he says he has no idea. When he had first come to New York, he had found a job at Harper’s magazine, and an apartment on Eighty-first that he shared with two editors and a man who won a Pulitzer prize. Stephanie doesn’t understand what happened to him. Jules says he is like America, and that their hands are dirty.

Before going upstairs, Stephanie explains that Bosco is different than he was when the Conduits were still playing. She looks at the sun reflecting off of the cobblestone street, and remembers shooting the Conduits first album cover years ago. Stephanie and Jules go upstairs and meet Bosco, who is old, fat, alcoholic, and dying of cancer. They discuss Bosco’s new album, which is titled “A to B.” His last albums have tanked, and people have become indifferent toward him. He believes this new album will be a comeback. The word catches Jules’ attention.

Bosco tells Stephanie that he wants interviews and features in magazines. He wants to record every humiliation, depicting the realities of getting old. “Time’s a goon, right?” he says, and Jules steps up and repeats the line. Stephanie does not believe any of these plans are going to work, but Bosco says she is too old to understand. Bosco goes on to tell Stephanie that he wants to do a national suicide tour, during which he will die on stage. Jules believes Bosco’s plan is genius, and Bosco gives him full rights to the story of his decline and suicide tour.

Stephanie leaves feeling defeated, but Jules is thrilled by the new opportunity. He buys a planner and a new pen to write his appointments in. Jules asks her what is the matter, and Stephanie remembers Jules as a teenager, when he protected her. She begins to cry, realizing that this feeling has been buried under years of dealing with Jules’ struggles. Stephanie feels like everything is ending. She misses the wild drug and sex filled days before she and Bennie were married, when they were young, lucky, and strong. She feels disturbed by Bosco’s obsession with dying. Jules agrees that everything is ending, but he believes it is not ending yet.

After a second meeting, Stephanie goes to her boss’s office. Dolly (La Doll) tells Stephanie that she can feel her negativity, and she should cancel her meetings next time she feels this way, so her attitude doesn’t bother the clients. Stephanie has known Dolly forever, and calls her a “bitch.” Dolly laughs at this.

Stephanie and Jules drive back to Crandale, where they pick Christopher up from soccer practice. He hugs her, and she feels grateful for the affection. She has a burning desire to talk to Bennie about her day. She speaks to Sasha, Bennie’s assistant, whom she used to mistrust, but has now grown fond of. Bennie is not at the office, but he calls a short while later to tell her he is stuck in traffic. Stephanie imagines laughing with Bennie about Bosco, and feeling happy again. She decides not to lie to Bennie about her tennis games anymore.

When Bennie arrives home, he goes straight into the shower. Stephanie decides to get into the shower with him, remembering that they had bought the double shower with handmade fixtures. Bennie had been adamant about buying it. She takes her clothes off, but before getting into the water, she looks through the contents of Bennie’s pockets, which he has left on the bedside table. This is an old habit she developed when Bennie was cheating. As Stephanie steps back, she feels a gold bobby pin stuck to the bottom of her foot. She knows that it does not belong to her, and suddenly realizes that Bennie is cheating on her with Kathy.

Stephanie leaves the house and goes into the yard. She can’t understand why this instance of infidelity is more painful than the others, but it is. Bennie calls from the kitchen as she staggers into a flowerbed. Stephanie kneels in the dirt by the fence. Christopher begins calling for her next, and Stephanie covers her ears. Then another voice comes from the far side of the fence. Stephanie sees Noreen through a crack in the fence boards. Noreen says she likes to sit in this spot, and Stephanie says she knows. Stephanie closes her eyes and wants to disappear. Inside the house, everyone is calling for her, including Jules. She stands and says goodnight to Noreen. As she begins moving out of the flowerbed, she hears Noreen quietly wish her a good night.