(mellow music)
- Mateo?
- Emily.
- That's me.
So, American Lit?
- Yeah, it's my writing mostly.
For this class I have to write four critical reviews,
two thesis papers plus the mid-term and finals.
- Twain, Faulkner, Hemingway, all my favorites.
- [Mateo] Yeah?
- Professor Vandergrief, he's tough.
Fair, but demanding.
He just got an article published in studies of philology.
A (mumbles) of Paradigm in American Realism.
So, the school allows for three times a week,
so I was thinking that we would meet on...
- Uh, three?
- Yeah, well the school pays for them,
so there's no reason not to use them.
- Uh, I just talked to someone at the tutoring center
and they said it's usually just once a week.
- Who was that?
- I don't know, it was just someone on the phone.
- Was it Bennett Davis?
It was Bennett Davis, wasn't it?
That's fine, he's fine.
If you wanna meet once a week with Bennett Davis,
then that's fine.
- That's not what I said.
I said I talked to someone.
See, I work and I pick up odd jobs, so my schedule can be...
- Four critical reviews, five pages each minimum,
two thesis papers 10 pages each at least,
mid-term finals seven, maybe eight blue books a piece?
That's a lot of writing.
If you want to accomplish that with a once-a-weeker,
then good luck.
- Wait, wait, wait, hey!
What's happening?
- Look, two things need to happen here, right?
You need to choose me as your tutor, which you should
because I'm very good, and I need to choose you
as my student, which, well I'm not sure that
you're a good fit.
- Wow, not a good fit.
What's a good fit for you?
Maybe I should call this Davis guy to see if you
would tutor me without the superior attitude.
(mellow music)
- I never had a student get less than a B.
I'm not bragging, just stating a fact.
You want me to be your tutor,
call.
- So okay, I need to get a B at least.
- Okay.
- I won an MIT scholarship, so if I don't keep a 3.0,
I'll lose it, which is pretty much my entire tuition.
Last semester I got a 2.8.
- Okay, than I'm glad you called.
So we will meet three times a week, Monday, Wednesday,
Friday at this time, and do not make me wait.
Please.
Okay, so let's get started.
- Sure.
- Oh, I booked us a room at the library.
- The library?
- Yeah.
What?
- I just thought it was so nice and peaceful out here.
No one would bother us.
I've got my laptop, my books.
We'll make it work here.
- Outside?
- Why, you can only learn inside?
We've already started with those Emerson and Theroux guys,
they're all into nature and shit, right?
- Grand (mumbles).
- Yeah, that.
See, I'll be inspired.
Trees and stuff, make my work a lot better.
- Interesting theory.
- Isn't it?
- Okay, fine.
But for today only.
(mellow music)
No.
- No?
- No.
To write a really good essay, you need to know
your audience, right?
- Wait, you gonna use that pen?
- Yeah, why?
- It's just it's kinda of a elementary school teacherish.
- Your audience, if you will, is Professor Vandergrief,
right?
- Professor Vandersleep, right.
- He demands original thought.
You can't just regurgitate facts.
You need to find your thesis then state your
points to back it up.
Clearly and concisely, strongest points first.
- Didn't I do that?
- Well, discussing Women's Expiration of Sexuality
and Song of Myself is good, but you need to mind the text.
- Mind the text, right.
- Right. Here.
See here.
Whitman starts by convincing you, the reader,
of the importance of sex.
Without shame, the man I like knows and avows
the deliciousness of his sex.
Then becomes more direct in his approach.
I draw you close to me, I cannot let you go.
I would do you good.
- He's a horny son of a bitch.
- Okay, well, we won't say it exactly like that,
but you could elaborate on Whitman as a sensualist.
- Sensualist, right.
College word for horny son of a...
- Read, write.
- I've never noticed that.
- Oh, yeah it was being fitted.
- Gettin' married?
- In June.
- Congratulations.
- Thank you.
- Scared?
- No.
- Oh.
- Should I be?
- No, no.
What's his name?
- Eddie.
- Eddie and Emily.
- I know.
- [Mateo] Nice.
That's what you always wanted to be
even when you were little?
- I always loved to read.
- Yeah, but didn't you wanna be like a princess
or ballerina or something?
- Nope.
- That's all my little sister talks about.
- Nope.
- When are you finished?
- Well, I defend my thesis in May,
and if all goes well, I will get my masters
in Library Science in June.
- Masters degree to be a librarian?
I just thought you needed to know how to tell people to,
you know, shhh.
- Ha ha.
Better.
- Really?
- Yeah.
- Boo-yah!
- Okay.
Not great, just better.
- Boo-yah.
What?
- Oh, it's nothing.
- No, what?
- You used the word verisimilitude.
- Yeah?
- Ah, it's nothing.
- Okay, is it wrong?
- No, no, no, no, it's perfectly right.
- So?
- I just, it's a funny word.
Verisimilitude.
Ah, always make me laugh.
- [Mateo] Then I got caught up at work.
I wanted to leave but he would let me go.
- It's the one thing I said.
You can't not come.
I'm not gonna make an effort to get here just to sit
around and wait and see if you show up.
- [Mateo] And you're all riled up.
- If you're gonna this, then you have to take it seriously.
- [Mateo] I do!
- Then show me!
I expect you here on time ready to work.
- [Mateo] I know, I won't miss again, promise.
- Okay.
Thank you.
- You're kinda hot when you're all steamed up like that.
- I am not hot.
- Yeah, you are, kinda.
- Shut up.
Just get your book out.
Discussing Ezra Pound.
(humming a song)
Oh, sorry.
- What are you listening to?
- Oh, The Killers.
- I like The Killers.
Let me see?
- No!
Mateo, give it back.
Will you just...
- No way.
This isn't The Killers.
- Okay, fine, never mind.
- No wait, this is some good stuff, wait.
- Ha ha.
- What is this?
- It's a musical.
- Yeah?
- It's called Carnival.
I saw it when I was little and I've always loved it.
- What's it about?
- Do you really wanna know?
Because I'll tell you.
- Shoot.
- Okay.
Well, the show starts at the circus.
The Grand Imperial Cirque de Paris.
It was unbelievable.
The curtain opened and the stage came alive with
jugglers, acrobats, tight-rope walkers, trapeze artists,
all dressed in these bright colors.
I thought it music be magic that conjured all this
behind that one simple curtain.
The show is about a girl, Lilly.
She's an orphan.
She runs away to the circus and there she meets
a puppeteer named Paul.
He's got a bad leg.
He's lame, so that makes him mean and bitter.
But when he talks through his puppets, he's really nice
and sweet.
- Sounds stupid.
- Okay, see, never mind.
- I'm kidding, I'm kidding, go on, go on.
- [Emily] Okay, well she falls in love with
the cad magician, Marco the Magnificent.
He's all flash, no substance, a real player.
What she doesn't get is that Paul is in love with her,
but you'd never know it.
As his love grows, he only gets meaner and crueler
to her, while his puppets get sweeter and more loving.
Eventually Lilly's left brokenhearted
by Marco the Magnificent.
So she's going to leave the circus, but just
as she's leaving, the little red-headed puppet stops her
and tells her he'd miss her terribly if she goes.
- [Mateo] And then she leaves?
- She reaches for the puppet and finds that it's shaking.
Then she really puts it together.
So she takes off the puppet and she finds
the trembling hand.
- Huh.
- Right.
And they realize they're in love with each other.
Corny, right?
- Yeah.
(smooching)
(clears throat)
Oh um, hey Emily.
- Hello.
- Emily this is Maribel, Maribel this is Emily,
my tutor.
- Oh yeah, yeah, it's so nice to meet you.
Mateo tells me you're super smart.
- Thanks.
- I'm sorry, hey um, I gotta.
- Oh yeah, yeah, you gotta study so you can get smart.
Get a good job, right?
Right Ms. Tutor?
- Right.
- Bye.
Call me later maybe?
- Okay.
- Make sure he studies, right?
- She seems nice.
- [Mateo] Uh huh.
- Mmm, oh my god, oh my god, this is like
the best tamale I've ever had.
You eat like this all the time?
- My mother, she's an awesome cook.
- Oh my god.
I would seriously be like 200 pounds.
I'd be huge.
(laughter)
- No laughing.
This is the outfit of my forefathers.
- Yes, of course.
I'm sorry.
I didn't know you played an instrument.
- I'm filling in for my cousin.
- Let's hear it.
- No.
- Oh come on.
- No.
- Come on, just play...
- Oh no!
No.
- [Emily] Just one, please?
(clapping)
- Alright.
(awful notes)
- You're terrible.
- I made 50 bucks.
(lively music)
- Sucked, really?
It's one of the great classics in all of American literature
so I'd say it's a little dismissive to say it sucked.
- I think Gatsby was a wuss.
- A wuss?
Is that what you're gonna say in your paper.
My thesis is that Gatsby is a wuss?
- The American dream, to become a bootlegger?
He was a baby and got what he deserved.
- No, no, no, no, no, that's just it,
that's the tragedy of it.
It's not the American dream, it's the corruption
of the American dream.
You see Gatsby is sympathetic because he's actually
the victim.
He was fed the idea that he could remake himself
and he bought it.
- Yeah he could remake himself, right?
Isn't that what America's about?
It's just that he cheated his way through.
He could've done something real, started a business,
a hardware store or something.
He could've been the next Wal-Mart.
That guy's loaded but he didn't.
- He was up against the clock trying to win Daisy back.
- That's not it at all.
- That's not what?
- The American dream.
It's just a device in this book, it's not real.
- And you have some insight into that?
- Yes.
And if you get off your, I'm an English major
and know everything, high horse I will tell you.
- Okay.
- My parents believed that they could make a better
life for themselves.
They weren't born here like Gatsby.
They just had to get in to America, right?
We lived 100 miles from the border, it might as well
have been a million.
My parents saved up every penny for the four years.
My father worked day and night.
My mother scrimped on everything.
And finally they scraped up $1,500 to buy
a pollera, coyotaje, to get us across.
You know what that is?
I was 11 and my baby brother was eight.
The coyotaje led us through the Mexican countryside
to the border.
An isolated spot on the banks of the Rio Grande.
They told us to swim to the other side
where another pollera would be waiting for us,
he would lead us through the desert.
It was after midnight.
The river was freezing.
Once we got across, there was no pollera to help us.
We were cold, dripping wet and all alone in the desert.
And father figured we should keep going,
so we started walking.
We walked for hours and hours, not even sure
we were going in the right direction.
The sun came up and we were still nowhere.
We couldn't see any sign of civilization,
only dirt and cactus.
It was dead hot.
We used up all our water, all our food.
We didn't know if we were heading in the right direction
or just going in circles.
My parents, very strong, just kept walking.
Keep going, they'd say.
If we can do it, so can you.
It's just right over the ridge, my father would say.
And my heart would leap.
America.
It's just right over the ridge.
I couldn't wait to see it.
I thought it would look different.
Then we'd get over the ridge and there wouldn't be anything.
More desert, more brush.
And we just kept walking.
Sometime in the middle of the day I was so exhausted,
so hot and delirious that I had visions.
I say my grandfather's old mule trotting over the desert.
I yelled, look over there.
Abuelo's here to save us.
(rattling)
My parents just pushed forward.
After many more hours my father said,
"It's over this next pass, I can feel it."
He said it so many times before I didn't
believe him anymore.
This time, finally, he was right.
Over the ridge was America.
A flat highway cutting across the desert.
We finally reached it.
A man with a pick up truck had pity on us.
He stopped long enough for us to jump on the back
and then took off.
He dropped us off at some gas station.
He never said a word to us.
That man saved our lives.
And from that, my parents built this life.
They worked in fields and restaurants, cooking, sewing.
Here I am.
In college.
Gatsby can eat it.
- Professor Mclntyre.
- Emily, hello there.
- Hello.
- This is a nice place to study.
- Oh, I'm tutoring.
I'm a tutor.
American Lit.
I'm just waiting for him.
My tutoree.
- Good for you.
- I've almost finished a Dialectical Materialism.
- Spirkin?
- Yes.
- Excellent, excellent.
You should be ready to defend in May.
- Yes, well, almost.
I'm workin' on it.
- Good.
Keep up the good work.
- Will do.
- Hey.
- Emily's in love with her professor.
- I am not.
- I've almost reading Diabolical Materialism.
- Dialectical.
Well I have.
- What your words were saying, I finished reading
this book, but your eyes were saying love me.
- You don't know what you're talking about.
- I'm telling Eggy.
- Eddie.
- That's what I said.
- You said Eggy.
- Oh, you're changing the subject because you
don't want me telling Eggy you have a mad crush
on your professor, who by the way, is like old,
like grandfather old.
What's up with that?
- Eddie.
Ed-die.
- [Mateo] This I like.
- I knew you'd like Hemingway.
- How?
- I just thought it suited you.
You should write your next paper on it.
- Alright.
- Here are some.
- [Woman] Hey Mateo.
- Hey Julie.
- Here are some critiques for reference.
Most of them discuss the religious symbolism in the book.
- Right, like the mass (mumbles) carries on his back
is like Jesus carrying the cross.
- Yeah.
Yeah, exactly like that.
- Catholic.
My mom's way into it.
- [Emily] Really?
- Yeah, she's been reading the bible to me since I was born.
- So do you believe in God?
- Yeah, of course.
Don't you?
- Uh, ah.
To tell you the truth, I haven't really thought
about it that much.
I went to church when I was little, Presbyterian.
I guess I believe in some sort of supreme being-ish.
- Do you believe in heaven?
- I guess.
- I go to mass very week.
I have to because my mom would kill me if I don't,
but I don't know, I like it.
It's kinda of um, it's calm.
- [Emily] Do you go to confession?
- Every week.
- What do you confess?
- You know, the basic stuff.
See taking the Lord's name in vain.
Picking on my little brother.
Coveting another man's fiance.
So one day I come home, right, and the priest is sitting
in my living room.
Wanna know why?
My mother was positive that she say our Lady of Guadeloupe
in a tortilla she made.
- Really?
- For days our living room was packed of people who
wanted to see the virgin.
They were praying and making blessings and stuff like that.
I mean it was packed, for weeks.
Finally it dies down.
I come home one day from school and I'm starving,
starving, so start making this quesadilla and my mom,
she got crazy.
She's like (speaking Spanish).
- No you didn't!
- She grabs the tortilla from the frying pan before
it was too late.
It was crazy.
(laughter)
- I don't know, that's like asking a parent to choose
their favorite kid.
- Do your top five then.
- American Lit, you mean?
- Sure.
- Well, just emotionally, I'd have to go with Ethan Frome.
I know that might surprise you, you probably thing I'd
go with something more intellectual like Prust
or something.
- [Mateo] If you say so.
- But that book just slays me.
- Because?
- Nobody does yearning quite like Wharton, you know?
I mean, Ethan Frome is desperately in love with
his cousin's wife Mattie.
She's living with them because his wife is sick.
I mean, you can just feel that desire, that longing.
It's palpable, right there on the page.
They spend all this time together but they never talk
about it, never discuss their feelings.
And I just completely felt that longing, that wanting,
you know?
- They end up together?
- No.
That's just it.
Once they finally find each other, profess their love,
bam!
Sledding accident.
It's like.
It's so, it's so heartbreaking, it's so tragic, you know?
(crying)
- Holy shit.
Pull yourself together.
- I know.
(nose blowing)
(sniffling)
Thank you.
Thanks.
Does that say mom?
- What?
Oh, no.
- Does it say Maribel?
- Who?
Oh, no.
- Is it a cross, some kind of catholic thing?
- No.
- You gonna show it to me?
- No.
(crunching snacks)
(mellow music)
- We had gone over to my grandmother's house
to clean out our stuff.
I used to love going to her house because it had
all of these little rooms.
It's like this old Victorian, so different than my house
which was like 60s mod.
Her house was filled with nooks and crannies and
just loaded with stuff like old dressers, and letters,
and clothes and dolls from like the 20s.
I mean, it was like a kid's treasure trove, right?
So after she died, we didn't go there for months and months.
And then finally my dad said we are going to clean out
her house because he was gonna sell it.
My parents were downstairs with my sisters and I was on
the second floor going through her old wardrobe.
When all of a sudden, I heard this creak, creak, creak.
I couldn't figure out where it was coming from.
I started walking towards the stairs to the old attic,
it got louder.
Creak, creak, creak.
So I went up the stairs.
- Oh no, never go upstairs, why would you?
- [Emily] I walked into the attic and it was a mess
and it was filled with old cob webs and junk from like
a hundred years ago.
It looked like Ms. Havisham's house from Great Expectations.
- I have no idea what you're talking about, but go on.
- [Emily] It was really dark but I could clearly hear
the sound.
Creak, creak, creak.
And then as my eyes started to adjust to the darkness,
I saw this rocking chair in the corner and it was
rocking back and forth,
back and forth.
Creak, creak, creak.
I just felt like she was there.
I walked over to the chair,
grandma, I said.
We miss you.
And it stopped.
- No way.
- Yeah, but it gets even weirder.
I went over to the rocking chair and I sat down in it
and when I looked out, I saw this pendant.
It was right in front of me hanging on a dusty
old dresser and I would've never seen it if I hadn't
sat right in that spot.
I always loved this necklace.
She wore it every day
And I'd always ask her, grandma can I have that?
You know like kids do, and she'd always say,
"I'm not finished wearing it yet."
- Guess she was finished wearing it, right?
- Yeah.
Yeah, I guess she was.
(mellow music)
What is it again?
- Ceviche.
- I know your mom's a really good cook, but I'm not
really a fish person.
- You can't even tell it's fish, come on, just try it,
you'll like it, promise.
- It looks really fishy like they're just like gobs
of white in there.
- Just try it.
- Okay.
Hmm.
- Good?
- Yeah, that's actually really good.
- Excuse me, do you know where Gardner Path is?
I'm supposed to be meeting some people there.
I think I got myself turned around.
- [Emily] Yeah.
Gardner Path runs parallel to West Avenue,
so if you just take this path around the corner,
make a left, then make your very first right,
you'll run into it in about four blocks.
- Thank you.
- [Emily] Are you looking for something special?
- Words out that a long-billed murrelet's been spotted.
- [Emily] Ooh, sounds rare.
- Very.
- [Emily] You know, you should check out
the Lowell Dingus book, The Mistaken Extinction,
it's very popular, about the evolution of birds.
- Thank you.
I'll check it out.
Dingus you said.
- [Emily] Yes, very popular in birding circles.
- Okay then.
Down to this corner.
- [Emily] Yes, left, very first right.
- Thank you, I got it, thank you very much.
- Good luck.
- I know why you'd like to be a librarian.
- Why?
- You're a know-it-all.
- I am.
- [Mateo] I wanna check out that Dingus book,
sounds interesting.
- Ha ha.
(laughter)
I guess I just never learned.
- The thing is you don't have to learn, you just do it.
You just...
- Just do it.
- Yeah, yeah, just do it.
You gotta pucker up your lips more.
- Like this?
- Yeah, yeah, but rounder, pucker up, pucker up.
Now blow, now blow, blow, blow.
- Like this.
(blowing)
- No, there's gotta be more power.
- I can't, I missed my window.
- Oh god.
What's he do?
- Oh, um, he's a pharmacist.
- Oh cool.
What's his last name?
- Matheson.
- Mrs. Emily Matheson, the pharmacist's wife.
- Mrs. Emily Woodbridge-Matheson, pharmacist's wife.
- Course.
Try it again.
Power, power, power.
(blowing)
(laughter)
- She said so you go back with your right first
and I go back with my left.
- Okay.
Alright, why can't we just like sway back and forth
like everybody else does?
- Because it's our first dance, I want it to be
a real dance.
- Okay.
- It's only our first lesson, so we'll...
- Okay, okay, okay.
- [Together] One, two, three.
- Okay, I think I'm supposed to start with my right, right?
- Yeah, yeah, you're right, yeah.
- I can't do this, it's like.
- Just one more, we'll just again, one more time.
(crosstalk)
- [Together] One, two, three.
(clapping)
- Hi, this is Eddie.
- Hey, nice to meet you.
Emily says you're doing great, actually.
- She's a good tutor.
- I'm dragging Eddie here to waltz classes
so we don't look too pathetic at our wedding.
- Looks good.
- So listen, I'm gonna let you guys get to work actually.
It was very nice to meet you.
- You too.
- And I will see you later.
- [Emily] Okay.
Bye - [Eddie] Bye.
- He seems nice.
- Yeah.
- Here.
- What?
- Let me show you how it's really done.
It's just a little off.
- What do you mean?
- Give me your hands.
Go with the right.
- Okay.
(mellow music)
Oh that's not right.
- Chin up.
♫ And all I wanna do is sit down and talk to you
♫ All I wanna do is sit here and look at you
♫ And then a couple ladies get to their feet and walk away
♫ Walking hand and hand along the beach like everyday
♫ And all I wanna do is walk along the shore with you
♫ All I wanna do is share all my thoughts with you
♫ If you were here I know that
♫ We'd be putting the world to right
♫ Watching the sun go down
♫ As the Coast Guard put on the lights
♫ And all the people in the boats could see
♫ Nobody on the beach but you and me ♫
Next week, merengue.
♫ Nobody on the beach but you and me ♫
(mellow music)
Yeah, but how do you know?
- I don't know, I just do.
- [Mateo] Okay, but how?
- He has all the qualities that I like.
He's nice and kind and stable...
(snoring)
No, no, no, don't do that.
I'm not saying it right.
He's a really nice person.
- So are you his Beatrice?
- Like Dante?
- What?
- [Emily] What?
- No, no, Beatrice, (speaking foreign language).
It's an old Mexican folk tale.
Many years ago (speaking Spanish) and his daughter,
Beatrice, lived in a big mansion in Mexico City.
Beatrice was very beautiful and also very kind,
nursing the sick and injured.
Someone like that, you can imagine attracted
many suitors, hundreds.
They would line up at her doorstep.
But she would never say yes to anyone.
One day a gentleman arrives at the mansion Dom Martin.
He loved Beatrice since the first time he saw her,
and to prove his love, he vowed to fight any man
who wants to marry her.
Many men tried to defeat him, but Dom Martin is too strong,
too skilled.
One suitor, full of price and black of heart vows
to kill Dom Martin.
Dom Martin has no choice but to fight to the death.
(swords clanking)
Beatrice loves Dom Martin because he is strong
and handsome, but she also knows that he has caused
pain and suffering and for this, she feels conflicted.
One night she makes a decision, certainly this
will make Dom Martin stop loving her.
She lights a fire.
Beatrice prays to Saint Lucia, then whispering
Dom Matin's name, kneels and puts her beautiful face
over the fire.
The smell of burning flesh spreads through the room.
Her brother Marcos hears his sister's scream and runs,
finding her barely conscious on the floor.
Lifting her gently he asks, "Why, dear Beatrice?"
She explains that now Dom Martin will stop loving her.
When Dom Martin hears what has happened,
he rushes to Beatrice.
He finds her sitting in an arm chair with a veil
covering her face.
The veil is spotted with blood and burnt flesh.
Very carefully Dom Martin takes off the veil.
He does not jump back terrified.
He looks straight at her.
"Ah, Beatrice," he says.
"I love you not for your beauty, you are good and generous,
"and your soul is pure.
"I will ask your father for your hand and we will marry."
The wedding of Beatrice and Dom Martin was the biggest
celebration the town had ever seen.
And for the rest of their lives, they were never apart.
Since that day, the street where she lived is called
The Barn Girl Street, (speaking Spanish).
- What?
- Is he your Dom Martin and you his Beatrice?
- Why is everything so bloody and gory with you guys?
Don't you have any nice folk tales?
- Because Emily, life is about pain and passion,
desire and death.
And we (mumbles) know this.
- The Tortoise and the Hare, that is a nice folk tale.
- So?
- I don't know.
Are you asking me if Eddie would still love me if
my face were all charred and gooey?
- No, no, no, look, look.
Is your love so strong and passionate that it would
withstand any obstacle?
- I don't know, Mateo.
I just want someone to play Scrabble with after dinner,
you know?
(mellow music)
- What are you doing?
- What? Nothing.
- That thing with your pen.
- I'm not doing anything, I don't know what you're
talking about.
- That up and down thing with your pen.
Okay.
Well if you don't mind then I'll just...
- No, don't, wait, Mateo, don't do that!
- So weird, what is?
What's up with you?
- Nothing, just.
Sometimes, not all the time, just sometimes I have
to just do certain things just a certain way, that's all.
It's not a big deal.
- What do you mean?
- Well, like sometimes, I mean not all the time,
but sometimes, you know, when I return my tray
to the conveyor belt at the cafeteria, I have to
have it in a perfect perpendicular angle.
And then sometimes, you know, at night when I'm in bed
I'll get a thought I my head and then I have to get up
and go to my closet and just straighten out my shoes,
you know, just little things like that.
- What would happen if you didn't?
Didn't do it?
- I don't know, I'm afraid that something bad would happen.
- To you?
- No, not necessarily.
Someone I love.
- Like what?
- I don't know, Mateo, okay?
I just do it so nothing bad will happen.
- Hmm.
- It's not like I have to go and flick a light switch
up and down 30 times or anything like that.
It's just that sometimes I have to just do things
a certain way.
- Like that pen.
- Fine, yes, like the pen.
- That's bugging you, right, isn't it?
- No.
- You wanna move it.
- No, I don't need to.
It's just stupid now, okay, so.
There.
(mellow music)
I like this part about Santiago's relationship with the boy,
I just think it should come earlier.
Hey.
- Hey.
- Sleeping, are you kidding me?
- I'm sorry.
I'm filling in working for my cousin.
- Well, falling asleep is rude.
- I know, I'm sorry, sorry.
- Where does he work anyway?
- Down Route 9.
- [Emily] Where?
- Washington Farms.
- What does he do there?
- Nothing, I'm just filling in for him.
- Doing what?
- Picking strawberries.
- Oh.
- My cousin's wife just had a baby, so he doesn't
wanna lose his job.
I go in there, I say I'm him, no one cares.
Then I give him the money because he really needs it.
Half of it.
I only have a week left, so.
- Oh.
- So there, now you know.
- Is it awful?
- No.
I don't know, you know.
- No, no, no, I don't.
Tell me.
- It's boring, it's hot.
It's rough on the back.
- How long do you work?
- 10 hour shifts, give or take.
- Do you get breaks?
- Yeah, yeah, um.
When we get thirsty, they let us, let us get some water.
(mellow music)
- Because you haven't really explored...
- Don't say it, don't say it.
- What?
I was just gonna say that you're missing
a semiotic analysis.
- God, you said it.
- What, semiotic?
- No, la, la, no, la, blah, blah.
- Semiotic.
- Semiotic, semiotic. - [Mateo] I can't hear you.
- You didn't read the Dorita essay I suggested.
- Socialism, post-structialism, modernsim, post-modernism.
I'm gonna shoot myself.
- I'm sorry, I thought you wanted to improve.
- Yes, yes, but you're constant nitpicking
every single word on this page.
- Nitpicking, you have to deconstruct the text, Mateo.
- Yes.
- That is what you're writing about.
- Yes, but every single word?
Maybe Hemingway wrote it is hot outside
because it is hot outside.
- No, no, no, nothing is without meaning.
The act of putting the word on the page gives it meaning.
If you had read the Dorita, then you would see
that the origin cannot be some simplicity,
but must already be...
- Blah, blah, blah, blah.
- You know what, fine, fine.
If you want to skate by using the same old tired theories,
then go right ahead.
- Skate by?
Spending 100 hours a week with you is not skating by.
- (gasps) Oh, oh!
Oh I am sorry that that is so difficult.
- Nondisjunctive function, operating consciousness,
phemeneutics, philology.
You're driving me crazy!
Think I'm ready for my mid-term?
- [Emily] Yeah, I do, I really do.
Do you?
- Yeah.
- Oh, don't forget the themes in Stephen Crane's work,
we discussed them.
- Fear, spiritual crisis and social isolation.
- Yes.
And if you're asked to compare and contrast two authors?
- Dreisner and Steinbeck?
I remember that.
- Good.
Good, that's good.
(sniffling)
- What?
Hey, I studied.
- No, no, no, I know.
- [Mateo] I promise, I'm ready.
- I know.
- Okay.
What is it?
- It's stupid.
- What happened?
- Nothing happened.
- Do you wanna tell me about it?
- Now that he's gone and done it,
I don't know how to undo it.
- [Mateo] Why, what'd he do?
What is it?
- He invited her to our wedding.
- Who?
- His ex-girlfriend.
I mean, that's really dumb, right?
Don't you think that's dumb?
- Ah...
- But now he's gone and done it and I don't know
how to undo it and I just don't want her there.
He said he ran into her at Starbucks.
I mean, honestly, and then they started chatting
about the wedding and then it just, it just slipped out.
I mean, and now she's invited.
- Maybe she won't come.
- Oh now, she said she'd love to, she's coming,
she will be there.
- Alright, you know you should tell him to call her
and uninvite her, tell her that it was a big mistake.
- I don't know, that seems rude, doesn't it?
Why should I even care?
You know, he doesn't love her anymore, he loves me,
that's why we're getting married.
- Of course, yeah.
- God, sorry, now I'm just a sniveling idiot.
- Oh no look, you want the day to be perfect.
- Yeah, yeah, that's it and I just, you know,
didn't exactly include...
- His ex-girlfriend.
(blowing nose)
- Yeah, sorry I'm just being such a girl.
- I mean, what did he do when you told him it bothered you?
- I didn't tell him.
- What?
- I'm just not really that good about talking
about my feelings.
- Oh really?
Really, 'cause I thought you never shut up.
- No, I just say okay and then I come here
and break down.
- Well you should tell him.
- You think?
I mean, I don't wanna seem unreasonable.
- Maybe he'll wanna fix it.
- You think?
- Yeah.
- Maybe I should tell him.
- [Mateo] Yeah, I think you should.
- Okay, I will.
- Then you'll have your perfect wedding.
- And then I'll have a perfect wedding.
(lively music)
(error chimes)
Huh?
Come on.
Just go.
- Okay, no jokes.
My little sister let me borrow her bike,
god forbid I'm late for Emily.
See, even she knows how strict you are.
What?
- It won't stop.
- Ah shit.
- What?
Does that mean it's broken?
Mateo, my whole life is on this computer.
My thesis!
- [Mateo] Let me see.
- Oh my god.
- When was the last time you backed it up?
- Uh.
- You never backed it...
- I always meant to!
God, I feel really, really nauseous.
I feel like I might throw up.
- Don't panic, I have a friend that fixes computers.
- Really?
- Yeah, but he might be closed soon.
Yep, we gotta go.
- Okay.
- Come on.
- On this?
- Yeah, yeah, it's fine.
Come on, get on the bike.
Get on the bike.
- Okay.
- You ready?
(squealing)
(mellow music)
- You didn't read it yet?
- I didn't get to it.
- Okay, well let's read it.
- Now?
- Sure, get it out.
Go ahead.
- What?
- Read it.
- Out loud?
- Yeah, why not?
Then we can discuss it.
- Okay.
- Are you embarrassed?
- No.
No.
- Go ahead then.
- They sent him back to her.
The letter came.
And before she could be sure there was no hidden ill
under the formal writing, he was in her sight, living.
They gave him back to her alive.
How else?
They are not known to send the dead
and not disfigured visibly.
His face, his hands, she had to look, to look and ask.
What is it dear?
A bullet through and through.
High in the breast, nothing but what good care
and medicine and rest and you a week can cure
me off to go again.
They had given him back to her not to keep.
(slow music)
Um, hello.
- Oh hey, Mateo, hi.
- And you are?
- I'm Bennett.
Bennett Davis.
Emily said you knew I was coming.
- Oh.
- You did know, right?
- Yeah.
Kind of.
- Okay, so where'd you leave off?
- Um.
Robert Frost, poetry.
- Poetry.
Am I right?
They had sent him back to her.
The letter came saying that she could give him,
that she could have him.
Let me reread that.
They sent him back to her.
The letter came saying that she could have him.
- So you gotta come back because that Bennett guy's
a real douche.
If I lose my scholarship, if I fail, that's on your head.
No, no, that's not what I mean.
I just, I don't know what to say.
Just please, come back.
- Henry James paper, get it out.
- Yeah.
- Let me see it.
Okay, this part should start here.
- Are we gonna talk about it?
- No.
- But...
- No.
- Don't you think that we should probably...
- No.
It was a mistake, okay?
It never happened, got it?
- Got it.
Here.
- What is it?
- Mole manchamanteles.
- Mmm.
Oh my god.
- Good right?
- It's ridiculous.
Mmm.
Oh my god, it's really incredible.
Really.
Did your mom make this?
- Yep.
- Mmm.
I like this part but I think it should address
the first person plural perspective because
that's really they key to his entire...
(phone ringing)
- Sorry.
I'll put it on silent.
(phone ringing)
Oh wait, give me a sec.
Hello?
(speaking Spanish)
It's my mother, she, she collapsed.
(somber music)
Thank you.
For coming.
- Of course.
And so I stopped by Professor Vandergrief's class,
I'm sure it's the last thing you're thinking about,
but I just wanted him to know, you know, just in case
you thought you might, well, he said you didn't have to,
you know, do this paper, so you could still.
I don't know exactly what to say.
I just, well, you just worked so hard and I just think
that you're doing so well and I guess, you know,
if you think you can manage then you could finish
and I could help you.
Um, okay.
That's it.
Bye.
(somber music)
Yeah, I think this is the best way to discuss
his stream of consciousness.
It's good, it's really good.
- I wanna show you something.
- Okay.
What is it?
- [Mateo] When I was growing up, my mother would
always tell me the legend of (speaking Spanish),
a brave Aztec warrior.
He was forced to battle the god of destruction
who had transformed himself into a monstrous dragon
and threaten his village.
The battle was epic, more exciting every time she told it.
The monster was fierce,
but he fought valiantly to fend him off.
Taking blow after blow until finally
he simply couldn't fight anymore.
Exhausted, spent and broken, he was going to give up,
but just then he spotted his mother peeking behind a door,
terrified, and he knew he couldn't give up.
With that, he summoned all his strength and courage
and delivered a powerful blow to slay the dragon.
And my mother would say, "See Mateo, see what love does?"
The legend says that after many battles, the brave warrior
returned home to Mexico and was consumed by divine fire.
That from the ashes his heart flew up to become
the morning star.
I always loved that story.
So one night when I was 16 and drunk and my friends
and I decided to get tattoos, I got this.
I've been pretty much embarrassed by it ever since.
Youthful (mumbles), you know?
But now I,
I want to believe it.
I wanna believe that something good can rise from the ashes.
- I brought you something.
- Yeah?
- I don't know if it's any good.
- What is it?
- I made it, it's an empanada.
- It is.
It's good.
- Really?
- Yeah.
- Good.
I brought this for your sister.
For letting me ride her bike to save my computer.
- [Mateo] A mouse in a motorcycle?
- It was my favorite book when I was her age.
- [Mateo] I bet you read a lot of 'em.
- I did, so that's really saying something.
I host a children's hour at the library every week.
- [Mateo] You do?
- Yeah, you should bring her by.
Maybe we'll read that one next.
I really don't have any.
- Come on, everyone's got something.
- Nope, I am an open book, ha ha.
- You got something.
Come on, tell me.
- I never told anyone, not a living soul.
- What is it?
- [Emily] Well, I remember it was just a few days
after we'd celebrated my birthday in the backyard.
My mother had taken my sisters to the beach for vacation,
but I had to stay back because I had to take the SATs.
I was walking over to stay at my friend's house to study
when I saw my father through the window of
a bookstore downtown.
I almost waved at him, but he was standing next
to a woman, very close, looking at a book
and um, I felt strange, like I was intruding,
so I stopped.
And then, god it was the simplest thing,
but she fixed his collar and I knew.
I was only 16 but I could tell it was something intimate,
you know?
I didn't know what to do, so I just sort of stood there,
frozen, spying on my own father.
And then, well later he kissed her,
so I was sure.
And my world sort of imploded.
- [Mateo] What'd you do?
- [Emily] Nothing.
I spent the night at my friend's, took the SATs,
and I never let on.
How could I bring it up?
It would've ruined everything.
- So you just buried it?
- [Emily] Yeah, guess I did.
- Wow.
(shuffling papers)
You okay?
- Yeah.
- Oh, that's right, the committee thing is today, right?
- Yeah, yeah, yeah, more like the death squad.
I feel so nervous.
- You're gonna be fine, just remember the dewey decimal
system was created by Marvin Dewey in 1876.
- Ha ha, god I wish they asked questions like that.
Do I have something on my neck?
Right here?
I feel like I'm getting hives.
- No, I don't see anything.
- I have a serious problem with public speaking.
I mean, just thinking about it right now is making
me feel nauseous.
I feel like I can't remember anything.
Okay, come on, come on.
Like let's see, uh, uh, bibliometrics.
Bibliometrics.
Bibliometrics, bibliometrics.
I know that it is important but if you were
to ask me what it's for right now, I couldn't tell you.
- Em, Em.
Hey.
- Yeah?
- You'll do great.
You'll be fine, I'm sure of it.
You're the smartest person I know.
Just, you know, just do what you always tell me to do.
Methodical, concise, one point at a time.
It's all up there.
- Okay.
- [Mateo] Okay?
- Yes.
- Good.
Congratulations.
- [Emily] Thank you.
- [Mateo] To celebrate I have something for you.
- Okay.
- Just, just don't say no right away, okay?
Just tell me you'll think about it?
- What is it?
- Just promise me you'll just think about it.
- What is it?
- Just promise.
- Alright, fine.
What is it?
- I won these two tickets in a raffle and I
want you to go with me.
- No.
- You said you'd think about it.
Come on.
- Mateo, I don't know how you would think in a million years
that I would do that.
- That's why you should go, Em.
- No way.
- I'm offering you a chance to do something so big that
for your whole life you'll face things differently.
You'll think like, hey man, this is hard but compared
to this, it's nothing.
- Bungee jumping?
Really?
Honestly I can't even think about it.
My hands are starting to sweat right now just looking
at these tickets.
- Okay.
One day you'll keel over.
You'll be cooking and you just keel over.
That's how it ends, Em.
For now you just gotta make the most of it.
- I am not in a million years going bungee jumping.
When he started counting, you know, before we jumped
and I looked down and saw how high we were,
you know, like on the tops of all those trees,
I mean I thought I was gonna die.
Like die, you know?
But I jumped, right?
I did, didn't I?
God it was such a rush, you know?
It was like, oh my god.
I mean, during the free fall part, did you feel like,
like your stomach was in your throat?
Because I did.
I mean, I was scared but then I wasn't.
I mean, but I was.
It was just, ah, it's just so crazy.
Okay.
Oh okay, that's funny, you're so smug now because
you made me do it.
But I mean I'm glad I did it.
Really, thank you.
- Wait, your necklace.
- What?
Oh no.
It must've fallen off.
(mellow music)
- And so Prufrock ends up crushed by the pressures
of modern life.
He had shut himself off from society and the woman
that he loves because of fear.
In conclusion Elliot has, through Prufrock,
described the isolation and loneliness of modern life.
A life in which people think instead of do.
Tada!
- Yay!
That was very good, really.
You hit every point perfectly.
You don't even need me anymore.
- What?
We still have the final, you can't quit on me now, right?
- I'm not gonna leave my player before the big game.
- Right.
And then we'll be done.
- Yeah, and then we'll be done.
What?
- Think we would've been friends if we didn't
have to meet like this?
- Where would we have met?
- Coffee house, on the hill.
- You wouldn't have given me the time of day.
- I wouldn't have?
You wouldn't have even looked at me.
- That's not true.
- Okay, mega catholic, IQ of less than 150,
loves hip hop, come on, right?
- Okay, look at me.
Tons of books, plain, studying to be a librarian,
loves musicals.
- You're not plain.
- You're not dumb.
- I never said I was dumb.
I know I'm not dumb.
150's like astrophysicist Einstein smart.
Dumb.
(mellow music)
- [Emily] Should we go over possible topics they'll discuss
on the final?
- [Mateo] I dunno.
Can I ask you something?
- [Emily] Sure, okay.
- [Mateo] Does Eddie know that your favorite music
is that gondola thing you told me about?
- [Emily] Hmm.
I, I, I, I don't know if I ever told him that.
- [Mateo] Does he know about your grandmother's attic
and finding the pendant?
- [Emily] Uh, gosh, I don't know.
I mean, he must.
- [Mateo] Does he know that when you meet someone
you study them carefully and then you come up with
a perfect book for them and that your whole
face lights up when you share it?
And it's beautiful?
That you're beautiful when you do that?
- [Emily] I, I don't know if he knows that.
- [Mateo] He should.
He should know that.
(soft music)
Don't do it.
- I'm going to do it.
- But you can't deny something is happening.
- Yeah, yeah, something, but that's all.
And now that something is over.
And I'm going to do it.
You don't even know me.
- I know everything about you.
You have OCD.
- No I don't!
Not clinically.
- You're a know-it-all and you're smart and you're funny.
I am your Dom Martin, Em.
- Yeah, but only me when I come here.
Out there I'm different.
I'm a total mess out there.
If we're not talking about books, I don't know what to say.
I'm horrible at parties, I'm self-conscious.
- I will be on that bench at two, okay?
- No.
Can't you just be happy for me?
- Look, I've, I've told you things that I've never told
anyone in my entire life.
I don't wanna be that guy in the poem who doesn't
want to share things because...
- T.S. Elliot?
You bring up T.S. Elliot right now?
We're talking about my life.
- I should let you know how I feel.
- No, no you shouldn't.
I'm going to marry Eddie because I have a future
with him and stability and if you know me at all
then you should know how important that is to me.
- Look, what I know is that for the last few months
you've shared your thoughts, your secrets with me.
Not him, me.
And I get it, I get you, that's, that's what you deserve.
Don't go through with this because things are in motion.
Don't bury this.
- You're not allowed to use that.
- Look, I'm gonna be on that bench.
I'm gonna be here.
- No!
No!
Just stop it, that is enough!
I am getting married tomorrow at 2:00 and I'm having
a wedding and I'm going to be happy.
And you coming here and sitting on that bench,
well that is, that is an act of betrayal,
so do not come here and do not sit on that bench
and do not wait for me because I'm not coming.
And if you cared about me at all, then you wouldn't
have asked me to.
(somber music)
- [Mateo] I searched where we went bungee jumping and found
it under the bridge.
(sniffling)
(soft music)
- I didn't expect to hear from you.
You wanted to show me something?
- We did it.
- An A.
Good.
You did it, really.
I knew you could.
- No, no, no, we did it.
Together.
Mrs. Emily Woodbridge-Matheson.
- I came here.
Saturday.
At two.
- But um.
I thought, I thought I was wrong to ask.
That I wasn't supposed to meet you here.
The whole betrayal thing that you said.
I would've come if you would've told me.
That's a good thing, right?
It's a good thing?
(soft music)
- I'm gonna go now.
I'm really glad about your grade.
- Wait, wait, Em, Em, please, hey!
(somber music)
Emily, Emily wait!
Wait!
Wait, come back!
- Mateo, please.
What do you want?
- Don't go.
- Listen, I've done a lot of thinking, okay?
And I've made a real mess.
I realized that this was a big mistake.
Maybe there was something, but it's gone now
and I think that we should just.
(light music)
- We should just what?
- Do that.
(smooching)
(mid-tempo music)
♫ Night and day or with your friends
♫ Could I be your friend
♫ You and me we're all away
♫ When we make our dance
♫ Night and day or with your friends
♫ Who could take a chance
♫ Watching us they'll understand
♫ That we are dancing
♫ I'm your baby
♫ You're mine too
♫ I'm your best friend
♫ It's so in tune
♫ Ohh, ohh, ohh
♫ Ohh, ohh, ohh ♫