How It All Goes Down
Get Me to the Chapel on Time
- March 1994 (Clare is 22, Henry is 30): Henry and Clare move into a two-bedroom flat together. Falling into the daily routine of married life, they soon discover each other's little annoying habits, but are willing to make compromises. Yet Clare really struggles with a lack of space to create her artwork. She feels like her ideas are shrinking by the day. "Every day I work, but nothing ever materializes" (2.1.5). It doesn't help that Henry keeps appearing and disappearing on time's whim. When Clare was a child, she viewed his visits as special events, but now "every absence is a nonevent, a subtraction" (2.1.6). Now she becomes afraid when he's gone.
- Henry, on his end of the relationship, struggles with Clare's solitude. Sometimes when he comes home, she seems irritated or shuts him out of her world. He wakes to her struggles. "Suddenly I see Clare, in a small room, closed in by all her stuff… I know what I have to do" (2.1.9).
- Wednesday, April 13, 1994 (Clare is 22, Henry is 30): To Clare's surprise, Henry returns home with a small, shabby TV. He tells her he wants her to watch a special program and hands her a piece of paper. The Illinois Lottery comes on and Clare learns she just won $8 million. At first Clare insists that they can't accept the money, but when Henry lights a match to burn the winning ticket, she relents.
- Wednesday, May 18, 1994 (Clare is 22, Henry is 30): Henry and Clare are going house shopping. Henry passes on every house they look at because he tells Clare he's already seen their house once during his travels. Clare asks him if it's OK for her to go check out houses by herself, since she should be able to find the place if it is, indeed, their future house. And, lo and behold, she eventually does.
- Saturday, July 9, 1994 (Henry is 31, Clare is 23): Henry and Clare have just finished moving into their new home. They make love as "the house envelopes us, watches us… and I feel that we found our home" (2.1.83).
- Sunday, August 28, 1994 (Clare is 23, Henry is 31): Henry and Clare hang out with Gomez. Gomez groans because Henry and Clare want to visit a bookstore, but he's not excited about the idea. Inside the store, Henry watches Clare from a distance, enraptured by her, when he notices Gomez looking at her in the same way.
- Sunday, January 15, 1995 (Clare is 23, Henry is 31): Henry and Clare are making dinner when Henry suddenly disappears, leaving Clare to eat by herself, waiting and wondering.
- Friday, February 3, 1995 (Clare is 23, Henry is 31, and 39): Henry and Clare have Charisse and Gomez over to their house. They're playing a version of Monopoly, made up by Gomez and Charisse. Suddenly they hear a big crash in the kitchen. Henry finds his older self in there, lying bleeding in a heap of broken glass from the wooden cabinet he landed in. Clare wants to call an ambulance but present Henry tells her that his other version will disappear shortly, and then he does.