Little Monsters

Abby waits on the beach for Adam’s boat to arrive. Worried about her father, she considers how she’s accepted a minor position in their family, content to let Ken and Adam shine. Her painting Little Monster will be on the cover of Art Observer.

She sees Steph on the boat and, knowing Steph is a cop, asks if they are in trouble. Steph agrees to meet Abby in the morning. Over drinks at Tzuco’s, Adam castigates Hillary Clinton for her email storage before discussing Steph with Abby. Abby notices his changed appearance as he bemoans his age and the loss of his doctor. Adam wonders why he can’t understand whales now. She tells him that they must see his doctor as they jockey to pay the check.

Ken remembers their turtle, Charon, questioning if Abby ever recalled these same memories. In his office, Ken creates an exact copy of Charon for his father’s model while listening to a linguist on the radio discuss the gulf between language and emotion. Jenny enters with tiny rugs and curtains for his model, created from his ugly tie. He expresses his love for Jenny as he comments on the value of hard work and attaches her creations to his model. 

Steph bluntly tells Abby that she is her half-sister. Abby recognizes her father’s resemblance to Steph as they walk after Steph’s confession. Steph asks about Abby’s relationship with Ken, and Abby articulates the importance of loyalty to the Gardners. Steph explains her subterfuge to Abby. She compares her family’s working-class background to the Gardners’ artistic and academic achievements. Abby asks when Steph will tell Ken and Adam, warning Steph about Adam’s inability to act as Steph’s father. As Steph acknowledges her own caring father, they see a great white shark.

Adam struggles to overcome his exhaustion, his symptoms of mania having subsided. He is lost in sadness, his mood swinging like a pendulum. He avoids diagrams he made while experiencing mania. Adam mourns that the Gardner name will disappear without a male heir, ignoring Ken’s twin daughters.

Ken and Jenny go over the details for Adam’s birthday party, and Ken asks about the toasts and the mic. Jenny suggests that he and Abby give a toast together. Ken is seemingly unwilling to discuss Abby and tells Jenny that he must leave. Disappointed, Jenny tells him they need to talk about Abby and the Arcadia. Jenny leaves her phone. Abby texts about her son, which Ken reads. Later, at lunch with David, Ken tells him that Abby is pregnant.

Frannie wakes Jenny up, alerting her to workers delivering tents for the party. Hungover, Jenny recalls that she drank excessively the night before and had a girls’ night with her twin daughters. Ken never came home. She checks her phone, worried about social media posts or other embarrassments. She sees only short calls to her husband and father.

Abby goes to her father’s house. She sees evidence of his manic symptoms and feels empathy for him. She walks through the house, wondering if her mother knew about his affair with Steph’s mother. David texts from his house nearby. When they meet, David asks about her pregnancy, planning a move for her and announcing that she can maintain the Arcadia. Sensing that he has offended her and recognizing his awkward phrasing, David tries to comfort her. Abby leaves.

Ken examines Abby’s painting after it is delivered to his house. In his office, he judges it with his X-acto knife in his hand before suddenly slicing through the canvas with his knife. He hears a twig break outside his window and asks who is there. 

Jenny abandons the conservative blue dress she had planned to wear to the birthday party, instead wearing a colorful skirt and revealing top. Embracing her recent dream and becoming Jennifer Lowell, Jenny opts for free-flowing hair. She sees Frannie, who asks if she’s leaving Ken. She understands Tessa’s silence, knowing that Ken stabbed Abby’s painting. She drinks tequila.

Listening to Mozart’s Requiem, Adam wishes he could avoid his party. He reads a birthday text from Steph, acknowledging he’s more like Victor Frankenstein than Charles Darwin. Hurt by his apparent failure, he vows to withdraw into his wooded home in Wellfleet.

Ken thinks up excuses to explain Abby’s painting when Tessa looks at him, making a gesture with her hands. Thinking she’s being playful, he makes the same gesture. She gestures toward Abby’s painting. Ken realizes she had watched him stab it.

Jenny’s father arrives with John Kaufman, a powerful Republican committeeman for the Massachusetts state party. Ken is shocked at seeing Kaufman. Jenny descends the stairs with a radiant and altered appearance from the Jenny that Ken expects.

Abby and Adam arrive at the party, and Adam expresses his pride in Abby. Adam claims that Emily would say the same to Abby. Adam sees his grandchildren. He comments on Frannie’s appearance, noting her developing body. Dressed in a suit rather than a dress, Tessa greets her grandfather. Jenny gets another drink, thinking about Abby’s painting that she’s repaired with gold tape. As Abby accuses Jenny of telling David about her pregnancy, Jenny asks to talk about her painting.

Ken calls the room to attention. Abby plays the ukulele, while Tessa and Frannie sing to their grandfather to the tune of the Beatles’ “Hey Jude.” Adam takes the mic and speaks about age. Abby interrupts him. She reveals her pregnancy, signaled by her belly and a symbol representing masculinity on her dress. Adam proclaims that the Gardner name will survive through his grandson, and David and Tessa protest for different reasons.

Ken presents Adam with his model and a deed. He explains that Adam owns an apartment in Ken’s senior living development. Adam doesn’t react, planning to confront Ken the next day. Abby gives Adam her painting, and, as she bows, a contraction forces her to her knees. Passing out, Abby lies on the ground. Steph pushes past Ken to administer help, having been trained as an EMT. Abby regains consciousness.

After the party, Ken speeds in his car, rationalizing his molestation of Abby when they were children, which he recognizes in the painting. He goes to the Arcadia, thinking of the paintings she might have there and what they might show. As he examines the paintings, he sees the narrative of their childhood created by Abby. He asks Siri to call his therapist. 

Abby asks Steph to look after Frida while she recovers. Steph arrives at the Arcadia. She sees Ken as he ends his call with George. Ken tells Steph that he knows her identity. 

Adam imagines teaching his grandson what he knows about the sea. He merges a memory of finding a conch shell in the Florida keys with a future where his grandson listens to one. Adam goes to sleep.

Talking to a resident in the hospital, Abby hears that her baby will be fine. She tells him she had an out-of-body experience after she passed out, which he dismisses. Steph visits Abby in the hospital and tells Abby she only wants a relationship with Abby and her son. She already has a father and wants to avoid Ken’s rage.

Jenny and Ken arrive at George’s office, and Jenny recognizes George’s masks as Indigenous objects. Ken prepares to tell Jenny everything—about his fantasy of cuddling Abby, his molestation of her, and his abandonment issues. She interrupts, telling him that he should be certain before he confesses.

Jenny has repaired Little Monster, as she once repaired Abby’s mug in college. An updated photo of the painting is printed in Art Observer along with a description of kintsugi, the method Jenny used to repair the painting. Jenny throws a baby shower for Abby at the Arcadia in October. Steph and Toni, whom Tessa and Frannie accept as aunts, attend.

Tessa and Frannie, like Adam, imagine a future with their cousin Reid, who will be born in November. Together with their aunts and mother, they create a time capsule for Reid, which he will open when he’s 21. Jenny tells Abby she might never see Ken again. He has willed the Arcadia to Reid, with a provision in the trust that Abby can live there for life. They consider the world and that Hillary Clinton has over a 90% chance of winning the election.