Remote Control
A short story.
Janet is clearly upset.
And Eric is clearly the target.
Well, clear to Eric. Janet contends that nothing’s wrong. She’s just feeling…off. But Eric can’t shake the feeling that this particular “off” is “on” him.
She goes to bed in a huff. They wake up in a Cold War.
Both go to work, Janet to her law firm and Eric to his “digital marketing consultancy.” By the time they meet up at home again, she’s over it. She greets him with a peck and a smile. Cold War over. Not that Eric relaxes. The onset had been sudden and inexplicable, as had the end, so he’s not getting too comfy just yet.
They talk about their day over takeout General Tso’s. Have a glass of wine (Eric has two) and settle onto the couch in front of the television, to wrangle with one of life’s biggest questions:
“What do you wanna watch?”
Janet scrolls aimlessly through Netflix and Prime Video and Hulu. She’d offer up a title.
”Only Murders In The Building”?
Eric would shrug. She’d keep scrolling.
Five show-offerings later, Eric finally contributes, “Oooh, why don’t we watch the next episode of Mad Men? Last night’s was so good.”
His lightbulb illuminates Janet too and they settled in for a little 1960s’ Madison Avenue drama featuring powerful ad alpha male and serial philanderer Don Draper and the rest of Sterling, Cooper, Draper, Pryce. They’d recently decided it was time for a rewatch.
Don Draper’s estranged wife Betty is, understandably, upset. In a huff. Don has done her wrong, again. She’s feeling that suburban midlife crisis flavor of caged desperation. She’s feeling that Byrne-ian “This is not my beautiful life” feeling in her bones, even though—chronologically—the show predates Talking Heads by a good decade or two.
Eric dozes off around the 21-minute mark and only wakes up when he feels Janet rise from the couch and heavy-foot huff off to their bedroom.
Is she mad? Again? Is it because I fell asleep? he wonders between eye squints.
He rubs his eyes, cracks the bones in his neck and stands up, unsure-foot stumbling his way to their bedroom, then the adjacent bathroom, where Janet appears to be scrubbing the enamel off her teeth, brushing with a stiff ferocity.
”Hey…sorry I fell asleep…”
”It’s fine.”
Fine, being the kiss of death, the ultimate tell in just how “not fine” something is.
”So, how’d it end?”
Janet stops the scrub. Thinks a bit. Sighs a big sigh.
”Well, Don’s in deep with some hussy again, big shocker.”
Back to the military-grade scrub.
”Ha, yeah. That guy has issues, right?”
No reply. He puts his hand on her shoulder. She flinches. The Cold War appears to have started back up while he was dozing. He retreats, brushes his own teeth, little spits and faucet drips breaking up the democracy/commie silence between them.
”Well, good night,” he says. Mostly to himself.
Coffee, he thinks in the morning. Perhaps coffee can thaw this icy standoff. He makes Janet’s coffee just the way she likes it: flat white with just a hint of cardamom. She strides into the kitchen with purpose. He hands her the still-steaming cup. She nods with a tight smile and takes it and walks immediately to their connected garage, “I gotta go” said but just barely.
”OK, see ya. Have a good day,” he says. Mostly to himself.
r u ok? he texts Janet, on his lunch break.
She replies with a thumbs up emoji. He wonders why there aren’t two different thumbs up emojis: one regular and one sarcastic. Because sometimes? It’s not all that clear. He’s on deadline, though, so he’s gonna take her at her word/emoji and stay focused on this dog food creative brief.
When he pulls into the driveway later that night, her Audi’s already on her side of the garage. He walks in the house, carefully, trying to take the temperature of the room, scanning for tripwires and landmines. She’s laying on the couch, listening to her favorite Chopin with a glass of wine. When she notices him, she reaches down for a glass she’d already poured for him and lifts it towards him. He takes it and takes a quick, probably-bigger-than-planned swig.
”Thanks.”
”Sorry about this morning. I just felt a little…off. And we had a huge meeting with all the partners that I had to present in, so I was feeling pressed towards that.”
”No worries.” he says, mostly to her, “how was your presentation? Did the rest of your day go ok?”
”Good, good. All good. Great. Sit down. Snuggle with me.”
He does as ordered.
”We have some leftover Mr. Chin’s. Wanna warm it up and watch the next episode? I think Pete is about to betray all of them…”
Still reeling just a bit from the emotional rollercoaster of the week, Eric doesn’t feel emotionally equipped to handle the oppressively simmering bleakitude and discontent of Mad Men. Not tonight. Besides, he has a sneaking suspicion, a correlation he can’t quite articulate yet.
“I kinda feel like something, I dunno…lighter?” he offers.
”Oh?”
”Yeah, y’know how sometimes you just need, like, a salad? I guess I feel like I can’t handle a steak tonight, if that makes sense?”
”I get that. How about Friday Night Lights?”
Friday Night Lights is basically comfort food for Eric and Janet. They see Coach & Tami Taylor as their #relationshipgoals. They’ve watched the entire series no fewer than three times, not counting Season 2, which nobody in their right mind counts anyway.
Comfort food as it is, Eric falls asleep halfway through the episode, again. They both stumble wordlessly to bed.
He awakes with an anxious shudder the next morning, worried that Janet was annoyed by his early falling asleep again. Janet rolls over towards Eric with a dozy smile on her face, “Morning, sweetheart.” She kisses him, uncharacteristic for her without either of them first brushing out their morning breath. Not that he’d complain.
The suspicion is no longer sneaking. It’s tromping. As real as morning breath.
A little before lunch, Eric’s phone buzzes.
I (heart) u
He taps out his own message back. Smiles.
Over burritos, Eric confides in his coworker Alan.
“So there’s this thing happening at home. It’s kinda weird.”
“The thrill is gone? Been there, man.”
“No. We’re still very much in love. It’s just…”
“She wants to introduce handcuffs?”
“What? Dude. No. Weirder. It’s like…our lives, the tone of our days…it’s like it… reflects whatever we watch on TV.”
“What? Like how?”
“Yeah. So last week we were rewatching Mad Men and suddenly Janet’s all pissed at me. Like I’m Don Draper! There’s not some other explanation—we hadn’t been bickering about vacuums or Amazon orders or her friends’ annoying husbands or anything, she wasn’t on her period, our finances are fine, nothing. Just…every time we watch Mad Men? She gets suddenly inexplicably furious with me.”
“First off, you don’t look a thing like Don Draper. Sorry.”
”You don’t think?” Eric knows.
”Well, maybe… it’s the ad thing?”
“That’s what I thought. Coincidence. So then I tried Friday Night Lights, where Coach and Tammy are committed and loving and all #relationshipgoals. And, for real, Janet was suddenly super affectionate and warm and cozy. It’s like… our tv viewing is determining the weather of our marriage.”
“Huh.” You can see the wheels in Alan’s sci-fi-loving brain turning before he finally deduces, “Well, you know the only way to really figure this out is to try something more obviously different, a zag from the good/bad relationship thing, something undeniable. What show could you watch?”
”Not American Horror Story…” Eric laughs.
”Not Game of Thrones…” Alan winces and motions with his thumb across his throat.
”Bob’s Burgers?”
”The Max Power episode of The Simpsons!”
“I should try, like, Masters of Sex or something.”
They both laugh.
“What if we try Masters of Sex? I heard it’s pretty good. A little, uh, steamy….” and to not seem so transparent he addends, “oh, and the lead actors are supposed to be brilliant…”
They try it. This time, Eric does not doze off during the show. And he and Janet have a little, uh, steamy sex.
“OK, but, like, sex is pretty suggestible, right?” Alan says the next day over burritos, “Like that’s why some couples watch porn together, to get in the mood. The idea that you two had sex after watching a show centered on sex doesn’t seem all that…unusual.”
“Yeah, I guess it could’ve put us both in the right headspace.”
“You think?”
“So what’s a better test, then?”
“Better than sex? Do you hear yourself? Man, the things I would do with that remote….” Alan scuzzes.
”You know what I mean. What’s better to test this theory of mine?”
”Something that won’t get you physically hurt or end your marriage….something that will be an obvious detour from where you two usually go….maybe something that’s not even about a married couple, or doesn’t have one at its core…”
”Yeah, like a comedy…”
”Community or 30 Rock. Reruns of The Office.”
“But those all have subplots with romantic relationships.”
“There’s gotta be something.”
“I feel like a comedy tonight,” Eric offers up.
”Like a movie? Or a series?” Janet clarifies.
”Maybe just a single episode. I’m pretty tired, but I feel like watching something to wind down.”
Janet scrolls through Netflix, naming different comedy series as she sees them. Arrested Development. Seinfeld. Brooklyn-99. “How about something….older? More…classic.” she proposes.
”Like what?”
”Oh, I dunno. The 80’s. Like Small Wonder or Mr. Belvedere or Family Ties or….oh, yes, this is what we’re doing…we are watching…” She presses play without even getting Eric’s input.
”Thank you for bein’ a frie-end…” the tv goes.
”GOLDEN GIRLS?” Eric gasps.
”Golden Girls!” Janet smiles. “I love this. Betty White is so funny. We’re watching it. No arguing.”
Eric thinks about his theory. Off their beaten path. No romantic relationships. Just elderly women being friends. Fine.
”Fine.”
“So…what’d you watch?”
”….Golden Girls?”
”And…”
”And I woke up to Janet wearing this floral silk kimono she hasn’t worn in years.”
”I mean, that’s not exactly proof, is it?”
”And she was up at 5 am. Like…like…”
”LIKE AN OLD PERSON”
”Like an old person. And, this is the kicker, she was sipping PRUNE JUICE."
”Prune juice?”
”We don’t even have any prune juice. Never have. I don’t even know where she got it.”
”Well, she was up for a few hours before you. She may have grown the prunes and juiced them before you woke up. Or, y’know, GONE TO THE STORE.”
”But it’s reasonable evidence, right?”
”Yeah, I kinda think it is. If she starts talking like Bea Arthur and bellowing ‘mother’ at you, you’ll really be in trouble. Can I please borrow the remote?”
Eric ignores the question. He’s stuck on a question of his own: ”Do I tell her?”
Eric doesn’t tell her.
Instead, he starts to curate the shows they watch to suit what he wants out of his marriage. He justifies that it’s harmless. It’s not hurting anyone. It’s just kinda…oh, steering his day-to-day more than usual.
More sex? Plenty of HBO and Cinemax shows to help with that.
A happier relationship? Sitcoms tend to end on an up note, especially the older ones.
It’s like he has genie in a bottle connected to the tv remote.
One night he comes home and the house is a mess. A sink oozing dirty dishes. Room temperature leftover containers strewn around. He’s tired of ro-cham-bo’ing to see who does the dishes. Then it hits him. Look, he’s not a chauvinist. He’s not a bad guy, no. But who would fault him for deciding to maybe suggest they go way back and watch a golden oldie….maybe Leave It To Beaver or Father Knows Best tonight. Just this once. He’s feeling a little vintage, after all.
The next day the house is clean as a whistle. Cleaner maybe. Janet, despite having a full schedule of her own at work, has slung on an apron and cleaned the house. Dinner—a casserole!—is in the oven as he pulls in after work. She kisses him, hands him the latest issue of The Wall Street Journal that came in the mail today, tells him to take a load off. A guy could get used to this.
“DUDE!” Alan says over tacos. “You gotta let me borrow that remote.”
“I dunno, man. Seems risky. What if it stops working? What if it backfires? What if you lose it? What if its mojo is somehow geo-connected to my exact location? Way too many what if’s.”
“C’mon, man. Just a little test drive.”
Janet wants to watch another episode of Leave It To Beaver tonight. “Darling, I think I’m obsessed,” she giggles. What can it hurt? Besides, who doesn’t love being called “darling”? He dozes off during this one.
When he wakes up, in his bed, Janet’s not there. Couldn’t be a Golden Girls thing, right, getting up in the elderly hours? They didn’t even watch that.
No. He realizes she slept in a different bed, just like the parents on Leave It To Beaver.
She is obsessed.
Suddenly she’s talking to him in a weird sing-song voice all the time, seemingly inflated with some over-the-top cheery helium. She won’t complain with him. Won’t bad-talk the neighbors. Treats his off-color jokes like federal crimes. The loose, sailor-tongued Janet is nowhere to be found.
And every night—laundry perfectly folded, kitchen spotless, his lunch already made for the next day—she kisses him chastely on the cheek and disappears into her separate bedroom, separate bed, curlers in her hair. Any attempts at intimacy are deflected, “Eric Spencer Monson! This is not a brothel!”or “I’m just so tired after all this homemaking, darling. Let’s take a raincheck, ok?”
“I quit my job today!” Janet beams one day, as she sits at the dining room table opening the daily mail.
Eric can’t bring himself to disrupt the pure joy on her face. “Wow! That was kind of sudden! I thought you loved that job.”
“I know! I know! I just felt like it wasn’t for me anymore, you know?”
Eric starts thinking maybe this is a monkey paw situation, where you get what you want but not how you want it. He’s gonna put his foot down and get this thing back to normal, get their lives back to what they used to be, he decides before spying a hulking pile of dirty dishes in the sink.
“Tomorrow,” he decrees, mostly to himself. “Everything will go back to normal tomorrow.”
The next day, though, Eric can’t find the remote. Janet has no idea where it might have gone. Neither do the couch cushions. It’s not like Eric needs a tv show right this very second or anything. He’s no addict. But, for obvious life-steering reasons, it’s concerning.
Janet pulls a strawberry rhubarb pie from the oven, places it on the windowsill to cool and heads off to the inaugural night of the Bridge Club she just founded with some of the neighborhood ladies.
“Don’t wait up for me.” Her perfect dimples catch the sunset light. Even stuck in her June Cleaver Era, she’s gorgeous.
Eric doublechecks every place he already looked, triple-checking a few of them to see if somehow he missed the remote in some shadow.
No dice. He goes to sleep.
The next night, Janet meets him at the door.
“Darling, did you take the tv?”
“Huh?”
“I went grocery shopping today and when I came back, the tv was gone. I just assumed you took it for one of your random weird work projects or something.”
“No, I was at a shoot all day. Barely even had a chance to eat lunch, much less stop at home to….take our tv.”
“Well, that’s strange,” Janet laments. She has no idea, Eric thinks to himself.
“Is anything else missing?”
“Not that I’ve noticed,” Janet replies.
He glances over and notices the open window where the strawberry rhubarb pie used to be. Where it was there’s a smudged footprint.
Alan’s desk is empty in the morning. Again. Alan hasn’t been to work all week.
Eric texts him, everything ok? haven’t seen you all week. O’Neill and E.T. Fingers are asking about you.
No reply.
Days later, HR announces that Alan has left the company. Eric asks Sonya in HR for Alan’s contact info. “I wanna send him a goodbye gift,” he lies.
“You know I can’t give that to you, Eric,” she shrugs him off.
Eric googles Alan. He finds: a rarely-updated LinkedIn profile, a Facebook account that hasn’t been updated since the 2016 election, an eBay seller hawking old sci-fi VHS tapes. He messages the eBay seller with zero confidence in getting a reply.
He texts again: i know you took the tv and the remote. just bring them back, you prick. the authorities don’t have to get involved.
For a second, he swears he sees the three little replying dots. Or did he?
He jumps over to Amazon.com and orders the exact same tv and remote combo as the magic one. They arrive a day later.
The remote changes channels perfectly.
With none of the extra bells and whistles he’s desperate for.
It shatters impressively when thrown at the wall.
A couple weeks and a half dozen shattered remotes later, in an immaculately clean home, sexually frustrated and well-fed Eric slouches on a La-Z-Boy in his “study” (“man-cave” he consistently reminds Janet), absently shoveling Ben & Jerry’s into his mouth, watching Rick and Morty on his laptop with headphones.
If he stops mulling the possibilities of the multiverse and slips the headphones off for just a moment, down the hall, from Janet’s room, he can hear her humming “The Toy Parade” as she does her weekly ironing of the main floor curtains.
She has never been happier.