63 pages • 2 hours read
The Perfect Couple
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Themes
The Illusion of the Perfect Family
Starting with the title of the novel, The Perfect Couple, Hildebrand deconstructs and debunks the notion of perfect couples and families. As the narrative shows, there is no such thing as perfection in love and relationships. Each of the two perfect families at the center of the narrative—the Otises and the Winburys—have flaws and secrets. While Celeste’s close relationship with her parents is warm and genuine, it also tends to be cloying and too involved. When Celeste begins dating Benji and tells him about Karen’s cancer, she reflects that her “entire relationship with her parents is too intense to explain to most people” (106). Though Celeste presents the front of being a dutiful, perfect daughter, the flip side to her devotion is that she tends to self-sacrifice. Most notably, on discovering that Karen’s cancer has returned, Celeste decides to go ahead with her unwanted wedding with Benji so that Karen can have a beautiful experience. Celeste also blames her supposedly illicit feelings for Shooter for bringing back Karen’s illness. These examples show that Celeste’s love for her parents has grown overwhelming to the point that it obstructs Celeste from considering her own feelings. Further, even the wholesome Otises have secrets from each other. Karen lies to Bruce about the anesthetic pills, and Bruce keeps his sexuality a secret from Karen.
The other perfect family—the Winburys—present even more of a façade, their pretense amplified by the pressure of status. While the Otises are a modest, nuclear family, the Winburys have a far more sprawling life. They are extremely wealthy; have not experienced divorce; and have two successful children, with the older married and the younger nearly married. Greer is a famous author, and Tag is professionally successful too. The Winburys check all the boxes for a perfect family. Yet, it quickly becomes obvious that perfection is a front: Greer spends her days worrying about Tag’s infidelity, Tag pursues a vulnerable young woman and refuses to support her resulting pregnancy, and Thomas, the older Winbury son, has been having an affair for several years. As Abby tells Detective Nick, “Everyone in the Winbury family has secrets” (57). When Benji discovers his father’s affair, he is devastated because “by the standards of today they are ‘normal;’ a happy, normal family. A family, he would have said, without secrets or drama” (231). The contrast between Abby and Benji’s views of the Winbury family shows that Benji was taken in by the illusion of perfection and normalcy.
Societal expectations around perfect families extend to perfect couples as well. Benji and Celeste are often called the perfect couple, but the truth is that Celeste is never in love with Benji to begin with. Celeste persists with the relationship merely out of a sense of duty toward Benji and her mother. Like the notion of a perfect couple, the notion of a perfect groom is also romanticized. Karen, Celeste’s mother, thinks of Benji as a real-life Prince Charming, with whom “Celeste’s future will be blessed” (245). In truth, Benji is not the idealized concept of a white knight, but a regular young man. Merritt too romanticizes Benji and Celeste’s perfect relationship, feeling pressured to seek a similar one of her own with Tag to disastrous results. An important lesson the narrative offers is that the pressure to become part of a perfect family and couple can drive people to very poor choices. Celeste thinks her mother and father make a perfect couple, and she craves the love she perceives in their relationship. Part of Celeste’s journey toward adulthood is realizing that her parents are not perfect, neither as individuals nor as a couple; they are just two people trying to live the best lives they can. Additionally, the text shows families can come in all forms. Merritt and Celeste form a sisterhood, while Chief Kapenash and his wife, Andrea, adopt their niece and nephew after the death of the twins’ parents. There is no singular definition of families and couples. If people accepted that possibility, the novel suggests, perhaps they would not experience as much pressure to chase an elusive perfection.
The Dichotomy Between Public and Private Personas
In an important scene in the book, Chief Kapenash’s 16-year-old niece Chloe McAvoy interacts with 29-year-old Merritt, each young woman admiring the other’s public persona. Chloe is in awe of Merritt, an influencer with social media clout, her cool black dress, and her beauty. Merritt is impressed by the fact that Chloe is a native of the island of Nantucket. Merritt tells Chloe she is “the luckiest girl in the world” (161) for getting to live year-round in such a beautiful place. Of course, Chloe is not particularly lucky. She lost both her parents when she was seven years old and experiences the typical difficulties of teenagers too. Merritt’s life is not as perfect as it appears either; shortly before this interaction, Chloe heard Tag ask Merritt to terminate her pregnancy. Both Chloe and Merritt have their own specific troubles, yet their public personas say otherwise. This dichotomy between private and public personas is a recurrent pattern in the book and highlights the pressure of maintaining social appearances.
The theme of dichotomous personas is best illustrated by Merritt’s character, especially because she is a social media influencer. Merritt’s public persona is linked with her profession, which makes her desire to project an appearance even greater. Chief Kapenash notes that Merritt posted a happy picture on Instagram when she left for Celeste’s wedding, even though Merritt must have been undergoing great emotional turmoil at the time. As an influencer, Merritt cannot let the turmoil show; she must constantly frame her life as a series of happy, vivacious snapshots. Greer feels social pressure keenly as well, reflected in how her appearance is a performance in itself. Greer takes care to dress and look a certain way: her hair stays pale blond; her clothes are chic whites and pastels; and her designer bags, shoes, and sunglasses are all understated and tasteful. Greer conveys wealth, competence, and tradition. Privately, however, Greer is racked with anxiety about her husband’s infidelity and forced to take heavy sedatives to quell her nerves. Similarly, the suave Tag pretends to be an ideal family man, but as his pursuit of Merritt shows, he is capable of problematic and predatory behavior.
The dichotomy between public and private selves is a symptom of a world preoccupied with surfaces and appearances. The world is not only tilted in favor of those who display the symbols of status but also constantly watching and judging the moves of every character. Tabloid journalists, regular people armed with phone cameras, and social media handles are ubiquitous in the novel, making it difficult for characters to shed their public personas. When Shooter and Celeste have a private moment on the docks, their image is captured by an unknown person and later sent to Shooter. Shooter zooms in to see in the picture his private self revealed, looking at Celeste with “naked desire, longing, covetousness” (330). The narrative suggests that Shooter may later be blackmailed over the picture. Thus, revealing the private self is a risk, as the world could easily respond harshly. Greer assesses this possibility when she considers, for a split second, abandoning Tag. Because Greer is a writer of murder mysteries, her husband being framed for a murder will prove irresistible fodder for the press: “The New York Post will cover it and the British tabloids. Greer will be cast as an object of pity; her fans with either cringe or rage on her behalf. The thought is horrifying” (255). As Greer’s reflection suggests, the omnipresence of media and surveillance in the contemporary world compounds the pressure on the characters to perform their public selves.
Finally, the characters fixate on public personas and appearances because those presentations are easier to control and manage than private selves and genuine relationships. A good example is Greer’s desire to plan the perfect wedding. Greer wants to execute Benji and Celeste’s wedding perfectly to compensate for the fact that she cannot control Tag’s infidelity or her own feelings of sadness and betrayal. Rather than face these feelings, Greer focuses on appearances and public performance.
The Privilege and Limitations of Wealth and Status
In the novel, wealth and its absence each work both as privilege and pressure. Thus, the author presents a nuanced examination of status, privilege, and the absence of privilege. The biggest roadblock, of course, is the absence of wealth in a world skewed to favor the privileged. As Karen repeatedly notes, the absence of wealth means she and Roger cannot take ordinary vacations and getaways for granted. They have to work hard for every dollar. When Karen becomes sick, the Otises incur thousands of dollars in debt for her treatment. The financial struggle means Karen knows that having money and resources is very important. She sees Celeste’s merging with the world of the Winburys as a blessing for Celeste. For Celeste too, Benji’s wealth at first represents sheer possibility and choice. In an early chapter, Benji offers Celeste tickets to Hamilton, the famous Lin-Manuel Miranda musical, which was completely booked out in New York City in real life in 2016 and 2017. The fact that Benji can procure the much-in-demand tickets is itself intoxicating for Celeste. Benji further reveals that his father is one of the original investors in the production, so Benji has seen Hamilton five times already.
Yet, even as she admires Benji’s world, filled with beauty and options, Celeste notes how its wealth makes her feel poor. When she sees the way Benji lives, Celeste begins to experience shame at her small apartment, her IKEA furniture, and her modest home décor. She also cannot help finding some of Benji’s behavior entitled and snooty, such as when Benji suggests she leave her retail-store candles behind when they move to a new house. In another sequence, Benji finds the idea of Celeste’s down-to-earth officemates Mawabe and Vern in the same room as Greer unimaginable. Celeste also dislikes Benji’s treatment of Shooter when Benji assumes Shooter will sail them to a restaurant like an employee. Thus, while wealth represents choice and freedom for Celeste, it also begins to symbolize compromise and corruption. For Merritt, the realization is not as simple. She is enamored with Tag in part because of his wealth and his Nantucket house. Merritt tells Celeste that Celeste does not realize how lucky she is “having a rich boyfriend with a huge waterfront home on Nantucket” (206). To Merritt, estranged from her parents, wealth represents stability and the glamor she likes. Wealth means a lifestyle like that of Tag and Greer and freedom from working in jobs that pay badly and come with predatory bosses like Trevor Darling. Caught up in the fantasy of wealth, Merritt forgets that the outrageously wealthy are at least as corrupt as anyone else. This inextricable link between wealth, corruption, and secrets becomes obvious to characters like Karen after she learns about Tag’s affair with Merritt. Karen reflects that “it makes either perfect sense or no sense at all that a family as esteemed and wealthy as the Winburys have a second narrative running deep underneath the first, like a dark, murky stream” (292).
For the wealthy, the performance of wealth and status can never lose steam. Greer is someone who “thrives on tradition, protocol, and decorum” (16). Greer symbolizes these values, always presenting a particular, put-together image in public, despite how exhausting it is to maintain that act. Greer is preoccupied with the Winbury name and heritage; she often stymies her feelings to perform the show of restrained, breezy wealth. When worrying about Tag, she recalls how decades ago, Tag had returned from his bachelor’s party smelling of the perfume of other women. Greer had wept in rage, but her mother—who came from old money—told Greer that in marriage, one must pick their battles, and Greer must “pick the ones you can win” (16). Greer’s mother’s advice shows that the wealthy and status-conscious have to live by certain rules, compromising on one’s feelings for the sake of smart strategy. Thus, status and wealth carry their own limitations, though these are of a different nature than the problems posed by an absence of wealth. Greer must keep up the charade of a happy marriage, Thomas must return to Abby, Abby must accept Thomas’s infidelity, and Benji must stick by his family.
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