Previously on The Affair...
Madeline was really happy
that you were here tonight.
You've been working so much.
DOD's trying to save an old base.
Hmm, it'll be an erosion study, probably a swinging gate.
- Where is it? - Montauk.
- Did you make it? - Almost.
Where are you going to stay?
Dad's place.
- Is that a good idea? - It's fine.
You here for work?
I am.
I'm a coastal engineer.
I haven't seen a face like yours out here in a while.
I like it.
Joanie. What's going on?
I miss my dad.
Man, you're getting big.
Where is Mommy?
All we have to do is think about her
and remember her and that way she will always be with us.
Good girl! Yeah!
Gorgeous girl.
Hi, Dad.
Sync and corrections by btsix www.addic7ed.com
_
Paul?
Hey, baby. How's it going?
I'm just calling to check in.
Oh. Well, I'm glad you did.
Where are you right now?
Joanie?
Are you still there?
I'm here.
Sorry.
- How are the girls? - Oh, they're great.
Your mom's coming to visit tomorrow to help out,
so they're super excited for that.
That's good. I'm-I'm glad.
I'm actually heading back tomorrow,
so I'll get to see Mom.
Okay, quick trip.
Did you get what you needed?
Yeah. Yeah, I did.
- I love you. - I love you, too.
You know it's rude to stare, right?
And creepy, given the context.
EJ.
What?
EJ. My name.
My name is EJ.
Oh, yeah. That looks safe.
Your front tire's flat.
And your back tire's flat. They're both... flat.
Good luck.
I should probably give you a ride.
If you touch me, I'll stab you.
Can you drop me at Lighthouse Point?
I can't believe you just got in the car.
- Are you gonna drive, or... - I mean, I could be anyone.
I could be a murderer.
I'd honestly rather die than have you keep looking at me like that.
Oh, my God.
Your car runs on gas.
You're the one wearing a watch.
Who the fuck does that anymore?
It's my dead mother's, you dick.
My bad.
You know you're doing irreparable harm
to a planet that's already dying, right?
It's not, like, a cool thing.
Sorry. If you want me to hear you, you're gonna have to speak into my good ear.
- What? - What?
Am I supposed to understand what's happening?
Not into old movies, huh?
Okay, then.
So what were you doing in the graveyard?
You first.
Oh, I was just looking for victims.
There we go. That's better.
I'm studying some of Montauk's older families.
I'm an epigeneticist.
The plot where you were standing actually belongs to a family
I'm super interested in; I've been studying them for years.
But, uh, I didn't want to walk over
in case you were there to visit a...
husband?
Brother, then.
Cousin? Still no?
Who do you think I am?
Lavinia? Caleb's wife?
What's so interesting about the Lockharts?
Well, I study trauma, so...
So...?
And how it gets passed down from generation
to generation.
I mean, the whole family is steeped
in cyclical tragedy.
Murder, drowning, suicide,
more murder, more drowning, more suicide...
Okay, it wasn't that bad.
Oh, my God. Are you Joanie?
Wow. Damn. I cannot believe this.
This is amazing. I'm taking you to dinner.
No.
- Why not? - I have to work.
Well, after work. After you work, we'll go to dinner.
And... don't get any ideas. Okay?
This is just so I can interview you.
No.
That's what your dad said at first, but he came around.
You know, you two have very similar scowls.
Do you get that a lot?
- You knew my dad? - Sure I did.
I interviewed him.
Nobody knew the history of Montauk like he did.
How did you...?
How did I what?
Know him? Meet him? Find him?
Never mind.
I found him to be pretty happy,
for what it's worth.
I never understood why he loved it so much out here.
The more this place deteriorated,
the more summer people abandoned it,
the happier he got.
Said it brought him back to the Montauk he remembered as a kid.
It was becoming a small fishing town all over again.
Yeah.
That was my dad.
There's this misconception that trauma can be inherited
from one generation to the next.
That's not exactly true, but what is true
is that children of parents who have experienced trauma
are more likely to be, uh,
easily triggered by their own stressors
than children of un-traumatized parents.
So, like, if you and I both experience a traumatic event,
you might be more likely to, uh, develop
anxiety attacks or, uh, PTSD
around the memory of it than I would
because your parents were traumatized and mine weren't.
Well, hypothetically.
The pattern is pretty clear.
Children of traumatized parents are just more sensitive.
They feel stress and danger more acutely
because they're primed to.
Okay, here's the theory I'm testing:
in some of the families that I've studied,
there is a black sheep of a child
who turns out to be extra resilient.
So, like, instead of inheriting the anxiety of a trauma victim,
they seem to inherit the resilience of a survivor.
What I don't know...
what I'm trying to figure out is how to predict.
How do you know...
which child will be weaker and which child will be stronger?
Is the trauma more dominant than the resilience gene?
Or is it the other way around?
And-and how does nurture play into all of this?
Like, for example, which are you?
What?
You seem tough.
Really tough.
Uh, which would suggest resilience.
But, um...
you're not that interested in my work, are you?
No, not really.
Cool, cool, cool, cool.
So, uh...
what are you doing with those thingies?
These are nanosensors.
They're basically trackable granules of sand.
Studying their movements
will help me predict how fast the coast is eroding.
So what's the verdict on the erosion?
I don't know yet, EJ.
As you can see, I'm still gathering data.
I hope it doesn't disappear too fast.
I love it out here.
I'm actually thinking about buying a house,
property values being so low and everything.
Oh, so you're insane.
How so?
Montauk is built on a pile of sand.
Not granite, sand.
In fact, the whole of Long Island
is basically just the result of glaciers
bulldozing their way across New England, bringing sediment up
from the ocean floor and pushing it into a pile
the way a child would make a sandcastle.
I don't know how fast it's eroding,
but I do know, in about ten or 20 years
all this is gonna be gone.
You'd be crazy to buy anything out here,
especially a piece of property.
But isn't that why you're here?
You're a coastal engineer, right?
Isn't it your job to save the world from drowning?
Hey, where are you going?
Home. I'm done.
Hey, did I offend you back there?
I wasn't trying to.
Don't take this the wrong way,
but you can't offend me
because I don't actually care what you think.
Good point. That's a, that's an excellent point.
Could I, though... could I offer you a compliment anyway?
Just in case, by some miracle,
I did manage to cause unintentional offense?
I think you're pretty impressive.
The way you handled yourself back there on the beach.
You're maybe the most impressive gir... uh,
woman I've ever met.
Because I'm a scientist?
Maybe you just haven't met that many intelligent women.
What? No. Because you're working so calmly
in the place where your mother died.
What?
Alison Bailey?
Your... your mom. She died at the jetty, right?
Are you sure that's true?
That's what it says in the police report.
You've seen the police report?
Yeah, the uh...
precinct flooded a few years ago, and they just up and abandoned it.
Left behind boxes and boxes of files.
It's a real gold mine for an epigeneticist.
Can you take me there?
You mean you want to...
keep hanging out?
Okay.
So many dysfunctional family trees.
The Lockharts, of course, are like my Windsors.
I've read every police report about your family.
Your great-uncle's murder, your grandfather's suicide,
the drug raids,
Scotty's hit-and-run.
Did you know even your dad was arrested once?
Yeah. They thought he stabbed someone.
Uh, uh, be careful with that.
Why?
Flood waters have made some of this stuff fragile,
these in particular.
How much time do you spend here?
You know,
I've come by once or twice
a day... for months.
God, you must be lonely.
I'm very selective with my company.
You should consider yourself lucky.
You're not gonna try to Phantom Thread me later, are you?
I don't know what that means.
Have you ever seen a movie?
Like, any movie?
Give you $200 if you can name one.
So, you got a thing for mushrooms, huh?
They reverse the life process.
What do you mean?
They latch onto a dead thing and break it down.
Turn it into nitrogen, carbon, sulfur, phosphorous.
Then return those minerals to the soil to make it fertile again.
So... decay turns you on.
Mushrooms are the greatest hope
for life to continue on this planet.
Once we're all dead and gone,
fungi are gonna come in and clear everything out
and make space for new life...
something better.
That's a pretty casual way to talk about mass extinction.
Where's her file?
- Isn't that what we came here for? - Of course.
Here we go.
_
You were right.
About what?
She died at the jetty.
Can you take me home?
Like... now?
Of course.
What the hell?
Raccoons.
It's frightening how big they're getting.
Also, there's no, uh, garbage pickup.
You have to go to the dump yourself.
Got it. Thanks.
Um...
What?
Did you mean to throw these away?
They're in the trash, aren't they?
Hard to imagine that woman drowning herself in the ocean.
And yet she did.
Hey! I don't know what you think is gonna happen,
but I'm not gonna fuck you.
That is so far from what... I wasn't...
What the fuck?
Thanks for the ride.
Of course.
So, you gonna stay in for the rest of night, or...
- I have work. - Cool.
Well, then, I'll come by tomorrow for that interview?
I'm going home tomorrow.
I won't be back.
Uh, nice to meet you, I guess.
Hey, uh, uh, do you mind if I hang onto this?
No. I really don't care.
Core samples indicate that sediment is washing west
towards New York City seven times faster
than the previous 36 months
and nine times faster than a decade ago.
The harbor jetties are almost underwater.
partially to blame for an increase in storms,
with the region seeing up to ten times the number
of significant storms a year than even 30 years ago.
Signs indicate that a continuation in the increase
of quantity and intensity of storms
will likely leave Montauk near uninhabitable
in the next five years.
Hello?
Joanie?
Is that you?
- Yeah. It is. - Oh, good.
You're, like, the fifth Joanie I've called.
You know you're pretty hard to find, right?
It's intentional.
Did I leave something in your car?
I was thinking about what happened today at the precinct.
I'd really like to show you something.
Mute call.
Locate pin.
Front door camera.
Unmute call.
You coming down, or what?
A supermoon.
I haven't seen one of these in a while.
I live for these.
I love the way the tide pulls out like that.
It reminds me of that scene in Moana when the sea pulls back
and lets the baby walk out across the ocean floor.
Seriously? Not even Moana?
Did you have a childhood?
So why does it pull back so far?
The tides are largely caused
by the gravitational pull of the Moon.
Supermoon brings supertides.
Why did you come to get me?
Well, I was out here and I realized I didn't want to look
at something so beautiful on my own.
And I wanted to say I'm sorry.
I never said it before, when we were together,
but I'm, I'm sorry about your dad dying.
And I'm sorry about the way that your mother died.
I was treating you like a subject, not a person.
I do that sometimes.
Or, according to my exes, all the time.
But, um,
I should have warned you what was in that file before you opened it.
It's okay.
It must have been awful, losing your mother at such a young age.
Not really.
My mother was an irrational, unhinged depressive
with a death wish.
In some ways, my life was actually easier after she died.
More stable, less surprises.
There was a moon like this one the night she killed herself.
I was staying with my grandmother.
I wanted to go outside to look at it, but my grandmother
wouldn't let me because there was a terrible storm.
Bring up historical weather simulation for this location
30 years ago,
October 13, 7 p.m. Eastern Standard.
Uh, what-what's going on? What are you...?
Just give me a minute.
Jump to 9 p.m.
Midnight.
Jump to 3 a.m., please.
Uh...
What just happened? What are you looking at?
It doesn't make sense.
What doesn't make sense?
There was a supermoon the night my mother died.
And the nor'easter was blowing so strong
that there was a negative storm surge.
Pulled the tide out further than normal.
Okay.
The police report said that she walked off the jetty,
but the water would have been
low for several hours.
There's... no way she could have drowned herself
in water that shallow.
Would've been like jumping into a bathtub.
But they found her body here, right?
Up against the rocks.
That's what her file said.
You think it's wrong?
No, but...
What are you gonna do?
What if...
You gonna kill me?
You think that scares me?
I can't be here. I have to go.
Hey. Hey, wait. Joanie...
- Find car. - Slow down. Just talk to me.
I have been in pain my entire life.
T-Tighter.
Tighter.
I said tighter.
- Is this your thing? - What?
You like being, uh, choked?
- What if I do? - You seemed so resilient
when we first met, so pragmatic.
- What is happening right now? - But...
this bit sort of leans in the other direction.
Would you say you have something of a-a-a death wish?
- What are you talking about? - My theory.
Okay-okay, just-just hear me out.
Resilience versus trauma.
Which is stronger? Which will win?
I-I know a bit about your family.
Your parents split, which is, like,
perfect for a controlled experiment.
On the one side, you've got your mother,
who inherited trauma and eventually succumbed to...
Succame? No, succumbed...
- What? - ...to her own trauma,
and on the other side,
you've got your dad,
who also inherited trauma,
lost everyone around him,
but somehow managed to find resilience.
- I think you should leave. - So what I'm trying
to figure out is where this leaves you.
Are you resilient,
or are you self-destructive?
I mean, at first I would've said resilient.
I mean, obviously, resilient. But now...
Were you fucking me for research?
What? No. I didn't say... Did I just say that?
Get the fuck out of this house.
- Joanie, come on... - No.
...don't be pissed, we're both scientists.
Gimme, it's mine.
It's mine.
Girls, why don't you guys take turns?
Figure it out.
My girls.
Grandma!
Hey.
Hello.
So beautiful.
Hi.
Hi, Mom.
Ah, Luisa, I don't know, what are we gonna do
with all these extra cupcakes?
The girls are gonna be on a high for, well, weeks.
They can bring 'em to school tomorrow.
Babe, tomorrow's Saturday.
Right.
Um... don't they have a birthday party? Gina?
- Yes. Yes, that's... right. - Well, she can take them there.
Good idea.
You know, um...
I got to jump on a call in a bit.
Give you guys a chance
to catch up with each other.
Bring the stuff in and I'll
throw 'em in the dishwasher, okay?
Thank you.
Well, I'm glad the timing worked out.
Paul says you've been running yourself ragged with work.
Oh, it's not that bad.
Just feels like it because this last trip came out of nowhere.
Well, between that and the kids, you deserve a break.
_
Well, if I work too much, it's your fault.
Who else would I have gotten it from?
You work just as hard as you did when you were still my age.
_
Warning. Sensor error.
- Your garden levels are off. - Paul?
Can you check the level monitor in the vertical garden?
Needs to be reset.
How was Montauk?
Was it weird to be back?
Dad left the house a huge mess.
It made me feel guilty, actually.
That he died alone out there.
I should've convinced him to move out here with us.
I mean, the way he was living, no electricity, no companion...
Mm, no.
You shouldn't feel guilty.
He was not gonna leave Montauk, no matter what.
He was the most determined person on the planet.
That's where you get it from, my love.
Not from me.
You think I'm like him?
Yeah. Exactly like him.
But this is a compliment.
I know how much you loved him, Mom.
I found some sort of shrine
at Dad's.
Bunch of letters. Photographs.
Of who?
Alison.
What did you do with it?
I threw it out.
Why?
Because I hate looking at her.
You don't mean that.
Actually, I do.
She ruined everything.
You know, the only good memories I really have of being a child
are in Montauk.
When you and Dad were together.
After Alison died and you guys split up...
...that was it.
My childhood was over.
Your mother was in a tremendous amount of pain.
She was not a strong person. Not like you.
But she loved you.
Come on, I was the replacement child.
Oh, my God, don't say that.
Sometimes I think she just wanted the rest of us
to be in as much pain as she was.
And that's why she...
What?
Why didn't we ever talk about the night she died?
About how it happened?
How are you supposed to talk to a seven-year-old about suicide?
You sure it was suicide?
Yes.
I mean, it was terrible, but it was not surprising,
given her history.
Why would you ask that?
No reason.
Never mind.
Look. Your father spent his life
chasing Alison's ghost.
Doubting, questioning, wondering what if.
_
Ow, Mommy, you're hurting me!
When Daddy does it, it doesn't hurt!
When is it my turn?
- When is it my turn? - Thea, it'll be your turn
in just a minute, okay?
Warning. Sensor error.
- Get Daddy so you can't hurt me. - Your garden levels are off.
When is it my turn? When is it my...?
My son died.
He died in my fucking arms.
Mommy.
Ow!
Oh, Maddy, I'm so sorry. Sweetheart...
Don't touch me! Don't touch me!
- Warning. Sensor error. - All you do is hurt me.
- Your garden levels are off. - All you do is hurt me!
Your garden levels are off.
Warning. Sensor error.
Your garden levels are off.
Warning. Sensor error.
Your garden levels are off.
Warning. Sensor error.
Your garden levels are off.
Check oxygen.
Warning. Sensor error.
- Your garden levels are off. - I said check oxygen!
Warning. Sensor error.
Your garden levels are off.
Warning. Sensor error.
Joanie, what are you doing?
What's the matter with you? Stop!
- Why? - What do you mean by why? Because we need this.
- It's broken. - Okay. I'll get it fixed, okay?
Just... just leave it alone. I'll get it fixed.
I got guys coming in tomorrow.
It's gonna be so expensive.
Look, it's just... it's just money.
Paul, just, just leave it.
Paul, it doesn't matter, just leave it.
It does matter.
It-it makes oxygen.
And our family's eventually gonna need it.
- It's never gonna be enough. - Sure it will.
No. It won't.
When the time comes, when it really comes,
what are we gonna do?
Stay in this house forever, just the four of us,
living on strawberries and air?
What is going on with you, Joanie?
I mean, was it being back at Montauk?
Because I don't understand what's happening.
Why are we trying to live past the point
that the air outside is toxic?
Because we have two beautiful young girls
- who we need to see survive. - Don't you get it?
This garden isn't gonna keep our children alive!
Nothing is!
The world is becoming uninhabitable.
Our children are fucked!
We're just shepherding them towards the apocalypse,
waiting for the day when we get to watch them die!
Will you keep your goddamn voice down?
All right? You need to get some sleep.
- You'll feel better tomorrow. - I'm not gonna feel better tomorrow.
Tomorrow will just be one step closer to the end,
and it's not gonna get better.
And the fact that you can't see that
makes me really question your intelligence.
Then why did we adopt them, Joanie?
Why did we bring them here? If there's no hope,
why didn't we leave them in Senegal to die?
That was your idea. Not mine.
Now you're just trying to hurt me.
I'm going to bed.
Hope to see you there sometime before morning.
Paul, wait.
Yeah?
I've been cheating on you.
For years.
Get out.
- No. - Get the fuck out.
No. This is your whole problem.
This is the 20th-century, romantic, monogamous bullshit.
What, you don't fucking believe in monogamy?
I'm your husband! Thanks for telling me.
Literally nothing has changed between us.
- I still love you. - Don't you fucking dare.
Thirty seconds ago you wanted me to come to bed.
We're still the same people we were 30 seconds ago.
- Nothing has changed. - Everything has changed!
Everything!
You're so fucking broken, Joanie.
You need to go, just get out.
Get out.
Get... the fuck out.
Get out!
Hey, can I come over?
You just happened to be nowhere near my neighborhood?
Singles?
Cameron Crowe? I... never mind.
- Can I come in? - Of course.
What's wrong with you? Why don't you have any stuff?
What do you mean? I have stuff.
Don't you have any pictures of, like... your family?
My father died right before I was born, so I never knew him.
I keep a photo of my mom on my phone. You want to see it?
No, that's okay.
- Can I have a drink or something? - Yes, you can.
Coming right up. Bourbon good?
Mm.
Why are you looking at me like that?
I'm just trying to figure out whether or not I should try to kiss you.
Are you fucking kidding me right now?
Okay.
That answers that question.
I do want to state, though, for the record,
I'm actually quite good in bed.
Not really.
No, I am. I'm great.
The circumstances last night were a bit...
extenuating.
I wasn't at my best, but, uh, normally I'm dynamite.
Okay.
Just wanted to set the record straight.
So...
why are you here?
Did you know my dad called 911 before he died?
No.
He had a heart attack.
The EMTs told me that they found him on the floor near his bed.
He was trying to crawl to his heart meds.
That's terrible. I'm sorry.
If somebody else had been there, he would have made it.
- You don't know that. - I do, actually.
I asked at his autopsy.
He took a while to die.
- Okay... - I abandoned him.
Just like my mother did.
But I thought... at the jetty, didn't you decide
- that your mother... - No, when-when she left him
for Noah Solloway.
Do you know anything about that?
- Only a little. - She left him right before I was born,
for this married guy that just
showed up in town with his family.
She waited on his table and then she stole him from his wife.
Really?
Yes.
That's who my mother was.
My father never got over it.
I mean...
he got married again, to my stepmother,
but he never really loved her.
When my mother finally died, he...
fell apart...
and they broke up.
How old were you?
Seven.
My dad and I were mostly alone after that, for years.
We left Montauk, we moved to Vermont.
He had a little horse farm.
But he never got married again.
He didn't even date.
He just put all his focus on me.
And...
when I left for college, he moved home.
The truth is...
...I was relieved...
...not to spend so much time with him.
His love was...
suffocating.
I felt like I could never let him down.
Like I had to make up for all the terrible things
that she'd done to him.
But it didn't work. I...
I couldn't do it. And he died of a broken heart anyway.
Joanie, that's not true.
Come on. He was an old man.
He was 72.
Ever since he died, I feel like
I can't hold her out of me anymore,
like she's possessing me.
I think about killing myself
all the time now.
On subway platforms,
when I'm holding a bottle of pills in my hand,
when a fucking truck goes by.
I have violent sex with strangers,
I work and I work and I work some more
because I'm afraid of having any time to myself
because I'm afraid of what I will do with it.
I've spent my whole life
shaping myself to be the opposite of her,
and it's not working anymore.
None of it is fucking working.
Joanie, your mother didn't kill herself.
Isn't that what we figured out at the jetty?
I don't know! She probably did.
You can drown in a bathtub.
And she wanted to die. Everybody said so.
Maybe this is just some stupid childhood fantasy of mine
because I don't want to believe
that she actually just fucking left me!
Joanie. Joanie, listen to me.
This is grief.
Yes, yes, it is.
Your dad just died.
Have you even... have you mourned for him?
You need to do that.
That's why you feel like you're going insane.
You don't let yourself feel anything.
I don't know how.
- Of course you do. - No, I really don't.
L-Let's talk about him.
What was he like? What did you love about him?
He was wonderful.
How so?
He could...
he could do anything, you know?
He...
he could ride a horse, he could surf, he could fix a car.
He picked up farming when we moved to Vermont,
and he was, he was good at that, too.
And-and he was so kind.
He was...
he was like a pain-seeking missile.
Wherever we went,
he'd find someone who was suffering and...
he'd figure out how to make their lives
just a little easier.
I wanted him to meet someone else so badly.
Someone who could...
look after him so that I didn't have to.
Hey, do you remember that box you gave me?
The one with all your grandfather's letters in it?
I mean, I didn't exactly give it to you, but...
Did you ever look through it?
Sort of, quickly.
I found something you should maybe see.
Why was your dad obsessing about a handsome Marine
named Benjamin Cruz?
So, here's my theory. Just hear me out.
I interviewed your dad a few times.
I liked him, but he was very, very closed.
He just seemed like a man with a lot of secrets.
Maybe he had a lover.
Maybe that's why he never remarried.
Maybe that's why he moved back to Montauk.
Did you ever see Brokeback Mountain?
I think maybe we're all just looking for our own Jack Twist.
- Who? - Oh, Joanie.
You're breaking my heart.
I don't know who the hell Benjamin Cruz is.
But... thank you.
For what?
You made me feel better.
My pleasure.
It's really late. I should go.
Okay.
What are you doing?
Don't you want this?
You gonna throw me out when it's over?
This is your apartment.
Good point.
I have been in pain...
Come here, kiddo.
Hi, Daddy.
- Come here. - ...my entire life.
- Hey. - Look at you. You look great.
And maybe that's what makes people think that I' weak
We made some cookies this morning...
-And maybe that makes people
treat me like some sort of receptacle...
Not gonna see you all weekend.
- Bye, Mama. - Bye, baby.
...for all their grief
and rage...
Hey. Hey.
...and disappointment.
Don't I know you?
I don't think so.
Cole?
This is my friend Ben.
Nice to meet you, Cole.
But I am fucking sick of it.
_
Everything okay?
_
He wasn't my dad's boyfriend.
He was my mother's.
I think he killed her.
Sync and corrections by btsix www.addic7ed.com