Things We Never Got Over

Things We Never Got Over is a romance between two people who begin the novel disliking each other but who come to find in each other that indefinable something that makes them whole. The novel celebrates the intensity and the impact not just of sex but the experience of an orgasm. Given the alternating narrative perspectives, the novel offers male and female experiences of pleasure. For both Naomi and Knox, the physical rush of an orgasm ushers them into a nearly spiritual ecstasy in which they transcend the physicality of their actual lovemaking, which often takes place in awkward and confined quarters. The orgasms give their physical intimacy an emotional charge that neither has experienced before. They register all over their bodies and short-circuit everything. “My ears,” Naomi admits after having an orgasm, “were ringing like I was in a church bell tower on Sunday morning” (244). This type of pleasure is also implied to be the opposite of what Naomi experienced with Warner, her abusive ex. That relationship was about pleasing Warner to the detriment of Naomi; here, she can not only give pleasure to Knox but, for the first time, unabashedly receive pleasure and lose herself in moments of ecstasy.

Orgasms symbolize both Naomi and Knox’s need to move beyond control and to embrace surrender. In the moment of orgasm, neither character can control their body or feelings. For characters who both prefer to remain in control (though for reasons that differ from each other), the orgasm is a powerful opportunity to “implode,” one of Naomi’s favorite words for describing sex with Knox. In turn, they experience the “agonized pleasure and triumph” of losing control (245). The sexual act itself is a familiar element of the erotic scenes of typical romances, but this novel allows Naomi and Knox to experience what they both so desperately need in their lives through their orgasms: the chance to put down the burden of responsibility and their need to control circumstances. In their orgasms, the novel offers a powerful and satisfying symbol for the rewards of giving in and the joy of surrender.

The saying goes that money cannot buy happiness, and it is a staple in the romance genre that money cannot buy love. In many ways, winning the $11 million state lottery exacerbates the flaw in Knox’s character. He believes, with a sincerity born of capitalist consumer culture, that every problem is fixable with sufficient financial resources. That it is unearned—he didn’t even buy the winning lottery ticket—does not bother him. Rather, he believes this unearned windfall guarantees him the happiness that prosperity, in the myths of capitalism, always brings.

This belief can be considered more of a delusion, as Knox is not a character who can be considered calm or happy. After all, as the novel opens, the incredibly wealthy man with his rugged good looks and his hunky body lives alone with his dog. Knox is grumpy, brooding, and distant. He is emotionally unavailable, uninterested in violating his solitude, and keeps his friends as distant as his family. Spreading his wealth alienated him from his brother, who sees the emptiness of wealth and refuses to pretend his brother’s largesse is anything but toxic. When Knox forces Nash to take a chunk of the lottery money, Nash, much to Knox’s chagrin, donates the money to the police department. Likewise, Knox’s wealth doesn’t provide solutions for his father, whose alcohol addiction resulted in him losing his home.

But tragedy is never the last word in a romance. Knox, and Naomi for that matter, win a much bigger, much more important lottery. Where the state lottery failed, love brings Knox happiness, spiritual calm, and purpose. As he comes to acknowledge, meeting Naomi, came through no effort on his part. Love, like the lottery, is more about luck, taking a risk, and timing. He did not seek Naomi’s company—she simply walked into his bar. This symbolic reading of love as a lottery risks sounding cliché, but the novel emphasizes that love brings the kind of satisfaction that money never does. Knox’s lottery money brings him loneliness, paranoia, and anxiety, but hitting the lottery of love brings him companionship, trust, and calm.