Chapter By Chapter Synopsis: Fifty Shades Darker: Chapter Eight

Okay, we are 32% done, and we're still on the same damn day as we've been on for about twenty percent now. Let's see if we get another day by the end of this chapter.

If you remember from last time, Ana and Christian went to a charity ball and had sex in Christian's childhood bedroom after he bid a hundred thou for a dance with her. Sounds like he got his money's worth. Then, they went back to Christian's delux apartment in the sky and found that his ex-sub Leila had slashed Ana's tires and poured paint over her car. It's not like she liked the car or cared for it, though, so...eh. Besides, like Taylor isn't going to be driving her everywhere from now on.

Ana married to Christian would totally be the embodiment of the joke, "Why do women need shoes? It's not like their feet can get dirty between the kitchen and the bedroom."

Anyway, now Christian is going to help Taylor, the ex-Black Ops Navy Seal Merchant Marine cum Bodyguard search the house even though Ana is worried. Because it's not like he'd have taken a strip out of her hide if she had pulled a stunt like this, but it's Christian, so he can do whatever the hell he wants. Because he's an asshole.

Sawyer, Taylor's counterpart (Christian only hires blonde women and men who have a "Y" in their last name, but only if that last name ends in "R"), tells Taylor that Christian is going into the apartment, and Taylor reacts like he's really concerned and frightened for Christian. Ana is worried because of this, but again, since it's Christian, it's not like there's anything she can do. The power dynamic in this relationship is completely one-sided.

Ana says she feels impotent. Oh, if only. If only.

Finally, Christian opens the front door and Sawyer pulls his gun on him. This could be a hilarious scene, but like everything else in the book, the author is completely unable to remove the spotlight from Ana and Christian for even a moment to play out what could be really humorous, but instead we get Ana still completely freaked out, "drinking [Christian] in" and just being worried about him and herself, and not caring that there's a group of bodyguards around who get paid to take bullets for her.

You can tell how much I don't like this book when my biggest beef so far is that Ana's dress apparently zips up the back. I haven't encountered an evening gown for ages that zips up the back. Back zippers are so cumbersome and show up too much. Side zippers are so much better. It makes me wonder if the author had a specific dress in mind, or if she even thought about this.

Anyway. Sorry, I know it seems nitpicky, but I've dressed up a few times recently, and even my cheapo sexy secretary dress zips up the side.

(Yes, I have one. I wear it with really high heels.) (No, you can't see a picture) (I know, your day is just ruined now.)

Nevar Forget

Ana wants Christian to call the police, but he says she needs psychiatric help, not police intervention. Goodness, it's not like she's unhinged with a gun or anything. It's not like it's something the police should be aware of.

Ana goes to bed and stares at the ceiling, musing that so much has happened today. It's taken us...five?...chapters to get through this. Five? I think so. Do you think a lot has happened in one day, Ana? Do you think?

Ana dozes off finally, and then wakes up disoriented, sure that a black-clad figure is standing at the end of her bed. She turns on the light and finds no one. Christian isn't around either, so she wanders through the apartment and finds him yelling at Elena on the phone in his study. He's telling Mrs. Robinson to leave Ana alone.

Honestly, Ana should handle this. If it comes from her, it will be so much better than coming from this lady's ex-sub. I don't see how Elena could ever really take Christian seriously since she used to Domme him, and he was an adolescent when she started raping him, so that just leaves a lot of incredulity in her mind where he's concerned. Ana, on the other hand, is sort of a threat to her, and I think she'd do better hearing it from her. Plus, it might make Ana a more interesting character. When she was yelling at Mrs. Robinson in the previous chapter, it was actually interesting.

Christian looks up finally to see Ana standing in his doorway, wearing one of his t-shirts. I'm reminded of a comedian who said that when a woman puts on her boyfriend's shirt, she looks hot, but the same is not usually true for a man putting on a woman's clothes.

Depends on the guy, I guess.

Anyway, instead of suggesting a clothing swap, Christian tells Ana she should be in satin and silk. They don't breathe as well as T-shirts do, though, so hopefully she won't go there.

Christian tells Ana that if anything ever happend to her because of him...we don't know what because he doesn't finish the sentence. Ana promises that nothing is ever going to happen to her.

They go into the bedroom and find the balcony open.

Okay, Christian lives at the top of a penthouse building. How on earth did Leila manage to climb up there? I mean, anything more than about three stories would require some pretty heavy-duty equipment, right? I mean, this story pretty much left the realm of believability a year ago, but I sort of feel like this whole Tom Cruise Mission Impossible bullshit should be left out of it just to give us a little bit of reality to cling to.

Anyway, now everyone starts galvanizing into action, sure that Leila is still in the house somewhere. I think Leila missed an opportunity to SWF these two. If she really knows the house well enough to hide from Taylor while he's searching for her, then she could have gone for months watching these two.

Ana thinks Christian should just try talking to Leila, but he won't do that. He thinks she's too unstable for that. He wants to run off with Ana instead. Before they leave, Ana gives Taylor a hug and tells him to be careful. Wanna bet that one or both of them will be in trouble from Christian in the near future?

Ana finally gets a look at her Audi A3 in the parking garage and wonders how Leila knew it was her car. Christian says that he buys one for all of his subs since it's the safest in its class. Ana snarks that he told her it was a graduation gift. He reminds her that she was never his submissive "Despite what [he] hoped."

Ana wants to know if he's terribly disappointed at her not being his current sub. He finally answers her and he's like, "What do I have to do to convince you that I don't want that anymore?" Um...hm...this is a thought: stop treating her like she's your walking, talking doll for you to play with and dress up and fuck whenever you feel like it and start treating her like she's an actual human being.

Oh, no, Ana just wants him to tell her about himself and tell her that he loves her. She doesn't voice this because communication isn't something she does. I think this really bothers me a lot--Christian is actually pretty good about communication. He talks to her, he tells her what she wants to know. Ana just stays in her head.

Of course, whenever she does voice an opinion, he yells at her, so maybe there's a reason for that.

Ana brings up Dr. Flynn and wants to know if Christian really believes she'll leave him if she ever found out the truth about what he talks to Dr. Flynn about. Christian's sure of it. Ana thinks he doesn't have faith in her, so he brings up that she did in fact leave after the last time he showed her that part of himself to her. I just...she left him because he beat her and he wanted to continue to beat her. No matter how much they keep talking about the safe word, that was how the first book ended. It wasn't because Ana didn't use a safe word, it was because he wanted to beat her continuously to make himself feel better, whenever he needed to make himself feel better. I don't know, maybe I'm naive, but I think that once you get past that, there's not a lot he could do or say at this point that's much worse than that. We shall see, however.

Ana tells Christian that his dad told her about how he didn't talk for two years, and Christian seems upset about this. He wants to know what else "Daddy" said about him. Ana brings up what Mia said about his "brawling," and Christian is sort of exasperated, but he's not all angry that she knows about him. This is...a good sign, actually. I mean, I figured he'd be all angry at this point, but he's not.

They get to a hotel, and Ana's positive that the receptionist is trying to figure out what a perfect god like Christian is doing with an ordinary girl like her. I just want to say again that I can't imagine a guy so good looking that a woman would really be that flustered around him.

Wait, I just thought of one...

They go to the hotel suite and Christian pours them both a drink, then reminds us all that it's till the sam fucking day by saying, "It's been quite a day, huh?"

Yeah. Most couples don't go through this much on their wedding day.

Christian comments that Ana isn't whining or crying or running away, and he finds it to be amazing. I think it shows just exactly how mentally unstable she is that she's not headed towards a meltdown right now. I mean, I'm just reading about it and all I want is for this day to end and to maybe sleep through the next one or two days and then just sort of have tea and crepes for breakfast, brunch, elevenses, lunch, supper, dinner and midnight snack before going back to bed again.

Mmmmm...crepes...

They go and have sex, and I don't fault them for that. It's comfort sex, I'm sure. I hope they're going to fall asleep after that, but of course we have to talk more.

Ana muses that Christian is so much more "open" with her than before, and she doesn't want to lose sight of his "Simple, honest journey" or some such shit. IT'S BEEN THREE WEEKS, OKAY?


Finally, they fall asleep.

Oh thank whichever deity or non-deity you believe in. Good GOD that was a long day.

Christian tries to get Ana out of bed once she's awake, and this is a nice change from how he's usually trying to get her into bed. He swats her on the ass, and she decides that it's his idea of affection.

Um...ain't nothing wrong with a good ass-slap first thing in the morning, babe. There really is this sort of all-or-nothing thinking in this book, which is odd since it's called Fifty Shades of Grey. You'd think there'd be more gray areas to work with. Just saying!

Ana chalks her soreness to the sex and the dancing and the high heels. After a day like hers, I'd have called it muscle fatigue. Because, lest you forget, it was a long fucking day.

Christian tells Ana that she needs to eat because she'll need her strength. Ana's hopes it's because they're going to be locked in the bedroom all day, but Christian says they're going out. Ana tries to tease and asks if it's safe. Christian is of course all clowny faces and smiles when he tells her that it's no laughing matter.

Get a sense of humor, asshat.

The doctor arrives to give Ana more contraception, and Ana grumbles internally that she can never have a nice, normal morning.

Hey, that's her fault.

The doctor decides to give Ana a contraceptive shot. I don't know...since Ana doesn't want to get pregnant any time soon, wouldn't an IUD or an implant be better? One of my friends gets the shot, though, and she likes it. You go in every three months and they inject you. Anyway, I'm sure that this information isn't just in here for no good reason, so I'm sure it'll be important in the future! (Yeah, right), so yay! We know what kind of contraception Ana is on!

Christian notes that Ana's in a bad mood, so she finally confesses that the doctor scared her into thinking there was a chance of pregnancy. This is stupid; it was really stupid of the doctor. Yes, there's always a chance when you have sex that you could get pregnant, but they used condoms, and Ana was on the pill and had her period, so everything really should be okay. Ana tells Christian that she was more worried about his reaction than anything else, really, and he says that he doesn't know what to do about her bad mood. He would normally beat it out of her.

How would beating someone put them in a better mood? I don't see how that would work.

Ana tells him that him holding her helps.

They shower together, and after Christian washes Ana off, he asks her to do the same to him. She notices how tense and frightened he is as she touches him, and she starts crying because it's sort of upsetting for her. She keeps imagining him as a hurt little kid, which I guess would be sad if it's someone you love, and Christian tries to reassure her.

This is a scene where you see what this book could have been in the hands of a better author. It could have really been quite a good book.

Ana tells Christian that he's a lovable person (yeah, right) and that she does love him, and so do his family and even Leila and Elena. She then says that she knows he loves her back.

"Yes," he whispers. "I do."

Hey, there's a chapter break here! That's really good. We're now at 37%. Huzzah!

Ooh, one last picture of Richard Armitage and Neal McDonough. I hope I didn't just melt your computer.
(Yes, he's pasty and blond, but he's pretty cute.)