The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus

Sasha picks Pen up early and comes to see her dorm room. He tells her that her room looks nice and doesn’t stop smiling the whole morning.

In the car, he tells her about his cousin Hugh, who tormented Freddie at school. Hugh grew up to enter the diplomatic service and was praised by their grandfather, who saw him as the golden child even though he had never been as proud of Christina for joining the diplomatic service. Sasha tells Pen that Freddie will relate the rest of the story, but the scandal around Freddie involved his efforts to take revenge on Hugh for past indignities. The chapter is now closed, since they discovered that Hugh was the official who was interviewed for the tabloid story; Hugh will now cause no more trouble for them.

Christina greets Pen and Sasha warmly when they arrive and tells them to go for a ride. They ride together, and in the stables, they stand close together but do not quite kiss. On the way to the house, Pen blushes and feels out of her depth.

In the house, Margot has arrived and behaves coldly towards Pen, who feels awkward. Upstairs, Pen takes a bath. Afterwards, she answers a knock on the door, thinking that it must be George. Instead, it’s Sasha. She invites him in while she ducks into the bathroom to finish getting dressed. Again, they almost kiss, and Pen tells him awkwardly that she hasn’t had sex before. When he merely tells her that they should go downstairs, she is embarrassed. She tells him to go first, then follows in a few minutes.

In the hall, she runs into George, who is delighted to see Pen. They again share a cigarette, and George asks what she thinks of Margot, who is not very maternal. Pen asks about George’s father, not realizing that she and George are half-sisters. George answers her coldly, then realizes that Pen has no idea about the truth and behaves with kindness again.

Downstairs, everyone converses together while Christina finishes making dinner. Sasha arrives and quietly tells Pen that he left because he wanted to kiss her very badly and knew that if he started, he wouldn’t be able to stop. After dinner, they sneak away and kiss on the staircase, and Sasha brings her to his bedroom.

Pen is charmed by the childhood relics in Sasha’s room, including a poster for The Who’s album, Tommy. He tells her that they can take things slow, but she tells him that she is ready to have sex. He comes up with the code word “golf” and tells her to say it if she wants to stop.

After having sex, they cuddle together, and she reflects on the experience, feeling happy but also off-kilter. She finally disentangles herself, and when he begs her to stay, she tells him that she is going to play a round of golf. He lets her go.

Early the next morning in the kitchen, Pen is embarrassed to run into Elliot and hopes that he won’t be able to tell what she has been doing with Sasha. Elliot makes casual conversation and asks if she knew of Margot. She says yes, explaining that Alice loved her clothes. Surprised, he asked if Pen’s parents ever mentioned Margot, then says that he thought Ted had a soft spot for Margot at one time. Irritated, Pen feels as though he is playing games. She tells him that she is going for a walk.

Returning, she finds the kitchen full of chaos as Margot criticizes Christina’s efforts to make a Peppa Pig-themed cake. Pen plays with Danny, who is thrilled that she is there and that it is his birthday. Margot asks Pen if she will have children someday, then antagonizes Christina by implying that she doesn’t have a job. Sasha defends Christina, saying that his mother’s work in the village and with the estate is a full-time job, as Margot well knows.

The party is a scene of joyful chaos that includes many children from the village, and Pen disappears into the fuss. When she steps out to take a break, she sees Freddie in the garden and asks him to tell her what happened with the public scandal. He explains that Hugh made his life miserable. During Freddie’s gap year, he and his friend Jake found a creepy Pope medal in the Vatican and thought that it would be funny to send the medal to Hugh with no note. They continued to send him odd things from time to time, but they miscalculated when they were on a beach and sent Hugh an envelope of sand. Unbeknownst to them, the anthrax scare was rampant, and the office assumed that they had mailed Hugh a biological weapon. Christina managed to convince the government that Freddie and Jake should be let off with no more than a fine and community service. Freddie was paying the fine by working for Margot in her London office.

Later that evening, Pen and Sasha have sex again. He asks her why she had never had sex before, and she tells him that she knew it would be weird and awkward and was waiting to find someone worth having sex with. He asks her if she believes in marriage, and she tells him about her parents’ divorce but says that she isn’t opposed to the idea of marriage. He tells her that Margot never believed in marriage, then makes a comment about George’s father abandoning Margot and George and running off to America. To Pen’s horror, she realizes that her father is George’s father as well. She waits until Sasha is asleep, then sneaks out.

She takes a taxi to the train and leaves for Edinburgh, not leaving a note. Alone in her room, she answers the landline that begins to ring.

Alice discovers that she has caught head lice from the wigs at the theater. Panicking, she calls and messages Pen repeatedly until Pen answers and promises to ride to her rescue right away. Arriving at Alice’s dorm, Pen calms her friend by reminding her that she also had lice one summer. She helps Alice to comb through her hair, and Alice is moved by the reminder that their friendship allows space for each of them to be vulnerable. While tending to Alice, Pen tells her about her discovery and the weekend at the Lennoxes. She sees that her voicemail box is full, but she doesn’t listen to all the messages.

When Pet returns to her dorm, she finds Elliot there. He tells her that the history between Ted and Margot wasn’t his story to tell. He then gives her Margot’s phone number. He says that he and the rest of his family are all fond of Pen, especially Sasha, and he urges her to come back when she is ready.

Finally ready to learn more about her family’s past, Pen sits down to read her mother’s diary. She is surprised to gain a sense of her mother as a young woman and reads about her mother’s desire to have a child. She also finds a letter from Margot to her father, in which Margot tells him about the pregnancy.

Pen meets Margot at the National Aquarium. She gives Margot the letter, and Margot tells her not to blame Ted. She explains that she never wanted to marry him and that when he called, she told him not to come back. She tells Pen that her own mother married at age 19 and never had a life of her own, aside from the paintings she made that are hung at Talmòrach. Margot wanted a different life for herself: one that did not include marriage.

Margot asks Pen what she knows about the life cycle of the common octopus and explains that mother octopi die after giving birth, sometimes even becoming food for their offspring. In her account, society views women as either the octopus or a selfish monster, and there is no in-between. Thinking of her mother and of Christina, Pen asserts that there are different options now. Margot expresses hope that this is true, but she believes that the most important thing is to make peace with oneself.

Pen takes the Tube to George’s house, and after purchasing coffee, rings to be let in. She apologizes, but George interrupts, explaining that Pen didn’t know the truth. George doesn’t blame Pen and says that she doesn’t view Ted as her father, although he did visit during her childhood and bring her extravagant presents. Pen asks George about her life outside of motherhood, and George explains her plans to resume her work designing menswear, this time with her own line. Pen says that she wants to intern at a magazine this summer, and George invites her to stay.

Rosh, Danny’s father, appears and says that he bought sushi on his lunch break. They invite Pen to stay, but she politely declines. George tells her not to be angry at her father, observing that Margot did not give him much of a choice in the matter.

Returning to the dorm, Pen finds an apology note from Fergus and a fountain pen left outside her door.

On the play’s opening day, Alice can’t concentrate and keeps running lines in her head. During breakfast, Charlie comforts her, and she realizes that she is attracted to him. Fergus also appears, apologizing for his behavior of the past few weeks and bringing champagne for Alice.

At the theatre, Alice remembers their rehearsals and steadies herself. She is able to play the part of Thomasina with style and becomes swept away in the action of the play. Afterwards, she and her friends gather to celebrate at a fancy restaurant. In the empty bathroom, she briefly has a panic attack when she imagines Julian there, but she calms herself and returns to the table. As she does, she thinks about her mother and admits that her mother’s steadfast love in the face of her father’s infidelity might also be a form of strength. At dinner, she holds Charlie’s hand.

Alice’s performance is deemed a success, and she receives calls to audition for the summer theater festival. Meanwhile, Pen calls her father and confronts him about his lies, asking if he ever planned to tell her the truth about Margot and George. He tries to justify his secretive behavior, but she says that they cannot have a real relationship unless he starts treating her as an adult and telling her the truth. He agrees.

Fergus apologizes to Pen, and she accepts his apology. In turn, she admits that she was using him “a bit” and also apologizes. He is now dating Flossie and seems happy, and he and Pen resume their friendship.

Pen also calls her mother and confronts her about Margot. Anna explains that she didn’t know about the matter until Pen was a child. Pen is angry at her mother for staying married to a man who didn’t love her. She hangs up on Anna. Anna calls back and explains that she was abandoned by her own mother, but she never would have abandoned Pen. She explains that her perceived suicide attempt in Pen’s childhood was really an accidental overdose. She tells Pen that she loves her and that all she ever wanted was to have a daughter who felt safe and loved. After the conversation, Pen tells herself that she is free from the past and can make her life however she wants.

After speaking to Fergus, Pen goes to her room and dresses warmly. As she walks through Edinburgh, the narration points out landmarks that will be important to her later, including a stationery shop where Jo will work while she and Sylvia experiment with dating publicly. The narrative also reveals that Sasha will graduate and receive several job offers, after which he will go on to work at a London museum. In the present, Pen meets Sasha at the National Monument.

The two of them reconcile, with Pen apologizing for leaving in a hurry and not answering his messages. In turn, she presses him about the weekend that he ignored her, and he admits that he panicked because of his feelings and wound up sleeping with Charlotte, his old fling. He apologizes. The two kiss, and Pen is filled with joy.

In May, Sasha takes Pen to Talmòrach, and she meets Christina in the garden. They talk about Margot’s ideas of motherhood, and Christina points out that octopus mothers evolved this way so that they would not compete with the young for food. She says that part of mothering is learning to help one’s children become independent; however, this doesn’t have to come at the cost of selfhood. Christina thinks but does not share that she and Elliot plan to give Talmòrach to the National Trust so that their children are not burdened by the massive estate. Sasha interrupts and teasingly says that Pen is here to visit him, not his mother. He and Pen go off to be alone together. Later, Pen looks at the painting of the open sea and thinks about Margot’s mother, who painted it.

The friends have gathered for the opening weekend of Alice’s play and are staying at the flat where the girls will live during their second year. Charlie and Alice are now happily dating. Pen is working in London at a literary magazine, and in exchange for free lodging, she is helping George with Danny. Sasha and Pen are happily together, and she remembers how he helped her pack up her room, labelling the folders carefully with the phrase “Pen: First Year.” She leaves her empty dorm feeling happy and content.

In the dark, an adult Pen nurses her infant daughter while the winter wind howls outside. She wonders what advice she will give her as she prepares to leave home and decides that she will probably just write down some of her old life stories and leave them in a drawer in case her daughter ever wants to read them.