Summary
Margot and Robert arrive at Robert's house. It's in a cute neighborhood and has a string of fairy lights across the doorway. As they're going inside, Robert reminds her that he has cats. Margot is impressed by the interior of his house, which is tastefully decorated with bookshelves, vinyl records, and framed posters. She is relieved, as she has never gone back to someone's house for sex before—all her high school and college relationships had previously relied on sneaking around. She momentarily worries that Robert's nice home is an elaborate ploy to convince her he's normal when, in reality, he's hiding a room full of corpses or kidnap victims. Before she can settle into this thought, Robert kisses her, groping clumsily.
They make their way into the bedroom, where Robert has a mattress with no frame. They drink a little more from a whiskey bottle on his dresser, and undress. Robert awkwardly takes off his shoes; while he bends over, Margot notes that he's a little overweight and kind of hairy. Her attraction to him wavers, but she feels it would take too much effort to extricate herself from their encounter--it's already gone too far to be stopped without mega-discomfort. She drinks more, hoping her resistance will dissipate. Robert continues to grope at her awkwardly, attempting a series of sexual acts that bring Margot no pleasure. He looks at her "stunned and stupid with pleasure, like a milk-drunk baby" (15), clearly more absorbed in the encounter than she is. Margot wonders if Robert's neediness explains why he'd be interested in a girl her age.
Margot is only aroused when she begins to think about how she thinks Robert sees her: she imagines his inner monologue, musing about how beautiful she is and how lucky he his to have her. The harder she imagines this ego-fantasy, the more she's able to feel attracted to Robert. They proceed, but before they fully have sex, Robert inquires whether Margot's a virgin. She laughs at the suggestion, which hurts Robert's feelings, killing the moment. He's able to recover, but she isn't, but nonetheless goes along with it, allowing Robert to proceed. As they have sex, Margot feels a sense of revulsion towards Robert. He, on the other hand, is absorbed, and finally climaxes. Margot ponders whether sleeping with Robert is the worst life decision she has ever made.
Afterwards, they watch a movie together, with Margot half-paying attention, half-daydreaming about a future boyfriend who will one day laugh with her at the craziness of this night. Robert begins talking about his feelings, out of nowhere, revealing even more of his vulnerability. He confesses that he wondered if Margot had a high-school boyfriend who she might've been with over the break, and rambles insecurely about his fear that Margot was sleeping with someone else. She ignores him. He questions whether she's awake, then whether everything is OK. Finally, they discuss his age—34. Margot claims that it doesn't make her uncomfortable, but is adamant that she doesn't want to spend the night. Robert drives her home, kissing her goodnight. All the while, Margot continues to imagine laughing at Robert with an imaginary boyfriend.
By the next morning, Robert has already texted Margot twice. She still feels repulsed, "overwhelmed with a skin-crawling loathing" (20). She considers ghosting Robert, but decides that would be inappropriately cruel. Instead, she drafts a mature and responsible break-up message. She doesn't send it, and in the meantime, Robert keeps texting her incessantly. Margot's roommate, Tamara, urges her to be up-front and tell him she's not interested. Margot feels guilty, and refuses. Finally, Tamara swipes Margot's phone and texts Robert: "Hi im not interested in you stop texting me [sic]" (21). Robert quickly responds, with impressive maturity, saying that he's sad but finds Margot sweet and enjoyed their time together. Margot is overcome with relief, "as though a leech, grown heavy and swollen with her blood, had at last popped off her skin" (22).
A month later, Margot sees Robert at a bar. It's the bar he refused to go to with her, because he claimed it was in the "student ghetto"—too juvenile for him, and clearly on Margot's turf. He sits at a table alone. Margot immediately grabs her friends pointing him out. They close ranks around her and usher her out of the bar. She feels simultaneously scared and guilty. Later, at home with Tamara, she receives a series of texts from Robert. They begin innocent and needy, but eventually become menacing. He whines about missing her, asks whether one of her male friends from the bar was her boyfriend, and eventually calls her a whore. The story ends on this bitter note, without divulging Margot's response.
Analysis
From the moment that Margot arrives at Robert's house, it's clear that her attraction to him is half-baked. When he reminds her that he has cats, it becomes bluntly obvious how little they know about each other: the cats are central to their string of inside jokes, yet they've never been to each other's houses, so it's awkward when Robert points out the cats' presence as if Margot doesn't know. This, again, reminds the reader that, although they've "talked" a lot via text-message, Robert and Margot know very little about each other in real life.
Margot is comforted by Robert's house: it makes him seem like a grown-up, fully-realized person, with objects and interests of his own. Yet, in a way, this kills her attraction to him: she only feels excited about him when she imagines that he sees her as a young, irresistible object, and her ability to project these feelings onto him is challenged when she sees that he, too, has a "real life."
Robert acts insecure. Far from being comfortable on his home terrain, he watches Margot for evidence of any impression his house might make on her. But he soon stops being attuned to her feelings, aiming, instead, to satisfy his own: he goes in for a kiss and, oblivious to Margot's lack of interest in their sexual encounter, proceeds to push things along. While Robert undresses, Margot realizes that she truly isn't attracted to him. She finds him awkward and a little pathetic—the "cute lumberjack" version of him that she had imagined is simply no longer tenable. She wants to go home, but feels it would be tactless to leave at this point, so stays because it would be inconvenient to hurt Robert's feelings.
This moment in the story is central to "Cat Person"'s viral internet fame: many readers resonated with the feeling of being in an unwanted sexual encounter but proceeding anyway, feeling it would take more effort to extricate oneself than to just stay, halfheartedly, until things end. This also initiated a viral discussion of sexual consent, leading people to question whether unwanted sex can ever be consensual. The situation between Margot and Robert is uncomfortable in a deeply nuanced way, which Roupenian brilliantly captures by letting readers into Margot's internal monologue.
Margot is only able to feel pleasure when she envisions Robert thinking about an idealized, ego-fantasy version of herself. In short, she's excited by the way she thinks that he thinks about her. He is absorbed in their encounter, pleasure-drunk to the point of neediness. Margot senses Robert's need and capitalizes on it: she wants to feel wanted, regardless of her lack of attraction to Robert himself. She imagines what he must be thinking about her, and momentarily revels in the pleasure of being desired before Robert's poor sexual skills take her back out of the moment. While Robert is characterized quite embarrassingly in this moment, it's really Margot who it reflects poorly upon: he may be awkward and dorky, but she is vain an manipulative, and it's up to the reader to decide which is more shameful.
When Margot laughs at Robert's intimation that she might be a virgin, it's clear that she has the upper hand in this interaction. She remembers her tender first time with her high school boyfriend, and her entire relationship with Robert is made to seem trivial by comparison. As she thinks about this, her revulsion towards Robert grows, but he doesn't seem to notice. After he finishes, Margot lays silently in bed, clearly uncomfortable. Her discomfort isn't lessened much when he starts talking about their age difference. It's established that he is 34—news to Margot—and the 14-year age gap only makes his neediness and insecurity feel more pathetic. Margot is no longer able to enjoy the pleasure of seeing herself through his eyes. Instead, she sees him as he's kind of always been: a little dorky, a little lecherous, altogether well-intentioned but unattractive.
Every moment following their sexual encounter is suffused with shame and discomfort. Margot is palpably uncomfortable as Robert drives her home, and ignores his texts that night and the next morning. At the same time, she feels a strange sense of guilt: she doesn't want to hurt Robert's feelings, but she feels disgusted by him and hopes he'll cease contact. Finally, Tamara intervenes and breaks things off. Robert initially responds tactfully, though he's clearly a little hurt, and Margot is hugely relieved. Her relief testifies to the fact that their relationship was, ultimately, built on an unsustainable fantasy of him, which she had constructed in his absence using fragments of knowledge she gleaned from his texts. Her disgust with the real-life Robert is nauseating, and the reader's heart stops right along with Margot's when we learn that she sees him at the bar. It's implied that Robert has gone out of his way to visit the bar Margot frequents, and he looks especially creepy hunched, alone, over a beer. Margot wonders whether she's being dramatic or mean as her friends performatively usher her out, but her relief at getting away from Robert outweighs any possible guilt.
When she gets home and Robert's texts begin to roll in, the feeling of uneasiness is amplified. At first, he's harmless, simply commenting that he thought Margot looked pretty that night. He eventually laments that he misses her, then begins to speculate as to whether she thought he was too old or had a crush on someone else. But this harmless grief and confusion metastasizes into anger as Margot declines to respond. Robert starts to badger her about the guy she was with at the bar, asking whether they were together. He finally ends his string of texts with a spiteful, one-word response: "Whore." Though he may have been several years her senior, Robert was clearly not blessed with the wisdom or maturity that comes with age: his anger at Margot suggests that he's bad at handling rejection. This ending reflects poorly on Robert: though Margot felt a little guilty for leading him on, ultimately, Robert's bad behavior confirms that she probably did the right thing by moving on.
