Does he love you?

"Does He Love You?" by Rilo Kiley

Get a real job, keep the wind to your back

And the sun on your face

All the immediate unknowns

Are better than knowing this tired and lonely fate

Does he love you?

Does he love you?

Will he hold your tiny face in his hands?

I guess it's spring; I didn't know

It's always seventy-five with no melting snow

A married man, he visits me

I receive his letters in the mail twice a week

And I think he loves me

And when he leaves her

He's coming out to California

I guess it all worked out

There's a ring on your finger

And the baby's due out

You share a place by the park

And run a shop for antiques downtown

And he loves you, yeah, he loves you

And the two of you will soon become three

And he loves you, even though

You used to say you were flawed if you weren't free

Let's not forget ourselves, good friend

You and I were almost dead

And you're better off for leaving

Yeah, you're better off for leaving

Late at night, I get the phone

You're at the shop sobbing, all alone

Your confession is coming out

You only married him, you felt your time was running out

But now you love him and your baby

At last you are complete

But he's distant and you found him

On the phone, pleading, saying

"Baby, I love you, and I'll leave her

And I'm coming out to California"

Let's not forget ourselves, good friend

I am flawed if I'm not free

And your husband will never leave you

He will never leave you for me

People interpret this song in many ways, but the most plain interpretation (to me) is that it’s about a woman having an affair with her close/best friend’s husband. What I love about it is that when listening to it, you can feel the suppressed emotion and the emptiness in every line, although the singer’s voice at first listen seems a bit flat and almost unmotivated. Hearing it for the first time is almost like watching a drama; you become invested in these “characters,” even though you've only been introduced to them for a scant few minutes, and then the big “twist” comes and reinforces how tragic this song really is. It doesn't sound like a depressing song, but if you let the lyrics sink in, you can see how this song doesn't need to sound dirge-like to be truly sad.

The first stanza opens with the narrator either addressing herself or her friend: “Get a real job/Keep the wind at your back and the sun on your face.”  She may be reciting to herself here the empty phrases people have told her in an almost monotone-like voice. “Keep the wind at your back and the sun on your face” means essentially to keep pressing forward and keep looking at “the bright side” of things; the unfeeling way the narrator says this is probably indicative of how she regards this trite advice. “All the immediate unknowns/Are better than knowing this tired and lonely fate” is the first hint we get that our narrator is jealous of her married friend. Her friend is freshly wedded and pregnant (as we will see in a minute), so she does indeed have some “immediate unknowns” in her life: raising her child, how her husband and she will get along in this new environment they've moved into, etc., but the narrator says being in that vulnerable position is far better than being alone and jaded like she is. 

“Does he love you?/Will he hold your tiny face in his hands?” she asks her friend, though she’s probably not looking for a response. The narrator wants someone to love her like her friend’s husband loves her. I think there is a lot going on here: it’s important to her that her friend is treated well by her husband, so she asks if he gives her that kind of treatment, but there’s a darker intention behind the words as well; because she knows her husband is having an affair with her, she’s asking her friend rhetorically if he really loves her. Of course, this assumes you interpret the song as saying the narrator knew the married man she was cheating with was her friend’s husband; if she really didn't know, then this line could simply represent both the narrator’s jealousy as well as her concern for her friend. All open to interpretation. 

“I guess it's spring; I didn't know/It's always seventy-five with no melting snow”: Nothing ever seems to change around the narrator. Her life is stagnant. The consistently-hot California weather represents the way the narrator’s life doesn't really change even as time passes:  time moves forward, but the weather in California stays the same, much like the narrator, essentially.

“A married man, he visits me/I receive his letters in the mail twice a week”: At this point we don’t actually know yet that this man is her friend’s husband. Whether or not the narrator knew it was her friend’s husband herself is disputed, but to me it seems obvious that she did know, considering she says he’s visited her. However you want to see it. Maybe the narrator really hadn't seen her friend’s husband before and didn't know who he was, since the two married after the friend left California. Who knows. Depends on whether you want to see the narrator (I’m just going to call her Jenny from this sentence on because that’s the singer’s name) as guilty or innocent. 

“And I think he loves me/And when he leaves her/He's coming out to California”: Jenny doesn't actually know if this man loves her, but she’s telling herself he does because it makes her feel better. Part of her realizes he’s not actually going to leave his wife to come live with her, but she feeds herself this fantasy to alleviate some of the jealousy she holds toward her friend. 

“I guess it all worked out/There's a ring on your finger/And the baby's due out/You share a place by the park/And run a shop for antiques downtown”: The imagery symbolizes (at least to Jenny) how well her friend’s life is (ostensibly) going for her right now. She’s got the ring, the baby, and the cute little family business: the stereotypical “perfect” life.

“And he loves you, even though you/Used to say you were flawed if you weren't free”: Her friend’s husband loves her even though she seemed opposed to the idea of marriage. Later echoed by Jenny to express to her friend that she doesn't intend to carry through with the affair she’s having with her husband.

“Let's not forget ourselves, good friend/You and I were almost dead/And you're better off for leaving/Yeah, you're better off for leaving”: “Dead,” meaning their friendship was almost over because of something…was it because Jenny’s friend knew Jenny had something for her husband? Intriguing.

Next two stanzas: Here we reach the climax. Jenny's friend confesses her marriage really isn't going so well and we discover who her husband is having an affair with: Jenny. The imagery of her friend sitting alone at night in the family shop, crying on the phone really reinforces the way this song feels like it's a drama on TV; you can just picture the entire scenario in your head. Just listen to how the music builds up to those catastrophic three lines that reveal what's actually going on. It's stellar.

"Let's not forget ourselves, good friend/I am flawed if I'm not free/And your husband will never leave you/He will never leave you for me": Not hard to figure out, but listen to the desperation spoken behind every line. This song is so good, seriously. In my interpretation of it, Jenny knew all along who it was she was having an affair with, and with the last two lines she's actually telling herself more than she is her friend that she really is never going to end up with this man. The sorrow, emptiness, and shock of the realization all echo clearly through her voice. I knew I shouldn't have done this song. It just ends up making me sad.