All Fours Chapter 15 Summary & Analysis

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

The narrator devises a plan to record a dance video for Davey, hoping it will entice him to have sex with her. She sets up her phone in the garage, but when she reviews the playback she discovers her body has changed: her butt appears long and flabby rather than round. Horrified, she decides to train for three months to reshape her glutes and abs. She joins a small basement gym run by a couple, Scarlett and Brett, and begins a weightlifting routine. While lifting, she visualizes Davey—first as a partner, then as someone she saves, and finally as an object of rage. The sessions leave her mentally blank and floating on endorphins. After one workout, Jordi asks what will happen if she actually has sex with Davey, comparing her obsession to Wile E. Coyote chasing the Road Runner. Later, the narrator calls her manager Liza about a stalled project with the artist Arkanda. Liza gently reveals that the opportunity has been in limbo for years, and the narrator realizes it is probably dead. The chapter ends with her feeling the weight of lost artistic relevance.

Key Events

The narrator decides to make a dance video for Davey, intending to post it publicly rather than text it.
She discovers, while filming, that her butt has changed shape and looks unappealing.
After researching online, she commits to a three-month gym regimen to reshape her body.
She joins a gym run by Scarlett and Brett and begins lifting weights, thinking obsessively of Davey.
Jordi questions what would happen after sex, using the Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner analogy.
The narrator calls Liza about the Arkanda project; Liza hints it has been delayed for years and may never happen.
The narrator realizes she has been “emerging” as an artist for too long and fears she is now past her prime.

Character Development

The narrator (unnamed protagonist) undergoes a significant shift this chapter. Her focus narrows solely to physical transformation for Davey, replacing any artistic ambition. She abandons her earlier belief that making lasting art is more valuable than exercising a temporary body. Her conversation with Jordi hints at self-awareness—she hears herself sounding like “other people” who believe sex can save them—yet she pushes that insight aside. The call with Liza forces her to confront the decline of her career; the Arkanda project’s quiet death mirrors her own fear of becoming irrelevant.

Jordi serves as a grounding voice, using the cartoon analogy to suggest that Davey may be a chimera—an impossibility—and that the narrator’s true desire might be to move on, not to catch him.

Liza shows patience but also gentle reality-checking, implying that the narrator’s career momentum has stalled and that only a late-life revival might restore it.

Davey remains offstage but dominates the narrator’s thoughts; his imagined presence drives her physical labor.

Scarlett and Brett are functional characters who guide the narrator’s training, treating her goal of a “lifted and rounder” butt with professional seriousness.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

The body as a project: The narrator treats her physical transformation as an artistic or work-like endeavor, complete with a deadline and measurable goals.
Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner: Jordi’s analogy suggests that the chase itself defines the narrator’s identity; if she catches Davey, she loses her purpose.
Chimera: Jordi calls Davey an illusion or impossibility, reflecting the narrator’s delusional fixation.
Failure in weightlifting: The gym’s philosophy of going “until failure” and then doing “ugly” reps mirrors the narrator’s relentless pursuit of an unattainable ideal.
The emerging-artist cycle: The narrator’s reflection on the Blinken Prize and her multiple debuts highlights the theme of artistic longevity and the fear of falling into obscurity.
Endorphins and mental blankness: The narrator’s post-workout floating state contrasts with her obsessive thoughts, offering a rare respite.

Why This Chapter Matters

Chapter 15 marks a decisive turn in the narrator’s self-deception. She commits to a three-month physical transformation, doubling down on her fantasy that a perfect body will solve her emotional and relational emptiness. At the same time, the chapter explicitly maps the erosion of her professional life: the Arkanda project dies not with a bang but with a whimper, leaving her stranded in a “wilderness.” By juxtaposing her gym training with the conversation with Liza, Miranda July exposes the narrator’s attempt to substitute bodily control for career control. The chapter also crystallizes the book’s inquiry into middle-aged desire: the narrator believes that sex with Davey is a life-or-death matter, yet the reader senses that the real death is the creative self she has neglected.

Study Questions and Answers

Why does the narrator decide to train for three months instead of pursuing Davey immediately? She realizes her body no longer matches the image she wants to present. After discovering her butt has changed shape during the test video, she believes the dance must be perfect to summon him. The three-month window is calculated from a hormone graph she draws on her phone, giving her a deadline before she ages further.
How does Jordi’s Wile E. Coyote analogy function in the chapter? Jordi suggests that if Davey is a chimera—an impossibility—then the chase is the point. If the narrator actually catches him, she will lose her identity and purpose. The analogy forces her to consider that her obsession might be about the pursuit itself, not the outcome.
What does the Arkanda project’s collapse reveal about the narrator’s current life stage? The project has been delayed for years, passing through multiple assistants. Liza’s gentle revelation that the narrator won the Blinken Prize (a debut prize) fifteen years ago underscores that her career has plateaued. The loss is “damaging, hardly survivable” because it confirms her fear that she is no longer an emerging artist and may never have another significant opportunity.