The Great Gatsby, Chapter 5

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

So in chapter 5, Nick answers Gatsby's request by asking Daisy to come over for tea alone without Tom. For this chapter for the first time, we get to see Jay Gatsby nervously frantic. The reason for his nervous demeanor probably spawns from the fact that this meeting he is to have between Daisy is his best attempt at reconciling their past love. After Daisy arrives, Gatsby soon knocks on the front door and Nick answers it only to find, "Gatsby, pale as death, with his hands plunged like weights in his coat pockets" (Fitzgerald 86). For the first half hour, the whole experience is a very awkward and embarrassing ordeal for all of them, until Nick leaves the room for a short while only to return and find Gatsby back to his usual confident expression and Daisy in tears of longing. It seems that Nick and Jay's relationship is starting to really strengthen because Nick now talks to Gatsby with a certain impolite criticism that can be found between two friends who have known each other for a long time. Nick says to Gatsby, "You're acting like a little boy... Not only that, but you're being rude. Daisy's sitting in there all alone" (Fitzgerald 88).

Although the awkwardness has settled, Gatsby, excited by the whole event, accidentally lets his act slip in front of Nick on the topic of his affairs. He mentions to Carraway that it took him three years to raise the money for the house. Nick quickly remembers that Jay had once told him he inherited the money and asks him about this. Nick realizing his mistake fabricates a lie that he had lost his money during the war and now was in business. Upon Nick's question of what business he was in, Gatsby quickly says, "That's my affair" (Fitzgerald 90). It appears to me that the smooth, clever Jay Gatsby is starting to lose his grip, and I predict that this dirty business he is involved in, most likely bootlegging, will soon crash down upon him.

So Jay Gatsby invites Nick and Daisy over to his house to show them, but mainly her, his house. Daisy is in wonderment of the house and also in a depressed state realizing what she has been missing, while Gatsby is, at the same time, enchanted by everything about Daisy. I find it funny because the more the moment becomes more perfect between Daisy and Gatsby, the more Nick gets uncomfortable and attempts to leave. After a while, the couple becomes so infatuated with each other that their remarks borderline stupidity, " 'I'd like to just get one of those pink clouds and put you in it and push you around.' I tried to go then..." (Fitzgerald 94). When Nick finally leaves, Daisy and Jay are left on the couch "remotely, possessed by intense life" (Gatsby 96).