Needful Things

Content Warning: This section of the guide contains a description of suicide, animal cruelty, domestic abuse, and murder, as well as references to pedophilia and child pornography.

The Methodist minister conducts Nettie’s funeral, while Wilma’s Catholic funeral is attended by people who are there to support her husband. Alan comforts Polly as she cries, and he wonders why Norris has been so unfocused lately. Meanwhile, Eddie Warburton leaves an envelope at Polly’s house addressed to “Ms. Patricia Chalmers” from the San Francisco Department of Child Welfare.

Alan asks Polly why her hands look better, and she is a little embarrassed to admit that she thinks Mr. Gaunt’s amulet is responsible. They head to Needful Things, where Alan finds it odd that the sign reads “by appointment only.” Polly says that she is merely borrowing the amulet on a trial basis. Alan is shocked to see that her arthritic hands have genuinely improved. He teases the concept of an amulet, and she hotly defends it. She also tells him that it feels as if something is moving around inside of it. Alan is uncomfortable with the idea of Mr. Gaunt parading as a healer, and he worries that the proprietor is a con man.