Cincinnati is the urban setting of Poppy Wright’s early adult life after college: she works at an upscale bar, spends much of her free time with the artist Julian, and begins building a life distinct from her parents’ home in Linfield. The city also brings Alex Nilsen into contact with Poppy’s new relationship, making it more than a workplace backdrop: it is where her changing life becomes visible to the friend who has known her longest.

Work and Life Beyond Linfield

After returning to her parents’ home in Linfield, Poppy works at an upscale bar in Cincinnati, about forty minutes south. The job offers a practical foothold outside the suburbs, even as the social world of home remains difficult. When her old teachers judge her choices and former classmates appear, she hides; when Jason Stanley, her first kiss, comes into the bar, she retreats to the bathroom and tells her boss she has vomited. For weeks afterward, the boss asks after her in a way that suggests she suspects Poppy is pregnant. Poppy is not, but the episode shows how exposed and constrained she feels in the place she has returned to.

Cincinnati is also the setting for Poppy’s attempt to shape an adult life around flexibility rather than a conventional career path. She imagines moving to another city, taking bartending or serving work that can be done intensely and then set aside for travel. That plan reflects her desire to leave the constricting atmosphere of Linfield without giving up the mobility that has become central to her life.

Julian and the Artist Community

Julian’s connection to Cincinnati is both educational and artistic. He left the University of Cincinnati after one year, where he had studied architectural design, because he wanted to become a working artist. He exhibits paintings at do-it-yourself venues around the city and shares an old white house with three other painters. The house’s porch gatherings—where the residents drink, smoke, and talk about their ambitions—stir in Poppy a complicated nostalgia for the transient community she encountered in Tofino.

Poppy’s relationship with Julian takes shape amid this loose, bohemian social world. They spend nearly all their spare time together, though his habits trouble Alex: Julian may arrive late, disappear from contact for days, and then spend weeks almost constantly with Poppy. His appetite for spontaneous trips and willingness to say yes to experience contrast with the carefulness Poppy associates with herself. Cincinnati thus holds both the appeal of an improvised, creative life and the uncertainty of a relationship that has not settled into clear commitments.

A Meeting Place for Poppy and Alex

The city’s bars become stages on which Alex encounters Poppy’s life with Julian. Julian first meets Alex at Poppy’s workplace during Alex’s Christmas break. They meet again during spring break at Julian’s grimy bar, which has a bicycle-repair shop in the back, and later have breakfast at Waffle House before Poppy and Alex leave for their trip. These meetings give Alex firsthand points of comparison with the man Poppy is seeing; he regards Julian as reckless and careless, while Poppy is disappointed that Julian seems to have little opinion of Alex.

Cincinnati’s narrative significance comes from this overlap of separate attachments. Poppy’s work, Julian’s artistic circle, and Alex’s visits all converge around the city, but they do not produce easy harmony: Alex dislikes Julian, and Poppy recognizes that the two men’s judgments of one another are not mutual in intensity. The city marks a period when Poppy is trying to establish a life of her own while her longstanding bond with Alex remains present in the background.