Phoebe sits on a king-sized canopy bed, struggling to relax with the impending thought of her death. While the wedding reception below begins, she feels overwhelmed by trivial concerns, like the blood staining a bride’s dress, which disrupts her idea of a peaceful closure. To drown out the noise, she attempts to use an old Discman but ends up frustrated by the scratched CD. She steps out onto the balcony, lights a cigarette, and attempts to find solace in smoking, though she finds herself coughing painfully.

With no demands on her time, Phoebe reflects on her situation, gravealleviating her morose thoughts with each puff, trying to maintain a steady composure. Yet her acute awareness of impending death leads her to contemplate the world beyond her existence, recognizing how easily people will move on. As she watches the wedding guests below, Phoebe is both captivated and detached, judging their interactions from her elevated perspective.

A knock disrupts her solitude, and in walks the bride—a commanding figure who confronts Phoebe about smoking in her room. Their interaction reveals underlying tensions, particularly around beauty and privilege, as the bride complains about her inadequate room and her extravagant wedding plans fueled by her deceased father’s money. Through their back-and-forth, Phoebe realizes how lacking a loving maternal presence shaped both their lives.

As the conversation develops, Phoebe begins to feel a strange kinship with the bride, who shares her own anxieties about familial expectations and impending matrimony. They engage in a candid discourse about art’s value and their respective life choices, with the bride expressing doubts about her mother’s influence and her father’s legacy. Their mutual struggle to navigate expectations, love, and loss creates a fragile connection.

Eventually, a moment of levity arises when they share laughter over dark anecdotes about death and absurdity. When the bride expresses a desire for Phoebe to reconsider her own dark plans, Phoebe rebuffs her, stating her decision is already made. Yet the conversation shifts when the bride starts to floss her teeth, symbolizing a calm before the storm of her wedding reception. This unexpectedly tender moment allows Phoebe a glimpse into companionship, contrasting the isolation she’s felt since her husband’s departure and deepening her inner conflict about life and death .