In the chap­ter titled “Miles,” the nar­ra­tive opens with Miles receiv­ing alarm­ing news about his broth­er Wyn­ton, who has gone into car­diac arrest. As they dri­ve towards home, Miles grap­ples with a mix of fear and guilt. He reflects on their strained rela­tion­ship, wish­ing he could have been a bet­ter broth­er. Dizzy, his sis­ter, is vis­i­bly shak­en, and Miles strug­gles to reas­sure her, nur­tur­ing a moment of con­nec­tion by express­ing his love for her.

The jour­ney through the for­est brings Miles to a pro­found real­iza­tion about the fragili­ty of life, con­trast­ing their youth against the ancient trees sur­round­ing them. He is haunt­ed by his past choic­es, espe­cial­ly his lack of engage­ment with Wyn­ton pri­or to his hos­pi­tal­iza­tion. As they approach their destination—a hot springs resort where they hope to find Cas­sidy, a per­son they believe may be con­nect­ed to Wyn­ton’s recovery—Miles feels a blend of hope and appre­hen­sion.

They arrive at the hot springs, only to find that Cas­sidy hasn’t worked there recent­ly. The staff pro­vides direc­tions to her home on Dan­de­lion Road, which impress­es Miles and Dizzy with its idyl­lic, pic­turesque scenery—golden hills, orchards, and a charm­ing yel­low house. Dizzy mus­es that it seems like a home fit for an angel, ignit­ing her belief in super­nat­ur­al beings.

Upon reach­ing Cassidy’s house, con­fu­sion and anx­i­ety mount for Miles as he wor­ries about how to approach her. They unpre­dictably act like care­free chil­dren, echo­ing play­ful ban­ter among them­selves. How­ev­er, the atmos­phere shifts dra­mat­i­cal­ly when a tall man in a cow­boy hat answers their knock. In a shock­ing twist, Miles real­izes this man is their father, a rev­e­la­tion that stuns both sib­lings. The chap­ter ends on a cliffhang­er, with a sense of impend­ing dra­ma as they real­ize they have unex­pect­ed­ly encoun­tered their estranged father, bring­ing a mix­ture of unre­solved fam­i­ly ten­sions and urgency to the sto­ry.