Chap­ter 2 begins with Monique ful­ly com­mit­ting her­self to the task of research­ing Eve­lyn Hugo, a woman whose leg­endary sta­tus in Hol­ly­wood has been shroud­ed in mys­tery and rumors. Although Monique had nev­er been drawn to clas­sic cin­e­ma or the stars that defined it, she is quick­ly cap­ti­vat­ed by Evelyn’s life. What start­ed as a sim­ple assign­ment soon turns into a deep dive into Eve­lyn’s tumul­tuous past—her ear­ly mar­riage at just eigh­teen, the alle­ga­tions of abuse from her mar­riage to Don Adler, and the famous love affair with Har­ry Cameron. With each lay­er that Monique uncov­ers, she real­izes how much more there is to Eve­lyn’s life than any­one out­side the indus­try could have imag­ined. Evelyn’s world seems full of pas­sion, betray­al, scan­dal, and the relent­less pur­suit of fame—a com­bi­na­tion of ele­ments that gives the impres­sion of a life lived under con­stant pub­lic scruti­ny.

Monique, who had been work­ing late into the evening, final­ly arrives home well after dark. She walks into her tiny, almost claus­tro­pho­bic apartment—a space that now feels even small­er and emp­ti­er in the wake of her breakup with David. It’s been five weeks since he left, and she still hasn’t quite fig­ured out how to deal with the lin­ger­ing gaps he left behind, like the cof­fee table that once held sen­ti­men­tal val­ue. The sad­ness of it all hits her in waves—wondering if David left because of the new job in San Fran­cis­co or if it was her refusal to join him that real­ly made him go. It stings to think that, no mat­ter the rea­son­ing, he’s gone. Despite her best efforts to push the painful thoughts away, she finds her­self drift­ing back to the same nag­ging con­clu­sion: David chose to leave, and the weight of that deci­sion con­tin­ues to haunt her.

Try­ing to shake off these emo­tions, Monique goes through her famil­iar rou­tine. After order­ing her favorite com­fort food, pad Thai, she escapes into the show­er. The hot water, almost scald­ing, becomes a refuge from the rest of her chaot­ic life, where the sim­ple action of wash­ing away the day pro­vides her with a brief sense of con­trol and peace. For a moment, she isn’t Monique Grant, the woman left behind by her hus­band. She isn’t a stalled writer wait­ing for something—anything—to change. She is just a woman in her show­er, indulging in the plea­sure of warm water and the scent of her sham­poo, a small solace amidst her over­whelm­ing cir­cum­stances.

Over the fol­low­ing days, Monique devotes her­self entire­ly to research­ing Eve­lyn Hugo. She spends hours read­ing old arti­cles about Evelyn’s mar­riages and con­tro­ver­sial love affairs, becom­ing increas­ing­ly absorbed in the actress’s life. The nights are filled with old movie clips, from Evelyn’s roles in Car­oli­na Sun­set and Anna Karen­i­na to her icon­ic appear­ance in Boute-en-Train, which Monique watch­es so often that it replays in her dreams. With each film, Monique’s admi­ra­tion for Eve­lyn grows; she begins to appre­ci­ate the depth and strength in the char­ac­ters Eve­lyn por­trayed on screen. Through these late-night film marathons, Monique starts to see Eve­lyn not just as a Hol­ly­wood icon, but as a woman whose life, filled with ups and downs, could teach her a thing or two about resilience and rein­ven­tion.

As Monique watch­es Eve­lyn in one of her most famous roles, she is cap­ti­vat­ed not just by the actress’s beau­ty, but by the pres­ence Eve­lyn com­mands in each scene. The pho­tos she pins to her wall only rein­force this image of an almost oth­er­world­ly beauty—sharp fea­tures, high cheek­bones, and a jaw­line that seems made for the screen. What strikes Monique most is how time­less Evelyn’s looks are, despite the aging process she’s gone through. There’s a grace in her appear­ance, enhanced by the images that cap­ture her over the years—from the ear­ly 1950s to the lat­er decades, Evelyn’s beau­ty evolves but remains unde­ni­ably strik­ing. As Monique pours over these images, it becomes clear that Eve­lyn was not just a fig­ure­head in Hol­ly­wood; she was a woman who carved out her place in the indus­try through sheer force of will, using her looks, tal­ent, and cun­ning to ensure her longevi­ty in the pub­lic eye. Each pho­to, each film clip, fur­ther pulls Monique into Evelyn’s world, spark­ing a curios­i­ty about the woman behind the roles and the facade. The more Monique learns, the more she real­izes the sto­ry she is about to write may not just be about Evelyn’s pub­lic per­sona, but about the raw, untold truth of a life lived in the spot­light.