Chap­ter 61 fol­lows Eve­lyn as she nav­i­gates the intense grief that accom­pa­nies the loss of her close friend Celia. The funer­al takes place in the qui­et con­fines of For­est Lawn in Los Ange­les, a loca­tion that holds a mul­ti­tude of mem­o­ries for Eve­lyn and those who were clos­est to Celia. The cer­e­mo­ny is pri­vate, away from the pry­ing eyes of the pub­lic, but despite the desire for inti­ma­cy, word gets out that Eve­lyn is there. The weight of Celia’s pass­ing is pal­pa­ble, and Eve­lyn, though sur­round­ed by Robert and Con­nor, feels a deep sense of iso­la­tion as the real­i­ty of the sit­u­a­tion begins to sink in. She can­not hide her emo­tions; the grief is over­whelm­ing, and it’s clear that she is not only mourn­ing Celia’s death but also the end of an era in her own life.

As Celia’s cas­ket is low­ered into the ground, Evelyn’s heart feels heavy, and she can­not hold back her tears any longer. The gleam­ing wood of the cas­ket, the image of Celia being buried, hits her like a wave, and the need to retreat becomes imme­di­ate. She steps away from the crowd, leav­ing Robert and Con­nor behind, and begins to walk up the wind­ing ceme­tery roads, try­ing to find a moment of soli­tude to process the grief she’s hold­ing inside. It’s dur­ing this walk that she finds her­self at the grave of her long-lost friend Har­ry Cameron. Har­ry, the man who had been a con­stant pres­ence in her life and had sup­port­ed her in more ways than she could count, became the place where Eve­lyn could let her emo­tions spill out. She sits by his tomb­stone, feel­ing as if the years of pain and loss she has accu­mu­lat­ed are final­ly being released. She doesn’t speak, for words seem inad­e­quate after all the silent con­ver­sa­tions she’s shared with him in her heart over the years. Her grief doesn’t need artic­u­la­tion; it only needs an out­let, and Harry’s grave offers her that moment of solace. In the soli­tude of his rest­ing place, Eve­lyn feels both com­fort­ed and emp­ty, as though she is momen­tar­i­ly healed but also remind­ed of the deep void left by Celia’s pass­ing.

As she stands up from Harry’s grave, Eve­lyn brush­es off her skirt, ready to rejoin the world she left behind. How­ev­er, as she stands, she notices the two paparazzi pho­tog­ra­phers who have been hid­ing in the trees, snap­ping pho­tos of her moment of vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty. But Eve­lyn feels no rage, no sense of humil­i­a­tion. Instead, she feels indif­fer­ent. The media’s obses­sion with her life, with every pri­vate moment she tries to keep to her­self, no longer holds any pow­er over her. At this point in her life, she under­stands that the media’s gaze is relent­less, and it takes too much ener­gy to care about it. She walks away, her mind more focused on what she needs to process per­son­al­ly than on what oth­ers think or say. The pho­tog­ra­phers may have cap­tured a fleet­ing moment of her sor­row, but Eve­lyn knows that her pain is hers alone to car­ry, and no pho­to can tru­ly cap­ture the depth of what she’s expe­ri­enc­ing.

Two weeks lat­er, Eve­lyn is back at her home in Aldiz with Robert, try­ing to recov­er from the emo­tion­al weight of the funer­al and the loss of Celia. But then, a mag­a­zine arrives in the mail. It’s an issue fea­tur­ing a pho­to­graph of Eve­lyn at Harry’s grave, a can­did image that had been tak­en with­out her con­sent. Along with the mag­a­zine, her daugh­ter Con­nor has includ­ed a note. The note, brief but deeply mean­ing­ful, sim­ply reads, “I love you.” The words are sim­ple, yet they car­ry so much weight for Eve­lyn. In the midst of the over­whelm­ing grief and the noise of the world, it is this ges­ture from her daugh­ter that stands out. The paparazzi may have cap­tured her grief on film, but it is her daughter’s qui­et love and under­stand­ing that tru­ly pro­vides Eve­lyn with the com­fort she needs. Connor’s note, though small, is a reminder that, no mat­ter what the out­side world sees, the true love and sup­port that Eve­lyn needs is with­in her fam­i­ly. And that is the love that will car­ry her through the hard­est of times.