In Chap­ter 43 of “We Solve Mur­ders,” Max High­field finds him­self com­fort­ably sit­u­at­ed in an opu­lent library that he now feels he belongs to, unlike a few years ago. The library is expan­sive, adorned with floor-to-ceil­ing shelves and win­dows, exud­ing an atmos­phere of refined ele­gance with dark oak and green leather. The light­ing con­sists of grand chan­de­liers and brass read­ing lamps, and Max imag­ines trans­form­ing such a space into a lux­u­ri­ous pool and gym area if it were his home.

Amid this splen­did set­ting, Max seeks out Henk, who is engrossed in a med­ical peri­od­i­cal from a plush leather sofa. Their inter­ac­tion begins with a light exchange about the philoso­pher Spin­oza, whom Henk asserts was cru­cial to the works of great thinkers like Kant and Goethe. Max thanks Henk for meet­ing him, reflect­ing on the chal­lenges he faces at his cur­rent agency and express­ing his com­mit­ment to remain true to him­self.

The con­ver­sa­tion takes a turn as they dis­cuss Jeff, a deceased fig­ure from Max’s past. Henk, seem­ing­ly indif­fer­ent to Jef­f’s fate, offers a philo­soph­i­cal remark about those who live by the sword often meet­ing dire ends. Max humor­ous­ly ref­er­ences a film he starred in, “Die by the Sword,” to light­en the mood. He then broach­es the sub­ject of his safe­ty, seek­ing Henk’s assis­tance in ensur­ing full secu­ri­ty cov­er­age, sug­gest­ing a lucra­tive offer of two mil­lion a year for ambas­sador­ship duties.

As the dis­cus­sion unfolds, Max hands Henk a dis­turb­ing card read­ing, “You’re dead.” Henk acknowl­edges the poten­tial lapse in care from Max’s cur­rent agency and shows a will­ing­ness to inves­ti­gate fur­ther. The dia­logue shifts to the after­math of Jef­f’s death, with Max con­firm­ing that clients are grav­i­tat­ing towards Henk. Their ban­ter incor­po­rates humor regard­ing Max’s film expe­ri­ences, empha­siz­ing their cama­raderie.

Max, feel­ing sat­is­fied with their con­ver­sa­tion, decides to for­mal­ize a con­tract with Henk. As he departs, he notices an elder­ly woman sob­bing qui­et­ly while read­ing about grief. Attempt­ing to lend some com­fort, he offers her an auto­graph, only to be met with the real­i­ty that she does not rec­og­nize him. This inter­ac­tion high­lights the com­plex­i­ties of grief and human con­nec­tions, leav­ing Max reflec­tive on his own emo­tion­al expres­sions.

In Chap­ter 43 of “All the Col­ors of the Dark,” a tense and inti­mate moment unfolds between two char­ac­ters amid a trou­bling atmos­phere. The chap­ter opens with one char­ac­ter express­ing dis­tress, unable to breathe, as the oth­er advis­es him to calm down, kneel, and pray. A bib­li­cal reas­sur­ance is voiced to com­fort him: “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dis­mayed, for I am your God; I will strength­en you.” The silence that fol­lows is pal­pa­ble until foot­steps are heard, sug­gest­ing an omi­nous pres­ence.

As they remain togeth­er, one char­ac­ter gen­tly traces the con­tours of the other’s body, map­ping out the ribs, col­lar­bone, throat, and facial fea­tures in a dark, inti­mate arrange­ment. A poignant exchange reveals the depth of their con­nec­tion; one reflects on his miss­ing eye, a sub­ject of ridicule at school, while the oth­er offers a stark but odd­ly com­fort­ing obser­va­tion about the eye sock­et. Their shared vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty becomes evi­dent, reveal­ing a his­to­ry of adver­si­ty and pain.

The nar­ra­tive then shifts to a reflec­tive rec­ol­lec­tion of hard­ship, address­ing themes of pover­ty and loss. The char­ac­ter rem­i­nisces about his child­hood plagued by the death of his father and his moth­er’s fluc­tu­at­ing emo­tion­al state and employ­ment. These mem­o­ries are heavy, paint­ing a pic­ture of relent­less strug­gles, dimin­ish­ing resources, and the haunt­ing uncer­tain­ty of home life. The pro­tag­o­nist’s feel­ings of inad­e­qua­cy and exhaus­tion cul­mi­nate in a moment of vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty as he admits his inabil­i­ty to cope, which leads to tears.

The oth­er char­ac­ter coun­ters with encour­age­ment, assert­ing his strength and resilience, par­tic­u­lar­ly among peers who under­stand pro­found loss. She empha­sizes that the expe­ri­ences they’ve endured will grant him pow­er once they escape their cur­rent predica­ment. This exchange serves to strength­en their bond, out­lin­ing the harsh real­i­ties of their exis­tence while also sow­ing the seeds of hope and empow­er­ment for the future. The chap­ter ends on a note of both shared sor­row and the poten­tial for resilience, under­scor­ing the trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of their strug­gles.

Chap­ter Forty-Three recounts the pro­tag­o­nist’s eight-month ordeal in Clearview Psy­chi­atric Hos­pi­tal fol­low­ing a grave inci­dent involv­ing her and her daugh­ter, Cecelia. Accord­ing to the recount­ed nar­ra­tive, under the influ­ence of major depres­sion and delu­sions, she attempt­ed to end both their lives by admin­is­ter­ing seda­tives and plac­ing Cecelia in a filled bath­tub. The plan was thwart­ed by her hus­band, Andy, whose time­ly inter­ven­tion with the police saved them. The pro­tag­o­nist, how­ev­er, has no rec­ol­lec­tion of these actions or the events lead­ing up to them, includ­ing being pre­scribed the seda­tives believed to have facil­i­tat­ed her attempt­ed mur­der-sui­cide.

In Clearview, she under­goes treat­ment for her con­di­tions, pre­scribed both anti-psy­chot­ic and anti-depres­sant med­ica­tions. Despite her vivid mem­o­ries of being con­fined by Andy, her ther­a­pist, Dr. Bar­ringer, con­vinces her these mem­o­ries are delu­sion­al. Through treat­ment, she grad­u­al­ly accepts respon­si­bil­i­ty for her actions, albeit with no per­son­al mem­o­ry of them, and begins to improve.

Andy’s unwa­ver­ing sup­port dur­ing her hos­pi­tal stay is high­light­ed as he vis­its fre­quent­ly, endear­ing him­self to the staff and con­tin­u­ous­ly show­ing care towards her. Their rela­tion­ship, ini­tial­ly strained to the point of her aver­sion to his touch, begins to heal, reflect­ing her progress.

As her dis­charge approach­es, the nar­ra­tive focus­es on her appre­hen­sion about return­ing home, tem­pered by the desire to reunite with Cecelia. Their bond remains strong, despite the sep­a­ra­tion enforced by her hos­pi­tal­iza­tion. Andy’s role expands beyond that of a sup­port­ive spouse to include arrange­ments for their daugh­ter’s care upon the pro­tag­o­nist’s return.

The chap­ter weaves a nar­ra­tive of recov­ery, guilt, and the grad­ual rekin­dling of famil­ial con­nec­tions, set against the back­drop of a severe men­tal health cri­sis. Its emo­tion­al depth is punc­tu­at­ed by the pro­tag­o­nist’s inter­nal strug­gles and the tan­gi­ble sup­port and nor­mal­iza­tion of her hus­band’s role in her jour­ney towards sta­bi­liza­tion and rein­te­gra­tion with her fam­i­ly.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

CHAPTER
43
The wind roared around Rhys and me as he win­nowed from the skies above
his court. But Velaris didn’t greet us.
Rather, we were stand­ing by a moon­lit moun­tain lake ringed in pine
trees, high above the world. We’d left the court as we’d come in—with
swag­ger and men­ace. Where Cass­ian, Azriel, and Mor had gone with the
orb, I had no idea.
Alone at the edge of the lake, Rhys said hoarse­ly, “I’m sor­ry.”
I blinked. “What do you pos­si­bly have to be sor­ry for?”
His hands were shaking—as if in the after­math of that fury at what Keir
had called me, what he’d threat­ened. Per­haps he’d brought us here before
head­ing home in order to have some pri­va­cy before his friends could
inter­rupt. “I shouldn’t have let you go. Let you see that part of us. Of me.”
I’d nev­er seen him so raw, so … stum­bling.
“I’m fine.” I didn’t know what to make of what had been done. Both
between us and to Keir. But it had been my choice. To play that role, to
wear these clothes. To let him touch me. But … I said slow­ly, “We knew
what tonight would require of us. Please—please don’t start … pro­tect­ing
me. Not like that.” He knew what I meant. He’d pro­tect­ed me Under the
Moun­tain, but that pri­mal, male rage he’d just shown Keir … A shat­tered
study splat­tered in paint flashed through my mem­o­ry.
Rhys rasped, “I will never—never lock you up, force you to stay behind.
But when he threat­ened you tonight, when he called you … ” Whore. That’s
what they’d called him. For fifty years, they’d hissed it. I’d lis­tened to
Lucien spit the words in his face. Rhys released a jagged breath. “It’s hard
to shut down my instincts.”
Instincts. Just like … like some­one else had instincts to pro­tect, to hide
me away. “Then you should have pre­pared your­self bet­ter,” I snapped. “You
seemed to be going along just fine with it, until Keir said—”
“I will kill any­one who harms you,” Rhys snarled. “I will kill them, and
take a damn long time doing it.” He pant­ed. “Go ahead. Hate me—despise
me for it.”
“You are my friend,” I said, and my voice broke on the word. I hat­ed the
tears that slipped down my face. I didn’t even know why I was cry­ing.
Per­haps for the fact that it had felt real on that throne with him, even for a
moment, and … and it like­ly hadn’t been. Not for him. “You’re my friend—
and I under­stand that you’re High Lord. I under­stand that you will defend
your true court, and pun­ish threats against it. But I can’t … I don’t want you
to stop telling me things, invit­ing me to do things, because of the threats
against me.”
Dark­ness rip­pled, and wings tore from his back. “I am not him,” Rhys
breathed. “I will nev­er be him, act like him. He locked you up and let you
with­er, and die.”
“He tried—”
“Stop com­par­ing. Stop com­par­ing me to him.”
The words cut me short. I blinked.
“You think I don’t know how sto­ries get written—how this sto­ry will be
writ­ten?” Rhys put his hands on his chest, his face more open, more
anguished than I’d seen it. “I am the dark lord, who stole away the bride of
spring. I am a demon, and a night­mare, and I will meet a bad end. He is the
gold­en prince—the hero who will get to keep you as his reward for not
dying of stu­pid­i­ty and arro­gance.”
The things I love have a ten­den­cy to be tak­en from me. He’d admit­ted
that to me Under the Moun­tain.
But his words were kin­dling to my tem­per, to what­ev­er pit of fear was
yawn­ing open inside of me. “And what about my sto­ry?” I hissed. “What
about my reward? What about what I want?”
“What is it that you want, Feyre?”
I had no answer. I didn’t know. Not any­more.
“What is it that you want, Feyre?”
I stayed silent.
His laugh was bit­ter, soft. “I thought so. Per­haps you should take some
time to fig­ure that out one of these days.”
“Per­haps I don’t know what I want, but at least I don’t hide what I am
behind a mask,” I seethed. “At least I let them see who I am, bro­ken bits
and all. Yes—it’s to save your peo­ple. But what about the oth­er masks,
Rhys? What about let­ting your friends see your real face? But maybe it’s
eas­i­er not to. Because what if you did let some­one in? And what if they saw
every­thing, and still walked away? Who could blame them—who would
want to both­er with that sort of mess?”
He flinched.
The most pow­er­ful High Lord in his­to­ry flinched. And I knew I’d hit
hard—and deep.
Too hard. Too deep.
“Rhys,” I said.
“Let’s go home.”
The word hung between us, and I won­dered if he’d take it back—even as
I wait­ed for my own mouth to bark that it wasn’t home. But the thought of
the clear, crisp blue skies of Velaris at sun­set, the sparkle of the city lights
…
Before I could say yes, he grabbed my hand, not meet­ing my stare, and
win­nowed us away.
The wind was hol­low as it roared around us, the dark­ness cold and
for­eign.
Cass­ian, Azriel, and Mor were indeed wait­ing at the town house. I bid them
good night while they ambushed Rhysand for answers about what Keir had
said to pro­voke him.
I was still in my dress—which felt vul­gar in the light of Velaris—but
found myself head­ing into the gar­den, as if the moon­light and chill might
cleanse my mind.
Though, if I was being hon­est … I was wait­ing for him. What I’d said …
I had been awful. He’d told me those secrets, those vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties in
con­fi­dence. And I’d thrown them in his face.
Because I knew it’d hurt him. And I knew I hadn’t been talk­ing about
him, not real­ly.
Min­utes passed, the night still cool enough to remind me that spring had
not ful­ly dawned, and I shiv­ered, rub­bing my arms as the moon drift­ed. I
lis­tened to the foun­tain, and the city music … he didn’t come. I wasn’t sure
what I’d even tell him.
I knew he and Tam­lin were dif­fer­ent. Knew that Rhysand’s pro­tec­tive
anger tonight had been jus­ti­fied, that I would have had a sim­i­lar reac­tion.
I’d been blood­thirsty at the barest details of Mor’s suf­fer­ing, had want­ed to
pun­ish them for it.
I had known the risks. I had known I’d be sit­ting in his lap, touch­ing him,
using him. I’d been using him for a while now. And maybe I should tell him
I didn’t … I didn’t want or expect any­thing from him.
Maybe Rhysand need­ed to flirt with me, taunt me, as much for a
dis­trac­tion and sense of nor­mal­cy as I did.
And maybe I’d said what I had to him because … because I’d real­ized
that I might very well be the per­son who wouldn’t let any­one in. And
tonight, when he’d recoiled after he’d seen how he affect­ed me … It had
crum­pled some­thing in my chest.
I had been jealous—of Cres­sei­da. I had been so pro­found­ly unhap­py on
that barge because I’d want­ed to be the one he smiled at like that.
And I knew it was wrong, but … I did not think Rhys would call me a
whore if I want­ed it—wanted … him. No mat­ter how soon it was after
Tam­lin.
Nei­ther would his friends. Not when they had been called the same and
worse.
And learned to live—and love—beyond it. Despite it.
So maybe it was time to tell Rhys that. To explain that I didn’t want to
pre­tend. I didn’t want to write it off as a joke, or a plan, or a dis­trac­tion.
And it’d be hard, and I was scared and might be dif­fi­cult to deal with, but
… I was will­ing to try—with him. To try to … be some­thing. Togeth­er.
Whether it was pure­ly sex, or more, or some­thing between or beyond them,
I didn’t know. We’d find out.
I was healed—or healing—enough to want to try.
If he was will­ing to try, too.
If he didn’t walk away when I voiced what I want­ed: him.
Not the High Lord, not the most pow­er­ful male in Prythian’s his­to­ry.
Just … him. The per­son who had sent music into that cell; who had
picked up that knife in Amarantha’s throne room to fight for me when no
one else dared, and who had kept fight­ing for me every day since, refus­ing
to let me crum­ble and dis­ap­pear into noth­ing.
So I wait­ed for him in the chilled, moon­lit gar­den.
But he didn’t come.
Rhys wasn’t at break­fast. Or lunch. He wasn’t in the town house at all.
I’d even writ­ten him a note on the last piece of paper we’d used.
I want to talk to you.
I’d wait­ed thir­ty min­utes for the paper to van­ish.
But it’d stayed in my palm—until I threw it in the fire.
I was pissed enough that I stalked into the streets, bare­ly remark­ing that
the day was balmy, sun­ny, that the very air now seemed laced with cit­rus
and wild­flow­ers and new grass. Now that we had the orb, he’d no doubt be
in touch with the queens. Who would no doubt waste our time, just to
remind us they were impor­tant; that they, too, had pow­er.
Part of me wished Rhys could crush their bones the way he’d done with
Keir’s the night before.
I head­ed for Amren’s apart­ment across the riv­er, need­ing the walk to
clear my head.
Win­ter had indeed yield­ed to spring. By the time I was halfway there, my
over­coat was slung over my arm, and my body was slick with sweat
beneath my heavy cream sweater.
I found Amren the same way I’d seen her the last time: hunched over the
Book, papers strewn around her. I set the blood on the counter.
She said with­out look­ing up, “Ah. The rea­son why Rhys bit my head off
this morn­ing.”
I leaned against the counter, frown­ing. “Where’s he gone off to?”
“To hunt who­ev­er attacked you yes­ter­day.”
If they had ash arrows in their arse­nal … I tried to soothe the wor­ry that
bit deep. “Do you think it was the Sum­mer Court?” The blood ruby still sat
on the floor, still used as a paper­weight against the riv­er breeze blow­ing in
from the open win­dows. Varian’s neck­lace was now beside her bed. As if
she fell asleep look­ing at it.
“Maybe,” Amren said, drag­ging a fin­ger along a line of text. She must be
tru­ly absorbed to not even both­er with the blood. I debat­ed leav­ing her to it.
But she went on, “Regard­less, it seems that our ene­mies have a track on
Rhys’s mag­ic. Which means they’re able to find him when he win­nows
any­where or if he uses his pow­ers.” She at last looked up. “You lot are
leav­ing Velaris in two days. Rhys wants you sta­tioned at one of the Illyr­i­an
war-camps—where you’ll fly down to the human lands once the queens
send word.”
“Why not today?”
Amren said, “Because Star­fall is tomor­row night—the first we’ve had
togeth­er in fifty years. Rhys is expect­ed to be here, amongst his peo­ple.”
“What’s Star­fall?”
Amren’s eyes twin­kled. “Out­side of these bor­ders, the rest of the world
cel­e­brates tomor­row as Nynsar—the Day of Seeds and Flow­ers.” I almost
flinched at that. I hadn’t real­ized just how much time had passed since I’d
come here. “But Star­fall,” Amren said, “only at the Night Court can you
wit­ness it—only with­in this ter­ri­to­ry is Star­fall cel­e­brat­ed in lieu of the
Nyn­sar rev­el­ry. The rest, and the why of it, you’ll find out. It’s bet­ter left as
a sur­prise.”
Well, that explained why peo­ple had seemed to already be prepar­ing for a
cel­e­bra­tion of sorts: High Fae and faeries hus­tling home with arms full of
vibrant wild­flower bou­quets and stream­ers and food. The streets were being
swept and washed, store­fronts patched up with quick, skilled hands.
I asked, “Will we come back here once we leave?”
She returned to the Book. “Not for a while.”
Some­thing in my chest start­ed sink­ing. To an immor­tal, a while must be
… a long, long time.
I took that as an invi­ta­tion to leave, and head­ed for the door in the back
of the loft. But Amren said, “When Rhys came back, after Ama­ran­tha, he
was a ghost. He pre­tend­ed he wasn’t, but he was. You made him come alive
again.”
Words stalled, and I didn’t want to think about it, not when what­ev­er
good I’d done—whatever good we’d done for each other—might have been
wiped away by what I’d said to him.
So I said, “He is lucky to have all of you.”
“No,” she said softly—more gen­tly than I’d ever heard. “We are lucky to
have him, Feyre.” I turned from the door. “I have known many High
Lords,” Amren con­tin­ued, study­ing her paper. “Cru­el ones, cun­ning ones,
weak ones, pow­er­ful ones. But nev­er one that dreamed. Not as he does.”
“Dreams of what?” I breathed.
“Of peace. Of free­dom. Of a world unit­ed, a world thriv­ing. Of
some­thing better—for all of us.”
“He thinks he’ll be remem­bered as the vil­lain in the sto­ry.”
She snort­ed.
“But I for­got to tell him,” I said qui­et­ly, open­ing the door, “that the
vil­lain is usu­al­ly the per­son who locks up the maid­en and throws away the
key.”
“Oh?”
I shrugged. “He was the one who let me out.”
If you’ve moved else­where, I wrote after get­ting home from Amren’s
apart­ment, you could have at least giv­en me the keys to this house. I keep
leav­ing the door unlocked when I go out. It’s get­ting to be too tempt­ing for
the neigh­bor­hood bur­glars.
No response. The let­ter didn’t even van­ish.
I tried after break­fast the next day—the morn­ing of Star­fall. Cass­ian says
you’re sulk­ing in the House of Wind. What un-High-Lord-like behav­ior.
What of my train­ing?
Again, no reply.
My guilt and—and what­ev­er else it was—started to shift. I could bare­ly
keep from shred­ding the paper as I wrote my third one after lunch.
Is this pun­ish­ment? Or do peo­ple in your Inner Cir­cle not get sec­ond
chances if they piss you off? You’re a hate­ful cow­ard.
I was climb­ing out of the bath, the city abuzz with prepa­ra­tions for the
fes­tiv­i­ties at sun­down, when I looked at the desk where I’d left the let­ter.
And watched it van­ish.
Nuala and Cer­rid­wen arrived to help me dress, and I tried not to stare at
the desk as I waited—waited and wait­ed for the response.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

I ’M SORR Y, EVELYN,” DON SAID when he sat down. I had already
ordered an iced tea and eat­en half of a sour pick­le. I thought he was
apol­o­giz­ing for being late.
“It’s only five past one,” I said. “It’s fine.”
“No,” he said, shak­ing his head. He looked pale but also a bit
thin­ner than some of his recent pho­tos. The years we had been apart
had not been good to Don. His face had bloat­ed, and his waist­line had
widened. But he was still heads and tails more hand­some than any­one
else in the place. Don was the sort of man who was always going to be
hand­some, no mat­ter what hap­pened to him. His good looks were just
that loy­al.
“I’m sor­ry,” he said. The empha­sis, the mean­ing­ful­ness of it, hit me.
It caught me off guard. The wait­ress came by and asked for his
drink order. He didn’t order a mar­ti­ni or a beer. He ordered a Coca-
Cola. When she left, I found myself unsure what to say to him.
“I’m sober,” he said. “Have been for two hun­dred and fifty-six days.”
“That many, huh?” I said as I took a sip of my iced tea.
“I was a drunk, Eve­lyn. I know that now.”
“You were also a cheater and a pig,” I said.
Don nod­ded. “I know that, too. And I’m deeply sor­ry.”
I had flown all the way here to see if I could do a movie with him. I
had not come to be apol­o­gized to. The thought had nev­er occurred to
me. I mere­ly assumed I would use him this time the way I used him
back then; his name near mine would get peo­ple talk­ing.
But this repen­tant man in front of me was sur­pris­ing and
over­whelm­ing.
“What am I sup­posed to do with that?” I asked him. “That you’re
sor­ry? What is that sup­posed to mean to me?”
The wait­ress came and took our orders.
“A Reuben, please,” I said, hand­ing her the menu. If I was going to
have a real con­ver­sa­tion about this, I need­ed a hearty meal.
“I’ll have the same,” Don said.
She knew who we were; I could see it in the way her lips kept try­ing
to hold back a smile.
When she left, Don leaned in. “I know it doesn’t make up for what I
did to you,” he said.
“Good,” I said. “Because it real­ly doesn’t.”
“But I hope it might make you feel a lit­tle bet­ter,” he said, “to know
that I know I was wrong, I know you deserved bet­ter, and I’m work­ing
every day to be a bet­ter man.”
“Well, it’s awful­ly late now,” I said. “You being a bet­ter man does
noth­ing for me.”
“I won’t hurt any­one like I did then,” Don said. “To you, to Ruby.”
My heart of ice melt­ed briefly, and I admit­ted that did make me feel
bet­ter. “Still,” I said. “We all can’t go around treat­ing peo­ple like dog
shit and then expect­ing that a sim­ple I’m sor­ry eras­es it.”
Don shook his head humbly. “Of course not,” he said. “No, I know
that.”
“And if your movies hadn’t tanked and Ari Sul­li­van hadn’t dropped
you like you got him to drop me, you’d prob­a­bly still be liv­ing high on
the hog, drunk as a skunk.”
Don nod­ded. “Prob­a­bly. I’m sor­ry to say you are most like­ly right
about that.”
I want­ed more. Did I want him to grov­el? To cry? I wasn’t sure. I
just knew I wasn’t get­ting it.
“Let me just say this,” Don said. “I loved you from the moment I saw
you. I loved you mad­ly. And I ruined it because I turned into a man I’m
not proud of. And because I ruined it the way I did, because I was awful
at treat­ing you the way you deserved to be treat­ed, I am sor­ry.
Some­times I think about going back to our wed­ding day and want­i­ng
to do it all over again, want­i­ng to fix my mis­takes so that you nev­er
have to go through what I put you through. I know I can’t do that, but
what I can do is look you in the eye and tell you from the very bot­tom
of my heart that I know how incred­i­ble you are, I know how great we

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

43
The hard­est part was that I believed that, in front of the doc­tors or vis­i­tors, I had
to pre­tend the whole time I was okay. If I became �ustered, it was tak­en as
evi­dence that I wasn’t improv­ing. If I got upset and assert­ed myself, I was out of
con­trol and crazy.
It remind­ed me of what I’d always heard about the way they’d test to see if
some­one was a witch in the old­en days. They’d throw the woman into a pond. If
she �oat­ed, she was a witch and would be killed. If she sank, she was inno­cent,
and, oh well. She was dead either way, but I guess they �gured it was still good to
know what kind of woman she’d been.
After a cou­ple of months, I called my father to beg him to let me go home.
He said, “I’m sor­ry, the judge is going to have to �gure out what she’s going
to do with you. It’s up to the doc­tors right now. I can’t help you at all. I’m giv­ing
you to the doc­tors and I can’t help you.”
The strange part is, before they put me in that place, my dad had sent me a
pearl neck­lace and a beau­ti­ful hand­writ­ten card for Christ­mas. I asked myself,
Why is he doing this? Who is he?
What hurt me most was that for years he’d been say­ing in front of the
cameras—whether it was when I did the “Work Bitch” video or when the
con­ser­va­tor­ship �rst start­ed and we did the Cir­cus Tour—that he was all about
me and the boys.
“That’s my baby girl!” he’d say right into the cam­era. “I love her so much.” I
was stuck in a trail­er with Lou’s weird-ass lack­ey Robin, who I’d grown to hate,
while he talked about what a great dad he was to any­one who would lis­ten.
But now, when I was refus­ing to do the new Vegas res­i­den­cy, when I was
push­ing back on tours, was I still his beloved baby girl?
Appar­ent­ly not.
A lawyer would lat­er say, “Your dad could’ve total­ly put a stop to all that. He
could’ve told the doc­tors, no, this is too much, let’s let my daugh­ter go home.”
But he didn’t.
I called my mom to ask her why every­one was act­ing like I was so dan­ger­ous.
“Well, I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know…” she would say.
I also texted my sis­ter when I was in that place and asked her to get me out.
“Stop �ght­ing it,” she texted back. “There’s noth­ing you can do about it, so
stop �ght­ing it.”
Along with the rest of them, she kept act­ing like I was a threat in some way.
This will sound crazy, but I’ll say it again because it’s the truth: I thought they
were going to try to kill me.
I didn’t under­stand how Jamie Lynn and our father had devel­oped such a
good rela­tion­ship. She knew I was reach­ing out to her for help and that he was
dog­ging me. I felt like she should have tak­en my side.
One of my girl­friends who helped me change clothes every night in the
under­ground chang­ing room dur­ing my Vegas run lat­er said, “Brit­ney, I had
three or four night­mares when you were at that cen­ter. I would wake up in the
mid­dle of the night. I had dreams that you killed your­self in that place. And I
dreamed that Robin, the lady who was your so-called nice assis­tant, called me
and said proud­ly, ‘Yeah, she died in the place.’ ” My friend said she wor­ried about
me the whole time.
Sev­er­al weeks into my stay, I was strug­gling to stay hope­ful when one of the
nurs­es, the only one who was real as hell, called me over to her com­put­er.
“Look at this,” she said.
I peered at her com­put­er and tried to make sense of what I was see­ing. It was
women on a talk show talk­ing about me and the con­ser­va­tor­ship. One was
wear­ing a #FreeBrit­ney T‑shirt. The nurse showed me clips of oth­er things, too
—fans say­ing they were try­ing to �gure out if I was being held some­where
against my will, talk­ing about how much my music meant to them and how they
hat­ed to think I was su�ering now. They want­ed to help.

Chap­ter 43 of The Ten­ant of Wild­fell Hall by Anne Bron­të begins with the pro­tag­o­nist recount­ing the return of Mr. Hunt­ing­don and his unset­tling deci­sion to hire a gov­erness, Miss Myers, for their child, Arthur, against her wish­es. She finds the choice ill-advised, not­ing her own capac­i­ty and desire to edu­cate her son. Hunt­ing­don, dis­mis­sive of her protests, insists on his deci­sion, reveal­ing a gov­erness, reput­ed for her piety and rec­om­mend­ed by a reli­gious dowa­ger, is already on her way.

The arrival of Miss Myers does lit­tle to ease ten­sions. With an appear­ance and demeanor that imme­di­ate­ly breed dis­trust, she fails to make a favor­able impres­sion on the pro­tag­o­nist. Miss Myers, despite pos­sess­ing a fine voice and musi­cal tal­ent, lacks oth­er accom­plish­ments and seems to har­bor guile. Her rela­tion­ship with Arthur and the pro­tag­o­nist is fraught, marked by over-indul­gence and an affect­ed piety that does lit­tle to mask her defi­cient authen­tic­i­ty and integri­ty.

Amidst these devel­op­ments, the pro­tag­o­nist’s resolve to escape Grass­dale for the safe­ty and bet­ter­ment of Arthur solid­i­fies. Covert prepa­ra­tions com­mence, with Rachel, the loy­al ser­vant, aid­ing in the pack­ing and plan­ning, despite her own reser­va­tions about leav­ing. Let­ters of farewell are dis­patched, explain­ing the pro­tag­o­nist’s dire sit­u­a­tion and hint­ing at her hid­den des­ti­na­tion, to her broth­er Fred­er­ick, her friends Esther and Mil­i­cent, and her aunt.

The nar­ra­tive cap­tures the ten­sion and dread of immi­nent depar­ture, con­trast­ing it with the mun­dane cru­el­ty and neg­li­gence of Hunt­ing­don’s behav­ior. As the chap­ter clos­es, the pro­tag­o­nist, con­sumed by anx­i­ety for the future, attempts to dis­tract her­self through writ­ing and prepar­ing but finds lit­tle relief. The chap­ter ends on a note of anx­ious antic­i­pa­tion for the escape planned under the cov­er of night, high­light­ing the pro­tag­o­nist’s des­per­a­tion for free­dom and a bet­ter life for her child away from the cor­rupt­ing influ­ence of Hunt­ing­don.