Chap­ter 175 of All the Col­ors of the Dark begins with Saint div­ing into long-for­got­ten inter­view tapes from over a decade ago, revis­it­ing moments and voic­es from her past. The set­ting around her feels serene, with the moon­light gen­tly cast­ing its glow through the blinds, cre­at­ing an atmos­phere of qui­et con­tem­pla­tion. Out­side, the city hums with life, but inside her apart­ment, only the sounds from the stereo fill the silence. As she lis­tens to the tapes, she traces the path of the nar­ra­tive, map­ping out sig­nif­i­cant loca­tions men­tioned by those she once knew, and reflect­ing on how those places and mem­o­ries are linked to the present moment. These tapes pull her back in time, and with each word, Saint feels her­self recon­nect­ing with peo­ple and events long buried in her mem­o­ry.

The voice of a younger Patch echoes through the speak­ers, shar­ing detailed rec­ol­lec­tions of expe­ri­ences with Grace. His sto­ries bring vivid land­scapes to life, includ­ing Baldy Point, Lake Altus-Lugert, and the Cal­i­for­nia-to-Col­orado gold rush. As Patch con­tin­ues, Saint lis­tens intent­ly to men­tions of Quartz Moun­tain State Park and the bur­ial place of Sky Jones. These names, so inti­mate­ly tied to the past, resur­face in her mind, con­nect­ing the present with moments that have shaped her. The more she lis­tens, the more she feels the pull of those past mem­o­ries, inter­wo­ven with a haunt­ing sense of loss and unfin­ished busi­ness. The past feels alive, and Saint can­not shake the feel­ing that there’s some­thing more to uncov­er.

Patch’s words pro­voke deep­er reflec­tion on time and dreams, urg­ing Saint to recon­sid­er her own place with­in the nar­ra­tive. She is com­pelled to pace her apart­ment, rest­less with the knowl­edge that these tapes hold more than just sto­ries of the past—they hold pieces of a puz­zle she has yet to solve. As she walks, the weight of the mem­o­ries starts to set­tle in her chest, and she begins mark­ing loca­tions that were sig­nif­i­cant to her, like Tensleep Creek and Angela Rossi. These places hold a spe­cial mean­ing, each one tied to unre­solved emo­tions and unfin­ished sto­ries. The tapes cre­ate an emo­tion­al whirlpool for Saint, and she finds her­self pulled into the depths of it, unable to escape the ques­tions they raise.

As Saint lis­tens fur­ther, she encoun­ters more inti­mate, per­son­al moments in the tapes. One pas­sage in par­tic­u­lar stands out—a sur­re­al and inti­mate scene where Patch requests to be paint­ed. He speaks about a pink shore, rhy­lo­lite, and the pecu­liar art of preser­va­tion, offer­ing a strange image of beau­ty in decay. This request, while odd, is loaded with emo­tion, and Saint is drawn to it, feel­ing a con­nec­tion to the way Patch views the world. It’s a moment of sur­re­al­ism that breaks through the mun­dan­i­ty of every­day life, and it adds to the com­plex web of emo­tions that she’s expe­ri­enc­ing.

The calm reflec­tion is inter­rupt­ed when Saint calls Himes, eager to share her find­ings. She tells him about Grace’s pos­si­ble con­nec­tion to oth­er miss­ing girls, a rev­e­la­tion that makes her uneasy. Himes lis­tens as she plays more excerpts from the tapes, includ­ing a chill­ing remark from Grace about res­ur­rec­tion and a mys­te­ri­ous con­nec­tion to the Trin­i­ty. This con­ver­sa­tion stirs up a new lev­el of urgency, as they both real­ize that these tapes are more than just records of the past; they are win­dows into some­thing much larg­er. The spir­i­tu­al under­tones, along with the miss­ing pieces of the puz­zle, sug­gest that their inves­ti­ga­tion has entered a new, even dark­er chap­ter.

The chap­ter con­cludes with a deep­er under­stand­ing shared between Saint and Himes, where they acknowl­edge the weight of the tapes. They both rec­og­nize the sig­nif­i­cance of the voic­es and mem­o­ries, and how they seem to echo across time, link­ing the past and present in unex­pect­ed ways. The real­iza­tion set­tles in that these frag­ments of the past, com­bined with their ongo­ing search, hold the key to uncov­er­ing the truth. Yet, the more they learn, the more they under­stand that they are only scratch­ing the sur­face. The truth remains elu­sive, but they know they are get­ting clos­er to some­thing monumental—something that will ulti­mate­ly pro­vide the answers they’ve been des­per­ate­ly seek­ing.