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.

PART II
BEA

JULY, ONE DAY AFTER BLANCHE
I don’t know who I’m writ­ing this for.
Me, I think. A way to get this all down while it’s still fresh in my mind. I can’t let myself hope that
some­one will find it. It hurts too much to hope for any­thing right now.
But maybe if I write every­thing down in black and white, some of it will start to make sense to
me, and I can keep from going crazy.
Last night was the first time I under­stood how eas­i­ly san­i­ty can slip right through your fin­gers.
Eddie includ­ed a book in the sup­plies he brought me, a cheap paper­back I’d had since col­lege,
and I found a pen wedged in the back of a draw­er in the bed­side table we car­ried up here just a few
months ago.
There’s some­thing espe­cial­ly bizarre about this, about writ­ing my own sto­ry over the words I read
and reread when I was younger.
But it’s even hard­er to write the truth.
Last night, my hus­band, Edward Rochester, mur­dered my best friend, Blanche Ingra­ham.
Blanche is dead. Eddie killed her. I’m locked away in our house. No mat­ter how many times I
repeat these facts to myself, they still feel so wrong, so crazy, that I can’t help but won­der if this is all
some kind of awful hal­lu­ci­na­tion. Or that maybe I drowned along with Blanche and this is hell.
That almost makes more sense than this.
But no. Blanche and I went to the lake house for the week­end, a girls’ trip that was sup­posed to
give us a chance to spend some time togeth­er. We’d both been so busy—me with run­ning South­ern
Manors, Blanche deal­ing with Tripp—and to just sit and talk with my best friend, to drink wine and
laugh like we’d been doing since we were teenagers had been … per­fect. That week­end was per­fect.
I’m replay­ing it all in my head to con­vince myself that there wasn’t any sign of what would
hap­pen next.
It’s hard to untan­gle, you see.
I remem­ber Eddie show­ing up unex­pect­ed­ly, and the three of us decid­ing to take the boat out for a
mid­night cruise. Eddie was dri­ving, Blanche and I were danc­ing to the music pip­ing out of the
speak­ers. Then my head was heavy, my thoughts fuzzy, and it was dark. Blanche was scream­ing, I was
in the water, and it was warm, warm like a bath, and I knew I had to keep swim­ming and swim­ming,
but when I got to the shore, Eddie was already there, and there was a blind­ing pain in my head, and
then black­ness. When I opened my eyes, I was … here.
In this room.
It was Eddie’s idea to add a pan­ic room to the third floor, after watch­ing some 60 Min­utes
episode about how they were all the rage in new con­struc­tion. I’d gone along with it when he’d
ren­o­vat­ed the house because I want­ed our new home to have the best of every­thing, and if it made him
hap­py, why not?
I would’ve done any­thing to make Eddie hap­py.
And it had been his idea to make it more than just an emp­ty space, too. He’d been the one to
sug­gest the bed.
“In case we get stuck in here for a while,” he’d teased, grab­bing me around the waist, pulling me
close, and even though we’d been mar­ried for almost a year by that point, I felt the same thrill that had
shot through me the first night he’d kissed me.
I’d nev­er stopped feel­ing that for Eddie. Maybe that’s why I’d nev­er seen this com­ing. I’d been
too in love, too trust­ing, too—
Eddie came in as I was writ­ing that last entry. I was able to shove the book under the bed before the
door was open, so he didn’t see that I was writ­ing, thank god. I’m going to have to be more care­ful in
the future.
It’s not much con­so­la­tion, but he looks awful. Eddie has always been so pol­ished, but today his
eyes were red and his skin looked a lit­tle slack, almost gray. And as insane and fucked up as it is, for
a sec­ond, I felt sor­ry for him. I want­ed to help him. That’s how our mar­riage had always gone, after
all. I was the plan­ner, Eddie was the doer.
I wait­ed for him to say some­thing, for him to at least try to explain what the fuck is going on. I
prob­a­bly should have screamed at him, rushed toward him, hit him. Any­thing.
But I just sat there, frozen.
I’d like to blame it on the lin­ger­ing effects of what­ev­er drug he slipped me and Blanche, but from
the sec­ond he’d walked in, I’d felt par­a­lyzed with some com­bi­na­tion of fear and shock.
All I could do was watch as he put bot­tles of water and pack­ets of peanut but­ter crack­ers, plus a
cou­ple of apples and a banana, on the table near the door, his back to me.
Eddie killed Blanche.
He killed her, and he could kill me.
Eddie, my hus­band, my part­ner. The man I thought I knew so well. Who smiled at me the day we
met with such sweet­ness in his eyes. Who always lis­tened so care­ful­ly when I talked about my day,
my busi­ness, my dreams. Who remem­bered lit­tle, sil­ly things—like my favorite hot sauce or how I
always liked my cof­fee with one reg­u­lar sug­ar, one Splen­da.
That man, my Eddie, was a mur­der­er.
If I think too much, I feel like scream­ing, and I’m afraid if I start scream­ing, I’ll nev­er stop, so
instead, I’m tak­ing deep breaths, even though the pattern—in for four, hold for four, out for six—
reminds me of the yoga class Blanche and I took togeth­er just last month.
God, one month ago. It already feels like anoth­er life­time.
Eddie didn’t speak to me, just set the food and water down, then went back out the door, and when
he was gone, I laid down on the floor and cried, shak­ing so hard that my teeth chat­tered togeth­er.
How had I mar­ried a mon­ster and nev­er seen it until it was too late?
FOUR DAYS AFTER BLANCHE
Today, Eddie came in again, more water, more food, and this time, I tried to talk to him, but as soon as
I said his name, he held up a hand, his face closed to me.
It was like look­ing at a stranger who shared Eddie’s famil­iar fea­tures. This cold, dan­ger­ous man
was no one I knew, and when he left, all I felt was relief. This time, there were no tears, no shak­ing.
Maybe writ­ing all this down is help­ing after all.
SIX DAYS AFTER BLANCHE
It’s been two days since Eddie was last here, and in that time, I’ve felt myself grow­ing calmer, san­er.
I still don’t under­stand what his plan is, or why he’s keep­ing me here, why I’m not at the bot­tom of
the lake with Blanche. But there has to be a rea­son, and I’m going to fig­ure it out.
I have to be smart.
Smarter than Eddie.
It’s the only way I’m get­ting out of this alive.

Bea didn’t mean to be late, but traf­fic was bad and the rain hadn’t helped.
By the time she slides into the booth oppo­site Blanche at their favorite restau­rant, La Paz,
Blanche is already on her sec­ond mar­gari­ta and the chip bas­ket is near­ly emp­ty.
As soon as she sits down, Blanche sig­nals the wait­er, point­ing to her glass, then to Bea, who
tries not to be annoyed. She does usu­al­ly get a mar­gari­ta, it’s just that tonight, she hadn’t planned
on drink­ing.
And she clear­ly doesn’t do a great job of hid­ing that annoy­ance because her voice is sharp­er
than she’d intend­ed when she says, “A three mar­gari­ta Tues­day, huh?”
Blanche just shrugs and drags anoth­er chip through the lit­tle blue dish of sal­sa. “Smoke ’em if
you got ’em!” she says, bright and, to Bea’s ears, fake.
Some­thing has been off with Blanche late­ly, but Bea can’t fig­ure out what it is. It might be
Tripp; he and Blanche have only been mar­ried a year, but there’s already a brit­tle­ness there, a
ten­sion. Just last week, Bea went over to their house for drinks, and had to sit through two hours
of the two of them steadi­ly chip­ping away at each oth­er, fling­ing lit­tle barbs, lit­tle insults wrapped
in affec­tion.
And sit­ting across from Blanche now, Bea sees that Blanche’s eyes look a lit­tle puffy, her skin a
lit­tle dull. She wish­es she hadn’t made that crack about the third mar­gari­ta.
When their drinks are set in front of them, Bea picks up the heavy glass with its salt­ed rim and
touch­es it to Blanche’s. “To us,” she says. “And not drink­ing those sug­ar-bomb mon­strosi­ties from
El Calor any­more.”
That makes Blanche smile a lit­tle, as Bea had hoped it would. El Calor had been the cheap
Mex­i­can place near Ivy Ridge, the school she and Blanche had both attend­ed as teenagers. They’d
gone in near­ly every Fri­day night, long before they’d turned twen­ty-one, and ordered the most
obnox­ious mar­gar­i­tas on the menu, frozen con­coc­tions that came in giant bowls and were bright
red or blue or neon green, col­ors that stained their lips and teeth.
Bea still has a pic­ture of her and Blanche their senior year, stick­ing out their tongues for the
cam­era, Blanche’s pur­ple, Bea’s scar­let, their eyes shin­ing with alco­hol and youth.
She loves that pic­ture.
She miss­es those girls.
Maybe tonight is the chance to recap­ture a lit­tle of that?
But then, Blanche lifts her menu and Bea sees the ban­gle around her wrist.
With­out think­ing, she reach­es for Blanche’s hand, and exam­ines the bracelet. It’s pret­ty, a thin
sil­ver cir­clet with a dain­ty charm—Blanche’s zodi­ac sign, Scor­pio, picked out in dia­monds.
“We have some­thing sim­i­lar to this com­ing out next year,” Bea says, turn­ing Blanche’s wrist so
she can bet­ter see the bracelet. “But we did an enam­el back­ing on the charm, and we’re offer­ing
col­ored stone options. I’ll get you one.”
Blanche jerks her hand back, her elbow near­ly upset­ting her drink, the move­ment so sud­den, so
aggres­sive, that for a beat or two, Bea doesn’t pull her own hand back and it just hov­ers there over
the chips and sal­sa.
“I like this bracelet,” Blanche says, look­ing at the menu and not meet­ing Bea’s eyes. “I don’t
need anoth­er one.”
“I just thought—” Bea starts, but then she drops it, pick­ing up her own menu instead, even
though she always orders the same thing.
So does Blanche, but you’d think the secrets of the uni­verse were encod­ed among the var­i­ous
descrip­tions of bur­ri­tos and enchi­ladas, that’s how intent­ly Blanche is star­ing at her menu now.
The silence between them is heavy and awk­ward, and Bea tries to remem­ber the last time she
felt this way around Blanche. Blanche, who’s been her best friend since she was a ner­vous
four­teen-year-old, away from home for the first time, try­ing to fit in at a new, fan­cy school.
Once the wait­er has tak­en their orders—the usu­al for both of them, Bea’s enchi­ladas verdes,
Blanche’s tor­tilla soup—that same silence returns, and Bea won­ders if she’s going to be forced to
scroll through her phone when Blanche says, “So, how’s the guy?”
Anoth­er spike of annoy­ance surges through Bea.
“Eddie is fine,” she says, putting extra empha­sis on his first name, which, for some rea­son,
Blanche nev­er wants to use. He’s always “the guy,” occa­sion­al­ly “that guy,” and once, at a lunch
with some of their friends from Ivy Ridge, “Bea’s lit­tle boyfriend-per­son.”
It was some­thing Bea had heard Blanche say a lot over the years, her go-to dis­mis­sive phrase,
but Bea had nev­er had it direct­ed at her before, and she’d end­ed up leav­ing lunch ear­ly.
Now Blanche drains the rest of her mar­gari­ta and repeats, “Eddie.” Fold­ing her arms on the
table, she leans for­ward, the sleeve of her tunic com­ing dan­ger­ous­ly close to a splotch of sal­sa by
her wrist. “I nev­er trust men who go by nick­names like that,” she says. “Like. Grown men. Your
name is Robert, don’t be Bob­by, for Christ’s sake, you know? Or John­ny for John.”
“Right,” Bea can’t help but reply. “Like when a guy is ‘the third’ but goes by ‘Tripp.’”
Blanche blinks at that, but then, to Bea’s sur­prise, laughs and sits back. “Okay, touché, you
bitch,” she says, but there’s no real heat in it. Bea feels some of the ten­sion drain away, and
won­ders if this night will be sal­vage­able after all.
But then Blanche leans for­ward again to take Bea’s hand. She’s drunk now, Bea can tell, that
third mar­gari­ta fin­ish­ing the job the first two start­ed, and her grip is sur­pris­ing­ly tight.
“But seri­ous­ly, Bea. What do you know about this guy? You met him at the beach. Who comes
back from vaca­tion with a boyfriend?”
“A fiancé, actu­al­ly,” Bea says, look­ing Blanche in the eyes. “He asked me to mar­ry him last
week. That’s why I want­ed to have din­ner with you. So I could tell you. Sur­prise!”
Bea holds her hands out awk­ward­ly to either side of her face, wig­gling her fin­gers, and
smil­ing, but she knows she’s not going to get it, the moment she’s seen oth­er women have, the
moment she gave Blanche. That pause and then the squeal and the tear-filled eyes, the inel­e­gant
hug­ging, the imme­di­ate plans for show­ers and par­ties, ques­tions about rings and dress­es and
hon­ey­moons.
No.
Blanche, her best friend in the entire world, doesn’t give her that.
Instead, she sits back against the booth, her lips part­ed in shock. Blanche is blond right now,
and the col­or is well done, but it’s too harsh on her, and for a sec­ond, she could almost be a
stranger sit­ting across from Bea.
Then after a moment, she gives anoth­er shrug, rat­tles the ice in her glass. “Well, at least let
Tripp set you up with a prenup.”
Their food arrives then, and as the wait­er sets their plates down, Bea can only stare at
Blanche, wait­ing until they’re alone again to lean clos­er and hiss, “Thanks for that. Real­ly
sup­port­ive.”
Blanche throws up her hands, that sil­ver ban­gle slid­ing up her skin­ny arm. “What do you want
me to say, Bea? That I’m hap­py for you? That I think mar­ry­ing a real­ly hot guy who just strolled
up to you on a beach is a great idea?”
“It wasn’t exact­ly like that,” Bea says, putting her nap­kin in her lap and glanc­ing around.
They’re keep­ing their voic­es low, but she still feels like they are just a few sec­onds away from
cre­at­ing a Real House­wives of Birm­ing­ham scene, and that’s the last thing she wants.
It’s the last thing that the old Blanche would’ve want­ed, too, but with this new Blanche—too
thin, too drunk, too blond—who knows?
“You don’t get it,” Blanche insists, and now, okay, yes, a woman at anoth­er table is glanc­ing
over, her eye­brows slight­ly raised. “You’re rich now, Bea. And not, like, nor­mal per­son rich. You
aren’t a suc­cess­ful lawyer or doc­tor. You are on your way to hav­ing Fuck You Mon­ey, and this guy
knows it.”
“And that’s why he’s inter­est­ed in me, right?” Bea says, feel­ing her face go hot even as every
oth­er part of her seems cold. “Because I’m rich. Which, coin­ci­den­tal­ly, is also what bugs you.
Obvi­ous­ly, being my friend was a lot eas­i­er when I was some … some fuck­ing char­i­ty case for
you.”
Blanche scoffs at that, sit­ting back in the booth hard enough to rat­tle it. “Okay, fine. I’m just
try­ing to look out for you and remind you that you can’t just attach your­self to any­one who’s nice
to you, but see­ing as how that’s your entire deal, I guess I’m wast­ing my breath.”
Bea is almost shak­ing now, can’t even con­ceive of eat­ing her din­ner, and she push­es the plate
away and picks up her drink. The ice has melt­ed, the mar­gari­ta has turned salty and sour and too
strong, but she downs it any­way.
“I just want you to be care­ful,” Blanche says, her expres­sion soft­ened. “You hard­ly know him.
You’ve been togeth­er, what? A month?”
“Three months,” Bea replies. “And I know every­thing I need to know. I know he loves me, and I
know I love him.”
Blanche’s face twists. “Right. Because love is def­i­nite­ly all that mat­ters.”
“I know things are rough with Tripp right now—”
“They’re not ‘rough,’” Blanche argues, mak­ing air quotes with her fin­gers. “It’s just that
mar­riage is a lot more work than you’re think­ing.” Then she shakes her head, puts her fork down.
“But then again, he’s hot and you’re rich, so hey, maybe it’ll be eas­i­er for you two. Maybe that’s
the secret.”
Anger drains out of Bea so quick­ly it’s like some­one pulled a plug.
Blanche is jeal­ous of her.
That’s what all this is about.
Blanche is jeal­ous. Jeal­ous of her mon­ey, jeal­ous of her suc­cess, and now, jeal­ous of her man.
Bea nev­er imag­ined that Blanche would ever want any­thing of hers. And now, she wants
every­thing.
Which makes it eas­i­er for Bea to gen­tly take Blanche’s hand. “Can we declare a truce?” she
asks soft­ly. “Because it’s going to be super awk­ward to have you as my maid of hon­or if we’re not