Pretty Things

Vanessa returns as the narrator, and she has an announcement: She’s a wife—she married Lachlan/Michael. They slept together in the master suite, in the same bed in which her parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents slept. Last night, drunk on champagne and tequila, Michael popped the question, and they got married before midnight in Reno at Chapel o’ the Pines. She’s known him for less than 20 days, but she has a husband, so she can start a family and never be alone again. She is overjoyed and wearing the ring meant for Nina/Ashley.

Vanessa hates Ashley now. She is a liar and a phony, and she cannot believe that she allowed herself to think that Ashley was better than her.

The narrative flashes back to the events leading up to Vanessa’s discovery that Nina is Ashley. After their heart-to-heart in the library, Vanessa feels too insecure to visit Ashley and Michael. She opens her bedroom’s armoire doors so that she does not have to see herself in the mirror. In a pile of sweaters, she finds her mom’s diary.

Her mom writes that Stonehaven will kill her. She thinks that William is having an affair with the secretary and she thinks Nina is a bad influence on Benny—though she blames his faults on herself.