The Antidote (Antonina) recounts to her Son a terrifying confrontation with her longtime customer John Boyet. Boyet pounds at her door demanding his deposits back, as he, his wife Atha, and his children are leaving Uz for Sacramento, having lost everything. Asphodel (the girl, Dell) is hidden in the closet; the Antidote glimpses Dell's sneakers showing under a poorly-hung door, and Dell silently holds the door shut from inside to keep from being discovered.

The Antidote stalls, polishing the earhorn and even suggesting Boyet postpone the withdrawal for a year, briefly hoping he might reconsider given how memories can burden a person. Boyet wavers but insists on completing the transaction, presenting yellowed deposit slips spanning fifteen years of their relationship.

The Antidote explains the mechanics of her work: customers deposit memories into her trance-state body via the earhorn, and during withdrawals she regurgitates their secrets verbatim in a mechanical voice while unconscious. She recalls Daisy O'Grady's recent successful withdrawal before Black Sunday, when Daisy relived a tender romantic memory in full sensory detail, comparing the experience to music.

However, since Black Sunday, the Antidote's magic has failed her. She is empty—the deposits are gone. She tries desperately to sink into her trance as Boyet recites "3-0-9-4-5-6," but cannot escape her own consciousness. Boyet grows enraged at her silence, repeats the number, and finally lunges, closing his hands around her throat as she remains horrifyingly awake and unable to deliver his memories.