The chapter flashes back to the morning of June 6, 2003, in the Carruthers household. Neveah, preparing for the last track meet of the year, hurries her younger brother Dante to eat breakfast before heading to play basketball, while Roman lounges on the couch playing video games. Their mother is asleep after a fifth overnight shift, and their father is still working part-time at Jackson Brothers funeral home while building up his fledgling crematory business with Oscar.

Neveah catches a ride to the meet with Susie Pettigrew's father. Dante watches her leave through the sidelights, laughing in the backseat -- a memory the narration marks as the last time he will see her laugh for a long time.

After Neveah departs, Dante heads out to the basketball court to meet his friends Charlie and Stefan. Roman, only half-attending his brother, is consumed by thoughts of Delia Cochran, a neighbor four houses down, with whom he plans to lose his virginity while her parents are away. Roman warns Dante to be home before the streetlamps come on.

The narration foreshadows that this seemingly ordinary morning marks a Rubicon crossed: a chain of events is being set in motion that will cast a permanent shadow over the Carruthers family, hinting that by day's end something catastrophic will occur.