In a flashback to when Frankie and George were twenty-one, the two spend a rare Monday night making handmade pasta in their apartment and catching up. George, in his final year of journalism school, tells Frankie he has landed an internship at the Edmonton Journal. Frankie first reacts with excitement, then immediate panic at the thought of losing him, and impulsively offers to move to Alberta with him so nothing between them will have to change.

George's surprised response forces Frankie to confront what she is doing. In the bathroom, Frankie realizes that her first instinct was to give up her own hard-won life and career just to stay close to George, and she fears that this is how she could lose herself. When she returns, Frankie apologizes for trying to insert herself into George's opportunity and instead encourages him to tell her everything about the internship.

Three weeks later, after graduation, Frankie takes George to the airport. Both are shaken by the separation, and Frankie is certain he is leaving for good. At the security gate they share an unusually open, lingering hug, and when Frankie asks George to promise he will not forget her, George repeats that he promises before walking away without looking back.

The chapter then jumps to October 2019 and shows their continued long-distance connection through email. George writes to tell Frankie he has accepted a reporting job at the Vancouver Sun, moving on from Edmonton to cover climate and environmental issues near the ocean and mountains he has long wanted to be closer to. He is excited about the work but admits he hates that the move will take him even farther from Frankie.

Frankie answers with enthusiasm and shares her own career news: a cook from Ronda has been hired to open a new restaurant and has asked her to join from the beginning. Although Frankie recognizes it as a major opportunity, she is afraid to leave the only kitchen she has known. George responds with complete faith in her, telling Frankie that of course she can do it, reinforcing the pattern of both of them pushing each other toward the futures they want even when those futures keep pulling them apart.