Ash buys her usual vegan panini at a local café run by a warm, coordinated couple and observes their ease together, prompting questions about how people find partners, purpose, and stability. Sitting by the windy seaside, she watches former schoolmates pass—one visibly pregnant—and realizes she has cut ties with old friends because she once believed she would leave the small village behind. She confronts a dawning belief that she is not "normal" and has badly messed up her life.

Returning home to an empty house, Ash wanders restlessly, seeking signs of Nick Radcliffe after his recent stay with Nina. She recognizes her growing fixation on Nick with a sense of dread, labeling it an obsession. She enters Nina’s bedroom, noting the loosely made bed and, in the en suite, the familiar arrangement of toiletries and Paddy Swann’s razor that Nina vowed never to move.

Ash considers how Nick might react to Paddy’s razor still holding flecks of Paddy’s multicolored stubble. She notices the toilet seat left up and judges it rude, especially in a bathroom once shared by Nina and the deceased Paddy. She stares at the bed pillows, imagining Nick there, and questions why Nick brought Nina to this house instead of his place, and why anyone would want to have sex in a dead man’s bed.

Scanning the room, Ash spots something half-hidden in the lambskin rug on Paddy’s side of the bed: a simple, large gold ring that seems too big to belong to her or Nina. As she examines it, Nina arrives home, calling out from downstairs. Ash pockets the ring and goes to greet her mother.