Xavier, awake earlier due to the time difference, leaves Samantha sleeping at the questionable hotel, notes police presence in the lot, and takes her grandmother’s 1966 Dodge Dart to get coffee and roses. He worries about the Dart’s lack of modern safety features and hopes Samantha’s use of it is temporary. Returning, he leaves the gifts by the bed, showers, and then talks with Samantha as hotel disturbances—screams, a siren, and someone being read their rights—undercut the mood.

They decide on breakfast and a mattress store, then settle on going to the zoo later—possibly with Samantha’s nephews—to give her sister Jeneva a break. At a diner, Jeneva texts that their father slipped back home after Samantha and Xavier left, but Jeneva did not speak with him. Samantha explains her parents have been together thirty-three years and that Lisa is the love of their father’s life, then reflects on the shock of early-onset dementia and its prognosis.

Samantha shares a heartfelt wish for a partner who will be a lifelong “witness” to her life—someone who shares inside jokes and history—using “Come On Eileen” as a touchstone. Xavier understands and internally compares it to his estrangement from his own parents, recognizing the loss of shared witness in his family and feeling conflicted about their need for him versus past hurts.

They leave around eleven to pick up the boys for the zoo, enduring the Dart’s oppressive heat, fumes, noise, and poor weather sealing. Samantha demonstrates coping strategies for the temperamental car: using a manual fresh-air vent, keeping throttle at stops to prevent stalling, and gauging fuel by listening for a “glug” from the tank because the fuel gauge is broken. Xavier catalogues the car’s impracticalities and safety concerns while Samantha defends its low cost.

On the freeway, after Xavier opens the dash vent, dried leaves begin to drift into the cabin, then suddenly a torrent of leaves blasts out, blinding them. Xavier calmly guides Samantha to slow and pull onto the shoulder with hazards on. As the chaos subsides, “Come On Eileen” plays on the radio, and they start laughing at the absurdity.

While clearing debris, Samantha discovers a petrified, mummified mouse on her lap and panics, gagging and demanding sanitizer. Xavier, laughing, removes the mouse by the tail and hands her wipes. A passing driver briefly stops to offer a jump, then withdraws after seeing their disheveled state. The two sit in the sweltering, leaf-strewn car, laugh together, and Xavier recognizes this ordeal as an early shared memory—the beginning of the kind of lifelong snowball of experiences Samantha had described.