After Lila leaves, Phoebe feels the old darkness return with the silence. She tries to recommit to her suicide plan, thinking about her therapist's claim that she was not really the type to kill herself and comparing her own hesitating nature to Mia's boldness. Wanting to stop thinking and prove she can follow through, Phoebe swallows a handful of the tuna-flavored pain pills she brought for killing her cat.

Almost immediately, Phoebe begins second-guessing the act and wonders whether the pills are strong enough for a human. Before she can sink into the moment, Pauline arrives with the requested coconut pillow and chatters about her new hospitality job. Phoebe unexpectedly gives Pauline honest advice about how to dress for the inn, and after Pauline leaves, Phoebe lies down but becomes fixated on the absurdity of dying on an artisanal coconut pillow.

Phoebe goes back to the balcony and watches the cocktail party below. Seeing Lila transformed back into the elegant bride and watching Lila with Gary makes Phoebe think about how she once stood in the same place as a hopeful bride and how far her life has fallen. The beauty of the jazz, the band, and the wedding scene begins to stir feeling rather than numbness, even as the pills make her tired and unsteady.

Then Patricia, Lila's mother, starts an impromptu speech that at first sounds embarrassing and cruel, dwelling on Lila's seriousness and lack of imagination. Phoebe becomes intensely invested in how the speech will end and realizes she cannot bear to die before hearing whether Patricia will redeem Lila or wound her publicly. That desire suddenly clarifies something larger: Phoebe does not actually want to die.

Because she wants to live and does not want to disrupt the wedding by calling for help, Phoebe rushes to the bathroom and forces herself to vomit up the pills. Exhausted, she lies on the cool marble floor and listens as Patricia turns the speech into praise for Lila's practical, unmistakably individual nature and for Lila's relationship with Gary. Phoebe falls asleep on the bathroom floor with the balcony door open, listening to a chain of affectionate, foolish wedding speeches instead of dying.