Cherry recalls the early days of her relationship with Jack Murphy, describing how she told her Catholic grandmother she loved Jack more than God just six months after meeting him. She reflects on how everything in her life felt improved by Jack's presence—food tasted better, stars shone brighter, and her studies became even more fascinating. She believed her life had simply become perfect and never questioned whether it could last.

Jack, a social person, brought Cherry to parties and dances she would have otherwise avoided. With him beside her, she could walk through any door, though she still preferred a corner with her back to the wall and a view of the exit. In return, she took him fishing, canoeing, and camping, noting he was cowardly about cold water and not a strong swimmer. Cherry vividly remembers standing with Jack at the blowhole at Avoca Beach, watching local boys jump into the dangerous water. Jack was relieved when she said they wouldn't swim there, and he kissed her on the rocks. Cherry then recalls a childhood memory of seeing a boy dragged from the sea after a blowhole accident, dead, and hearing his mother's wails—a sound she feels has followed her forever.

Cherry describes double dates with her friend Ivy and notes that Jack's mother preferred his previous girlfriend, a trainee nurse, and found Cherry odd, especially because Cherry had no interest in becoming a math teacher. Jack's mother called her "Clever Clogs." Cherry acknowledges Jack loved her deeply, citing cards and notes he wrote calling her "his girl" and saying he was "keeping me forever." After her mother's death, Cherry also found a drawer of notes her parents exchanged, revealing their love, humor, sadness over not having more children, and even raunchy exchanges.

Jack wanted four children—Harry, Henry, Helen, and Hope—all with H names, which he found funny. Cherry honestly reflects that she likely never truly wanted children but didn't know it was possible or permitted for a woman to feel that way. She assumed Jack would make parenthood bearable, as he made everything else bearable. The chapter closes with Cherry musing that marriage is mysterious, even from the inside, and that her own experience of it sometimes felt like "a softly furnished minimum-security prison."