Paula takes baby Timmy to Tiny Fish Swim School, a swim school forty minutes from home that accepts babies under six months, rather than waiting four weeks for a spot at a closer school. She is driven by an urgent need for Timmy to learn to swim immediately after the woman on the plane predicted he would die by drowning at age seven. Paula recognizes this urgency is irrational—if she believed the prediction, Timmy wouldn't drown for years—but she cannot help herself.

Since returning from her sister Lisa's wedding, Paula and Matt have not discussed the prediction, though Paula thinks about it constantly in an exhausting loop of disbelief and anxiety. She recalls her teenage therapist, Dr. Donnelly, once pointing out that her obsessive thought patterns were exhausting and not universal. Despite Matt's outward nonchalance, he has told his mother Zehra about the prediction, which makes Paula realize it weighs on him too.

Before the swim lesson, Paula dropped Willow off with Zehra, who recognized Paula's urgency and gave Timmy a Swarovski evil eye bracelet for protection—a Turkish tradition Matt had previously discouraged as a "village superstition." When Paula asked if Zehra truly believed in its power, Zehra deflected with a shrug and a mention of the brand. As she clasped the bracelet on Timmy's wrist, Zehra whispered ominously that the woman on the plane may not have made a prediction but cast a curse.

At the pool, the instructor demonstrates "self-rescue" by dropping her baby granddaughter Olivia into the water, where the infant rolls and floats on her back. While one alarmed father decides to leave, Timmy is thrilled and tries to leap from Paula's arms into the water. Paula laughs outwardly but is haunted by Zehra's whispered words about the possible curse.