Chapter 17 is narrated in first person by the older woman from seat 4D—the one who made death predictions on the Hobart-to-Sydney flight. She describes the morning of the flight as a cool, clear April day in Hobart. She had not eaten breakfast because the previous day had been bad: a distressing incident at a gym and a mortifying incident at a grocery store left her with no food in the house.

The woman recounts her struggle to pin a brooch she has worn daily for thirty years to her blouse. Despite thousands of prior successful attempts, she could not manage the simple task. This frustrated her to the point of fury. She stepped onto the back veranda of her Battery Point workers' cottage, recently purchased and not yet feeling like home, to calm down. From there she could see Mount Wellington with snow, the River Derwent, and a woman on a lower deck who mistakenly thought the narrator was waving at her. A younger man joined the woman below, handing her a coffee.

Returning inside, the narrator tried again to pin the brooch but failed, growing so angry she threw it across the room. She describes this as out of character for her personality type, which she compares to Queen Elizabeth's. The brooch seemed to vanish, and she methodically searched the floor grid by grid, finding it after fourteen grids near the bed. She then pinned it easily.

After that, the narrator sat motionless in her study armchair for approximately four hours until her taxi arrived, not eating, drinking, or thinking. She acknowledges that something was not right with her that day, and addresses the reader directly, noting they likely already knew that.