Joar recounts that the evening after the friends met in the hospital chapel, Ali told them her father had to move far away due to debts. He admits he did not cry after his father’s accident or at Ali’s news and worries that his silence may have hurt her. When he told Ali he would never love anyone again, Ali kissed him; he jokes that she later claimed he had kissed her.

Louisa asks why Ali could not stay, and Joar says Ali’s father needed her. Louisa remarks that they all refuse to abandon those in need; Joar tells Louisa she is one of them. When Louisa asks about the art competition, Joar describes that he and Ali drove around, fell asleep in each other’s arms on a hill, and that on the return Ali learned to drive, nearly crashing into a wall before stopping at the last moment. Ali told Joar, with wild exhilaration, that now he knew he did not want to die and ordered him not to die before she returned.

They stopped by the sea, where Joar collected driftwood to build the frame for Kimkim’s painting, which carried a lingering scent of the sea decades later. Back in town, they met Ted and Kimkim at a crossroads and returned to Joar’s apartment to clean it for his mother’s return from the hospital. As Ali played with old toys, a conversation about Superman’s cape led Kimkim to run with his shirt like a cape and crash into a wall, causing laughter. Ted added that Superman’s cape was originally a blanket from his mother, which left them quietly contemplative.

Ali asked if they would forget her when she moved. The boys teased her, then admitted they could not imagine life before her. Ali promised she trusted the three of them more than anyone, and Ted and Kimkim echoed this. They lay together on the floor for hours and then framed Kimkim’s painting.

On the roof in the present, Joar says this memory sustained him in prison. Louisa shares Fish’s idea that Heaven is one perfect “now,” and Joar says he had millions of such moments. He continues with Ali joking about champagne at the award party and Ted suddenly asking the competition date, which no one had checked.

Joar frantically searched his room, found the newspaper announcement, and discovered the deadline was in a week. When they read the details together, they realized the competition had a maximum age of thirteen. Ali and Ted explained it was a children’s competition and that they were no longer children. Faced with the lost opportunity, Joar says quietly that he cried then.