The morning after the party, Bela sits at the kitchen table while Mommy comes home still wearing her jacket and looking exhausted. Mommy tells Bela to eat, takes aspirin with orange juice, and complains that the party turned into "a séance" because people kept bringing up dark things instead of having fun. Bela notes that Daddo is still asleep upstairs in his clothes, which shows how disrupted the previous night was for both parents.

When Bela mentions that Daddo fixed the closet hinge and slept in Bela’s bed, Mommy becomes more alert. She then abruptly asks who Other Mommy is and explains why: Marsha Dickman became so frightened after the party that she slept at her brother’s house, and friends have been texting Mommy about it all morning. Because another adult has now reacted strongly, Mommy pushes Bela for concrete details instead of dismissing the subject.

Bela answers hesitantly but describes Other Mommy as physically wrong and unstable. Bela says Other Mommy’s eyes can appear on the sides of her head or on the bottom of her face, that she is sometimes bigger than Daddo and has to duck in Bela’s room, and that at other times she slides across the floor on her belly. Mommy calls Bela’s description creative, but her questions and reactions show that she is unsettled and trying to understand whether Bela is imagining things or reporting something real.

Before Mommy can continue, Daddo rushes downstairs calling for Bela, clearly afraid Bela has been left alone. Mommy says she had gone to Marsha’s house to check on her, and both parents awkwardly blame the previous night on drinking. When Bela reminds them about their promised zoo trip, they laugh at having forgotten and try to restore normal family routine, though Daddo avoids Mommy’s attempt to hug him. The chapter ends with Bela noticing that Mommy still has not let go of her most important concern: even though she does not ask again, Mommy is still thinking about whether Other Mommy has ever spoken to Bela.