The chapter opens with the narrator finally speaking to retired cop Tim Yoon, who apologizes for the delay due to his daughter's wedding. She no longer needs plates run—she's solved the mystery of the real estate card and telephotographer. Tim reveals that Brian, the former FBI neighbor who gave her his number, has died of kidney disease. He had only been in the FBI about a month before his diagnosis, explaining why he was selling his truck. That night the narrator tells Harris about Brian's death and the real estate card, prompting a rare exchange. Harris notices the photo of the narrator on the card and, aroused by the voyeuristic image, tersely tells her to put on her robe. When she says she donated it, he tells her to wear something else and goes to sit in his car.

Harris returns, knocking on the door, and they begin an elaborate sexual roleplay in which he plays the telephotographer—a stranger who spied on her. The encounter is raw and intense; the narrator struggles to stay present with her eyes open while channeling the fantasy. Afterward, Harris stays in character, describing his photography work, and they lie together for the first time in ages. The narrator retrieves her old robe from Goodwill and buys a pair of ceramic lions—her only personal contributions to the home's décor besides ten spoons. On the second night in the robe, the sex deepens; feelings develop between the characters they're playing. She asks the telephotographer if they could "make a go of it," and they discuss the paradox of desire and marriage in an infinite regress of affairs.

On the third night, the narrator pushes the roleplay further by telling the telephotographer she's confessed to her husband, echoing the real conflict. She also shares her peep-show past honestly for the first time. The telephotographer responds with acceptance, but the narrator worries that the gap between these fictional selves and their real selves is growing dangerously wide.

The next day the couple discovers their dog Smokey has developed severely matted hair over his anus, trapping impacted feces. Together, in a scene of tender emergency teamwork, they painstakingly cut away the matted fur and clear the blockage. The shared crisis reconnects them in the way their relationship has always functioned best—against insurmountable odds. The narrator reflects that they are people who come alive only in emergencies and otherwise fail each other.

Afterward, Harris quietly reopens their central conflict by saying he didn't like the dance. The narrator realizes he honestly doesn't like what she honestly is, and that the telephotographer's acceptance was an act. Yet when Harris asks if she saw someone that night, she tells the truth: yes, a woman. He asks if it will happen again, and she says yes. Harris proposes "favored nations"—the same freedom for himself—and the narrator agrees. She recognizes this moment of mutual honesty and negotiated openness as the true apex of her life, not her time with Davey. She can remain in the house, with her family, as she really is.