The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise

Jules, Charlie, and Lucy text in a group chat a few hours after Jules reported their mother missing. Charlie and Lucy think that Jules is overreacting, but Jules’s intuition tells her that something is wrong, especially because Tanner is not returning their calls or texts.

Louise wakes up and misses Ken. Four days after he died, she took a fly-fishing trip that they had scheduled by herself. She enjoys the freedom of being a widow but misses Ken and his idiosyncrasies. She is drawn out of her thoughts by the letter and starts her morning routine. She then reminisces about George. She loves the life that she built with Ken but still feels a twinge of pain for the 48 years she’s lived without George due to the as-yet undefined decision that they made. She lights the stove and sets the letter on fire, ignoring Tanner ringing the doorbell, until the letter burns into ash even though it hurts her hand and triggers the fire alarm. 

Tanner hears the fire alarm and pounds on the door, but she panics when Louise doesn’t answer. Assuming that something bad has happened, she climbs the fence into the backyard, though it hurts her leg, and is about to use a patio chair to break the sliding glass door when Louise opens it, seeming unbothered and chalking up the fire alarm to burnt toast.