Machado’s partner is accepted into Iowa’s MFA program. She plans to move in with Machado in Iowa City. Machado pretends to be excited but feels terrified at the prospect.

In 2012, when the general public believes the end of the world will occur, Machado suffers her own personal apocalypse. It takes place in a park, where the “trees were punctuated by birds” (186) and the idyllic landscape gives Machado no warning about the pain she will go through that day.

As Machado sits in the park with her partner, her personal apocalypse happens when her partner confesses to being in love with her classmate Amber. The two drunkenly kissed once, and Machado’s partner now believes she is in love with Amber. Machado leaves the park and, in scrolling through posts from an online recycling community on her phone as a distraction, finds someone giving away a box of old library catalog cards. Machado decides to pick them up to make a collage. Later that evening, her partner arrives at her house insisting they can still make things work.