Content Warning: The source text includes mentions of suicidal ideation, detailed depictions of obsessive-compulsive disorder, and references to alcohol addiction, disordered eating, and anti-LGBTQ+ bias.

The introduction to this chapter describes an “indie kid” named Finn being killed in the forest by the Messenger of the Immortals.

The chapter opens with the last people to see Finn—siblings Mikey and Mel, and their best friends Jared and Henna—discussing the difference between love and infatuation. This is a particularly thorny conversation for Mikey because Henna, with whom he’s secretly in love, is describing her attraction to Nathan, a new kid in the school. As the conversation eventually turns to their upcoming history paper, the group witnesses Finn, pursued by a glowing girl, run out of the forest. The pair disappears from sight, and a bewildered Mikey sees a pillar of light shoot up from a point in the forest where he assumes Finn and the girl have gone.

The introduction to this chapter describes an indie kid named Satchel writing a poem that her parents “give her loving space” to compose (11). She’s then joined by another indie kid named Dylan, who tells her of Finn’s death; they comfort each other.