The woman thinks back to her roommate who once told her that, in a dangerous situation, one can throw a fake seizure on the ground to scare away an attacker, which reminds the woman of her own father, who had real seizures. The woman thinks back to another memory of an evangelical gathering on campus where her roommate baked cookies. The woman reminisces about how her roommate was both devout but also practical, always ready to defend herself. However, three years after the woman met her roommate, she stayed out late only to be found murdered in her own living room.

From then on, the woman tells her friends about her roommate’s death. One day, she tells her friend, a fellow volunteer at a partner violence helpline, about the seizure advice her roommate once gave. The friend then says that things would be safer if men weren’t around at all, though she figures that the woman doesn’t agree, knowing the brief affair between the woman and a professor. Years later, the woman and friend somewhat stay in contact; the friend becomes an attorney; and the man who killed the roommate is convicted.

One day, the woman gets a letter from her roommate. It is sent to her at a bad time, when the woman is in the midst of getting a divorce with her own husband due to her longstanding unhappiness—which she saw not as unhappiness but rather a practical sense. The divorce process has gotten nasty for both of them, with threats and insults. Faced with the letter, the woman resolves to meet with her old professor whom she had not talked to in years.

The woman recalls a time, back in college, when she went to a evangelical gathering in an outdoor clearing with her roommate. There, she participates in a practice where she is asked to allow god into her heart, which she obliges and does, though deep down inside, she feels nothing. After that, she goes to her professor’s office and tells her about what happened. By then, she has seen him regularly for months after class; her father’s seizures are worsening; and her professor tries to flirt with her in private. Eventually, the professor asks to meet with her roommate for a research project he is doing.

At the bar, the woman meets the professor again. In a booth, the woman reminisces on her roommate and how she died. She then accuses the professor of ruining her roommate in the time that they knew each other. The professor tries to gaslight her, but she remembers the time when the professor and the roommate were getting close, prompting the woman to spy on them to see what was going on, especially as the roommate sometimes appeared with bruises on her. Finally, the woman puts down the roommate’s letter as proof, though she accidentally spills bourbon on it and tries to recover it as she leaves.

The woman receives more threatening emails from her husband’s divorce lawyer. She then resolves to go to his house, which he lived in with his new wife. Outside, he watched them through their window, and she read the letter, in which the roommate asked her to stop stalking her now that she cut off ties with the professor. The woman then puts away her letter and catches the new wife heading outside to take out trash. Recognizing her, the new wife accuses the woman of trespassing and tells her to leave. She then hears the voice of her husband through the door that the new wife just came out of. Suddenly, the woman falls to the ground and pretends to have a seizure.