Content Warning: This section of the guide describes and discusses the source text’s treatment of infertility, pregnancy loss, child death, abuse, racism, sexism, and anti-gay bias.

Mariel narrates in 1996.

Mariel Prager cites her belief in heaven as due to the fact that “she’d been there once, so far” (11). Second-best to heaven is “a type of restaurant found in the upper Midwest called a supper club,” which she calls welcoming and “out of time” (11). Mariel is a lifelong visitor of Floyd and Betty’s Lakeside Supper Club in Bear Jaw Lake, Minnesota, which she has owned for two weeks after inheriting it from her grandfather, Floyd.

Mariel feels overwhelmed to be the restaurant’s owner; previously, she’s only run the bar, a job she loved. She returns to the bar as expected despite “what happened last night” (12)—later revealed to be a pregnancy loss. During her short commute, which takes less than a minute on foot, Mariel is hailed by an elderly regular at the Lakeside named Hazel. Hazel asks what happened to Mariel the night before; Mariel vaguely cites sickness. Hazel further reports that Mariel’s mother (whom Mariel had not seen for a decade prior to Floyd’s funeral) wants her daughter to give her a ride home from church.