At the beginning of Chapter 10, Sarah shares the moment of losing Charlie from her own perspective. First, she recreates the conversation with the publisher, in which she “told him [she] didn’t want to edit his magazine anymore” (232). He takes the news easily, and she is “shocked” by how “frighteningly easy” (232) it is to change her life.

Clarissa calls her immediately to talk her down from “having a midlife crisis” (233). Suddenly, Sarah doubts the move; “it is hard,” she thinks, “when it comes right down to the actual choice, to know what you want out of life” (234). Seeing Little Bee, Sarah realizes that the girl had made her think she “was a better person,” when really she “was a quiet, practical, bereaved woman who focused very hard on her job” (234).

In that moment, she remembers, she realized Charlie was missing. She describes “the unspeakable certainty that someone had taken Charlie” (235). Everyone seems to stare as she runs, screaming, frantically across the beach. She feels “the second stage of [her] mind shutting down” (236) as she splashes into the river. As she reaches after what turns out to be a plastic mask, she plunges her cell phone into the river.