After We Fell

The third installment in Anna Todd's After series continues the turbulent romance between Tessa Young, a driven college freshman, and Hardin Scott, her temperamental British boyfriend. The story opens as the couple encounters Tessa's estranged father, Richard, outside a tattoo shop. Richard is dirty, drunk, and apparently homeless. Tessa has not seen him in nine years, since he abandoned her and her mother, Carol. Hardin is hostile, but Tessa insists on bringing Richard to their apartment. Richard claims he tried to contact Tessa over the years, but Carol blocked his efforts.

Hardin faces a university disciplinary hearing for assaulting Zed, a fellow student with romantic feelings for Tessa. Hardin's father, Ken Scott, the chancellor of Washington Central University (WCU), attends with his wife Karen and stepson Landon, Tessa's best friend. While Tessa waits outside, she meets Zed, who threatens to press charges. When Hardin emerges, Zed reveals that Tessa has secretly been planning to move to Seattle for a job at Vance Publishing. Hardin erupts, feeling betrayed, and gives Tessa an ultimatum: choose him or Seattle. He drunkenly offers to marry her if she stays, but Tessa recognizes the proposal as desperation rather than sincerity. Hardin later admits he lied about being expelled; he received only academic probation and fabricated the story to manipulate her into going to England with him.

The couple joins Ken, Karen, and Landon for a trip to Ken and Karen's cabin at Sandpoint. A peaceful outing gives way to disaster when Tessa overhears Hardin on the phone with Sandra, the Realtor handling her Seattle apartment, and discovers he deliberately sabotaged the deal by describing her as an undesirable tenant. She is devastated and kicks him out of the bedroom.

Hardin retaliates by befriending Lillian, the daughter of one of Ken's old college friends staying at a neighboring cabin, though he withholds the fact that she is gay to make Tessa believe Lillian is a romantic threat. At a group dinner, Hardin sits beside Lillian and ignores Tessa, who bonds instead with Robert, a kind young waiter. Lillian later reveals the truth to Tessa, exposing Hardin's jealousy tactics. The couple's provocations dissolve into physical reconciliation at a local bar, but back at the cabin, their worst fight erupts. Hardin calls Tessa selfish, and Tessa tells him he is broken and she cannot fix him. They leave with nothing resolved.

At the apartment, Hardin accuses Richard of having a drug addiction, not just a problem with alcohol. Tessa and Hardin have their most explosive argument yet; she delivers an impassioned speech about his self-sabotage and refusal to change. Hardin shuts down and tells her to leave, slamming the door in her face. Alone, he discovers Tessa's religion class journal, filled with entries describing him as her hero and expressing unwavering faith in his worth. In a fit of rage, he destroys the handwritten love letter he once gave her, then immediately regrets it.

With nowhere to go, Tessa stays with her former roommate Steph, who lures her to a going-away party at the frat house. Steph gives Tessa a drink laced with a benzodiazepine, a sedative. Dan, whose sister Hardin once secretly filmed during sex, and Steph take the incapacitated Tessa upstairs, remove her dress, and attempt to film a compromising video to humiliate Hardin. Zed breaks down the door, destroys the camera, and drives the semiconscious Tessa to Carol's house. Hardin, alerted by Molly, Tessa's longtime antagonist, races to find Tessa, puts her in her childhood bed, and asks Carol not to tell Tessa he was there.

The next day, Tessa tells Hardin they need time apart to work on themselves. He reluctantly agrees. Tessa drives to Seattle alone and moves temporarily into the home of Kimberly and Christian Vance, her boss and his fiancée, since Hardin's sabotage left her without an apartment. She starts at the new Vance Publishing office and the WCU Seattle campus.

Despite their agreement for space, Tessa and Hardin fall into nightly phone calls and maintain their emotional connection. Hardin begins attending a kickboxing gym instead of drinking and has a meaningful conversation with Ken, who acknowledges responsibility for Hardin's anger and suggests therapy. Richard, meanwhile, is living at Hardin's apartment and going through drug and alcohol withdrawal. Hardin keeps Richard's addiction hidden from Tessa and pays off Chad, Richard's dealer, to protect her.

Hardin drives to Seattle to surprise Tessa, and they spend an intimate weekend together. Tessa eventually has dinner with Zed in Seattle and independently realizes their friendship is unsustainable. She decides to cut contact with Zed on her own terms, recognizing she would feel the same pain if Hardin maintained a friendship with someone who wanted him romantically.

During a visit to Hardin's apartment, Carol arrives after Hardin calls her about Richard's situation. Carol turns on Hardin, revealing to Richard the bet, a cruel wager in which Hardin originally pursued Tessa as a game, that sparked their relationship. In a private conversation, Carol confesses to Tessa that she and Richard were never legally married and warns Tessa she is repeating her mother's history of loving a destructive man. Tessa stands firm, declaring that Hardin is not her father and she is not her mother.

Ken offers to pay for Richard's drug rehabilitation. Hardin reveals he plans to graduate early but refuses to attend his mother Trish's wedding in England. Christian Vance secretly arranges Tessa's passport, and after pressure, Hardin relents. At a routine medical appointment, Tessa's doctor raises concerns about possible infertility. She keeps the news from Hardin, who has stated he never wants children.

In England, Trish warmly welcomes Tessa. At a bridal shop, Tessa meets Natalie, a young woman Hardin once cruelly seduced and humiliated as part of his former pattern of manipulating women. Natalie, now happily married and pregnant, tells Tessa she has forgiven Hardin and prayed for him to find what she calls his salvation. Tessa is deeply moved.

On the eve of the wedding, Hardin discovers Trish and Christian Vance kissing in the kitchen. Enraged, he screams at his mother and fights Christian until Trish's fiancé, Mike, intervenes. After Hardin reveals the affair, Mike walks out but ultimately forgives Trish, and the wedding proceeds. Christian insists on meeting Hardin to explain. At a bar, Sasha, the companion of Ken's college friend Max, remarks pointedly that Hardin should not treat his father that way, referring to Christian. Hardin stares at Christian, noting his green eyes and the identical nervous gesture of running his hands through his hair. The devastating implication settles over him: Christian Vance, not Ken Scott, may be his biological father. The novel ends on this cliffhanger, with Kimberly simultaneously beginning to tell Tessa a secret Christian has been hiding.