Keep Your Friends Close

“Basically, we only allow people who meet certain membership criteria to join, and everyone has to sign a nondisclosure agreement. We have to be careful with who we let be around our kids, you know?”

Whitney’s explanation of the West Hollywood Moms’ Club reveals the friend group’s transactional, image-obsessed nature. The existence of “membership criteria” and a “nondisclosure agreement” transforms what could be a supportive group into an exclusive, high-stakes social contract built on wealth and status. This piece of world-building directly establishes the theme of The Performance of Motherhood and Social Status, defining the characters’ relationships as being built on exclusion rather than genuine connection.

“God, I hated these moments. Those awkward couple breakup moments when you had no choice but to pick sides. […] I hated even thinking that, and I’d never say it to her face, but Abby had a point. Brooke was a tough person to be around.”

This flashback reveals the deep-seated judgment and fractures within the friend group long before Kiersten’s death. Whitney’s internal monologue exposes the superficiality of their support system, where emotional vulnerability is viewed as a liability. The passage also highlights how unspoken resentments erode the women’s bonds, illustrating the theme of The Corrosive Power of Secrets in Friendships by showing how the performance of friendship conceals a lack of genuine empathy.

“[S]he just snapped and started pounding Kiersten’s chest with her fists, forgetting all about the breathing part. It was frantic and wild. Smack. Smack. Smack. […] Thankfully, the paramedics finally arrived, but not before Brooke broke Kiersten’s rib pounding on her chest like that. We all heard it snap.”

Jade’s narration of Brooke’s CPR attempt frames a moment of desperation as an act of violence and potential guilt. The use of onomatopoeia (“Smack. Smack. Smack.”) and the visceral auditory detail of a rib snapping create a detailed image of the moment that appears to cast suspicion on Brooke. This description is a critical piece of narrative misdirection, manipulating both the characters’ and the reader’s judgment by presenting a traumatic event through a biased and unreliable lens; Jade doesn’t fully understand CPR (as evidenced by her vague reference to “the breathing part”) and has her own reasons for casting doubt on Brooke.

“I would power through this day. This vortex that had been swirling around us and our family. I was going to get us out. Somebody had to because I refused to drown.”

In the immediate aftermath of the murder, Jade’s internal monologue creates dramatic irony. Her metaphorical vow not to “drown” in her family’s secret financial and marital problems echoes Kiersten’s fate. This statement is subtle foreshadowing, linking the symbol of the swimming pool to Brooke’s desperate struggle for survival and hinting at her status as Kiersten’s killer.

“If it wasn’t something you could brag about or post on Instagram, they weren’t really interested in it.”

In this internal monologue, Brooke reflects on her inability to impress the West Hollywood Moms’ Club with her past business success. The narration critiques the group’s value system, which privileges shareable achievements. This observation directly supports the theme of the performance of motherhood and social status, establishing the superficial and transactional nature of the friendships at the novel’s center.

“I didn’t need any time to think about what I said next: ‘Look at Brooke.’”

After Detective Perez informs Whitney that Kiersten’s death was a homicide, Whitney immediately names Brooke as the perpetrator. This quote marks a crucial turning point, revealing the group’s readiness to sacrifice an outsider to protect the core. Whitney’s lack of hesitation is a key moment of characterization, portraying her as decisive and ruthless in a crisis, complicating her characterization as a grieving best friend.

“Everyone pretends like Whitney and Kiersten were super tight, and they were, or they are, but what I’ll tell you is that they weren’t getting along.”

During her police interview, Brooke deflects suspicion by revealing a fracture in Whitney and Kiersten’s seemingly perfect friendship. This moment introduces doubt and complexity into the central relationship, directly engaging with the theme of the corrosive power of secrets.

“I kept my mouth shut about Colin. I’d never kept anything from her. Not once. That’s all I could think about on the drive home. We didn’t have secrets.”

In a flashback, Whitney consciously decides not to tell Kiersten about her husband’s gambling relapse, marking the first significant secret between them. The narrative uses short, declarative sentences to emphasize the weight of this decision and the subsequent internal conflict. This moment serves as the apparent genesis of the central friendship’s decay, eroding a foundation supposedly built on transparency (subsequent events reveal that Kiersten had already been keeping secrets of her own).

“I’m not playing with you, Whitney. I know you’ve spent your life in a big, huge bubble of white privilege, but all that’s about to end.”

Detective Perez confronts Whitney at her home, cutting through the facade of wealth and social standing. The dialogue is a power shift, as Perez dismisses Whitney’s privilege and asserts the authority of the law, forcing her to face consequences for her secret life. This scene demonstrates that the characters’ insulated world cannot protect them from the fallout of their deceptions.

“It wasn’t dead bodies hidden upstairs, but it was IKEA furniture. […] We only let people into the parts of the house that were finished. The ones that looked pretty and nice.”

Narrated from Jade’s perspective, this passage uses the house as a metaphor for the secrets underpinning her life and marriage. The contrast between the meticulously designed downstairs and the hidden, cheap furniture upstairs symbolizes the facade of wealth she presents to the world. This illustrates the performance of social status, where outward appearances are carefully curated to conceal a less desirable reality. The passage also obliquely links this performance to Jade’s murder of Kiersten; her remark about hiding dead bodies is ironic in retrospect, but it is telling that she treats this as equivalent to hiding “IKEA furniture,” hinting at how the need to preserve her image will eventually drive her to violence.

“Jade needed room to breathe, and I had air.”

This metaphor from Whitney’s point of view describes her decision to involve Jade in her escort business. Her framing is grandiose and self-serving, allowing her to see herself as Jade’s savior when in reality she is involving her in a risky enterprise. It also proves to be ironic, as Jade has manipulated her into the arrangement.

“It wasn’t like a wedding. We were all on the bride’s side. The video photomontage made every person in the place cry. Except for me.”

Brooke’s internal monologue at Kiersten’s memorial uses a simile to contrast the celebration of marriage with the somber performance of grief. The phrase “we were all on the bride’s side” is re-contextualized to suggest the group’s forced unity against a perceived enemy rather than genuine solidarity—a point underscored by Brooke’s sense of being outside this group in her response to the loss. This subversion of a familiar saying highlights the fractured and suspicious nature of the group’s alliance in the wake of the murder.

“‘I’m sorry,’ I said, covering my mouth. ‘I don’t know why I think this is so funny, but I just do. It feels super tribal, you know? Like we’re cavewoman sisters or something.’”

During a moment of crisis, Whitney watches Jade breastfeed another woman’s baby and compares the act to a “tribal” bond between “cavewoman sisters.” The simile suggests an innate understanding between mothers but is ironic (and misleading) in light of the many secrets fracturing the group; even their seemingly genuine moments are intertwined with deceit.

“They were all in there trying to hide from me, but the real villain sat among them. What a great place to hide.”

Brooke’s isolation and the group’s collective suspicion of her have made her the perfect scapegoat, allowing the actual killer to remain hidden within the circle of accusers. The statement demonstrates the theme of the unreliability of perception in a world of deceit, where the truth is obscured by paranoia and misplaced blame.

“Funny part is how hard you’re working to point us at Brooke, but the closer we look at Brooke, the cleaner she looks. […] Kiersten was alive when Brooke went into that bathroom and likely dead by the time she came out. We’ve had to expand our reach. We’ve had to look at other people who might have shady pasts.”

In this exchange with Whitney, Detective Perez uses verbal irony to dismantle Whitney’s certainty about Brooke’s guilt, signaling a critical shift in the investigation. This moment highlights the theme of the unreliability of perception by demonstrating how the most obvious conclusion, fueled by group consensus, is often a deliberate misdirection from a more complicated truth.

“I’d already started it today when I met with Detective Perez. I told her every single little dirty secret I’ve ever heard whispered about them. Every one. All their secrets. And I hoped their secrets destroyed all their lives the same way they’d destroyed mine.”

Brooke’s internal monologue reveals a significant character shift, driven by a desire for revenge. This confession marks the moment she weaponizes the secrets that once bound the friend group to dismantle it entirely. This turning point illustrates how betrayal transforms personal trauma into a destructive force, escalating the novel’s central conflict by ensuring that no character’s hidden life will remain safe.

“I couldn’t wrap my brain around it even though it was the truth. If there was anyone who understood sex and love could be separate, it was me. […] That was sociopathic. To come home to a family and children. Act as if nothing was wrong. Especially during this.”

Following her discovery of Colin and Jade’s affair, Whitney’s narration contrasts her view of sexual openness with the emotional betrayal she now faces. The word “sociopathic” characterizes her friends’ deception not merely as infidelity but as symptomatic of a broader amorality. This passage complicates Whitney’s character, revealing that while she can compartmentalize certain deceptions, she is shattered by the violation of genuine emotional trust within her closest circle.

“[A] forty-one-year-old woman parading her issues on social media in such a fashion is an immediate red flag. […] Her speech is pressured and all over the place. Her thoughts don’t connect, even though she thinks they do. They’re tangential. She sounds irrational and paranoid.”

During an emergency custody hearing, the judge analyzes Brooke’s frantic social media posts, interpreting her raw grief and desperation as evidence of mental illness. The clinical, diagnostic language demonstrates how a woman’s public emotional display is pathologized and used to strip her of parental rights, while the reference to her age—ostensibly a reference to the behavior expected of adults—hints at the intersection of misogyny and ageism. This scene is a direct critique of the performance of motherhood and social status, showing how failing to maintain a composed facade results in severe institutional punishment.

“Had she faked the cancer diagnosis to get to my husband? To get to me? I put my hand over my mouth. What if the entire conversation in the parking lot that day had been bullshit? What if she’d been playing me this whole time?”

Whitney’s series of rhetorical questions marks her horrified realization that Jade has fabricated her daughter’s cancer diagnosis. This moment represents the apex of the novel’s secrecy, revealing a level of manipulation that re-contextualizes all of Jade’s prior actions. The revelation underscores the theme of the corrosive power of secrets by showing that a lie intended to elicit sympathy was, in fact, a calculated, long-term betrayal.

“You should’ve married Kiersten. I’m not kidding. I know we joke about it all the time, but it’s the truth. She’s your person. Always has been. Not me.”

This quote reveals the foundational crack in Whitney and Colin’s marriage, exposing a long-held resentment that has festered into betrayal. Colin’s dialogue reframes Whitney and Kiersten’s connection not as a supportive friendship but as the central, primary relationship in Whitney’s life, eclipsing her marriage. This perception serves as his justification for infidelity, tying his betrayal to a prior one—a broken emotional contract within his marriage.

“[U]p until now, I’ve never been someone’s first choice. […] And then I started talking to Colin, and suddenly, for the first time ever, I was someone’s first choice. He wanted me more than anyone else. […] Being with him felt so incredible that nothing else mattered, and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to experience that feeling.”

Jade’s confession provides the psychological motivation behind her betrayals, linking them to a deep-seated insecurity and a desire for validation. The repetition of “first choice” emphasizes her singular focus on being wanted, which she uses to justify catastrophic actions, including faking her daughter’s cancer and embezzling money. This quote illustrates how the characters’ obsession with personal fulfillment fuels the novel’s central conflicts and moral compromises.

“And then he pressed play. […] But suddenly there was her voice. Jade’s unmistakable voice. Shaking and afraid. […] ‘Breathe, goddammit, Kiersten. Breathe. Do you hear me?’ Jade cried. […] ‘I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to.’”

This moment is the climax of the murder investigation, providing irrefutable evidence in a story dominated by subjective and deceitful perspectives. The auditory sensory detail—“rustling,” “muffled noise,” and Jade’s “shaking and afraid” voice—contrasts with the calculated lies Jade has told. The scene directly addresses the theme of the unreliability of perception in a world of deceit by revealing a fragment of truth that cuts through the characters’ self-serving narratives.

“Brooke was sitting in the huge concrete tub. Naked and white. She held Julian against her chest. There was blood all over the sink. The walls. The tub. Like someone had finger painted but with blood. […] That’s when I noticed the knife. The chef’s knife from my kitchen downstairs. It lay at her feet. Next to an empty bottle of whiskey.”

The imagery in this passage presents a stark tableau that marks the novel’s final tragedy. The simile juxtaposes an activity associated with childhood with extreme violence, highlighting Brooke’s confused mental state and the horrific outcome of her desperation. This scene is the culmination of Brooke’s arc, demonstrating how the pressures of performative motherhood and the trauma of betrayal have driven her to murder.