The next morning, Sallie explores the well-stocked new house before anyone else is awake. She finds Grace in the dining room, who arrived before dawn. Sallie confesses to Grace that she couldn’t go through with consummating the marriage and is unsure if she will stay. At a tense breakfast, Eng avoids eye contact with Sallie, while Chang and Addie are openly affectionate.

After the meal, Sallie and Addie walk to the kitchen garden. Addie is frustrated to learn that nothing happened between Sallie and Eng, telling Sallie that it’s her “wifely duty” and that she must “get on with it” (127). Sallie accuses Addie of forcing her into the marriage, but Addie retorts that she was doing Sallie a favor, as Sallie had no other options. The argument ends in tense silence.

Later, while Sallie is sitting on the porch reading Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park, Chang confronts her, with Eng necessarily present throughout. He bluntly outlines the scandal and ruin she would bring upon herself and Addie if she were to leave. That afternoon, Sallie rests in her room and, in a moment of distress, takes scissors to a piece of embroidery, destroying the pattern. Feeling trapped, she goes down to a quiet supper before returning to her room to cry.

Over the next few days, Sallie lives like a guest in the house, sleeping in her own room and avoiding intimacy with Eng, who has become withdrawn and distant. Chang watches her with impassive judgment. Feeling trapped, Sallie reads the biblical story of sisters Leah and Rachel and identifies with Leah, the less-loved wife accepted out of obligation.

One day, Chang confronts Sallie again about her refusal to consummate the marriage. He implies that her previous sexual experience should make intimacy easier. He demands to know if she plans to leave, but Sallie has no answer. That night, she has restless dreams and wakes feeling that her marriage is an irrevocable mistake that will haunt her for the rest of her life. However, unable to ruin her sister’s life or her own, she remains.

Sallie finds a sense of purpose by creating a flower and herb garden around the house. In the evenings, the four of them sit together in the parlor. Sallie starts a new embroidery project depicting the biblical scene of Leah and Rachel sitting by the well. A quiet connection begins to form between Sallie and Eng. He recommends the novel Frankenstein, and its story of a misunderstood creature connects with Sallie’s growing understanding of the brothers’ lives. Eng also shares his favorite poetry by Alexander Pope, leading to a thoughtful discussion.

Their bond grows when Sallie asks to learn chess. Despite Chang’s dismissive attitude, Eng patiently teaches her the game. A few days later, Eng brings Sallie a small bouquet of flowers. That night, he invites her to play chess again. Later, after Addie is in her own room, Sallie slips into the brothers’ bedroom. Eng makes space for her, and she lies down beside him. He puts his arm around her, and they fall asleep without becoming intimate.

Sallie and Eng’s relationship slowly blossoms. He’s patient and observant, which Sallie describes as “deliberate.” Over several days, he plays chess with her, tames a neighbor’s wild horse, and begins winning her over with small, thoughtful gestures. One night, Sallie initiates their first real kiss, and they consummate their marriage. Eng props himself on an elbow and slides Sallie beneath him, and when he shifts his weight on top of her, Chang’s body falls heavily against hers; Eng tells her to focus only on him.

Their shared life is a constant negotiation of privacy. With Chang always present, they learn to communicate through glances and subtle touches. Despite this, desire grows between them, and their moments of passion seem like “defiance” in Sallie’s eyes. However, she’s disquieted by Chang’s occasional unwanted advances—a hand brushing her waist or thigh—which Eng either doesn’t notice or chooses to ignore. Sallie feels conflicted, wondering if she’s somehow complicit in these moments.

Sallie and Addie discover that they’re both pregnant. They visit Dr. Albright, who tells them that the babies they carry may be fused together, noting that there’s no prior record of conjoined twins bearing children. The news fills Sallie with anxiety. To manage the expanding farm and households, Eng and Chang lease an enslaved couple, Cato and Phoebe, and their son, Peter, from a neighbor. Cato works as a blacksmith, and Phoebe helps Grace in the kitchen.

Phoebe, who is also a midwife and healer, offers the sisters herbal remedies to ease their pregnancy symptoms. Though Addie is initially skeptical, both she and Sallie come to rely on Phoebe’s traditional knowledge. The sisters’ relationship softens during their shared pregnancies, finding kinship in their unique situation. 

As winter sets in, Sallie’s labor begins. Dr. Albright is out of town, so Phoebe delivers the baby. Sallie gives birth to a girl and is relieved that she isn’t a conjoined twin. They name her Katherine, to be called “Katie,” and Eng looks at her with awe.

In the days following Katie’s birth, Sallie attempts to return to her old self. Eng is besotted with his new daughter. Six days later, Addie gives birth to a healthy girl, Josephine, or “Josie.”

Initially, Phoebe is a wet nurse for both infants. After a week, Sallie and Addie decide to try breastfeeding. They struggle at first, but with Phoebe’s patient instruction, they succeed. The sisters navigate the exhausting early weeks of motherhood together, their lives revolving around feeding and soothing their babies. The world outside their domestic sphere fades away as they adjust to their new roles. Sallie feels a fierce love for Katie, who she notices has Eng’s observant, serious gaze.

Several months after Katie and Josie are born, Sallie and Addie are both pregnant again. Their father, David, makes a surprise visit to the farm—his first since their marriage. He comes alone, explaining that their mother is feeling unwell. He meets his granddaughters for the first time, noting their family resemblance.

Addie correctly guesses that he has come to see if the children are conjoined twins and to reassure their mother that her daughters are healthy. He admits that this is partly true but also insists that he wants to know his grandchildren. He observes that both his daughters seem happy and prosperous and notes their new pregnancies. When Sallie suggests that they bring the girls to visit their grandmother, David discourages it, saying that it’s best to wait so as not to upset her. He still seems to view Eng and Chang as curiosities and hasn’t fully accepted his daughters’ marriages.

As the years pass, the narrative follows the relentless cycle of seasonal work on the now self-sustaining farm, which the brothers manage using new scientific farming techniques. At the same time, the growing family becomes increasingly self-contained. Visits from Sallie and Addie’s relatives become rare, and their neighbors and the wider community continue to gossip. Despite their financial success, they’re treated with a polite but firm distance. At the general store, a woman named Mina Greenbow expresses invasive curiosity about their “unusual arrangement,” making Sallie uncomfortable.

Life inside the house becomes increasingly tense. The four adults coexist in a precarious balance, with quarrels frequently erupting between the brothers or the sisters. Eng and Chang’s disagreements become more common, and Chang’s drinking increases. Addie and Sallie learn to read his moods to avoid conflict. One evening, after Chang has an outburst at supper, Addie confesses to Sallie that she feels suffocated and sometimes wonders what her life would be like if she had made a different choice.

By the time the sisters have six children between them, the house is overwhelmingly crowded and noisy. The two couples constantly disagree on parenting styles, with Addie and Chang favoring discipline, while Sallie and Eng are more indulgent. The tension becomes unbearable for Sallie, who feels trapped by Addie’s domineering presence.

Sallie writes a letter to Eng, proposing that they establish separate homes. Eng agrees, and the brothers purchase a 650-acre property in Surry County, 40 miles away. The brothers decide without consulting the sisters: Sallie and her children will remain on the Wilkes County property in Traphill, and Addie will move to Surry County with hers. The brothers will split their time, spending three days at each house. This arrangement makes the final weeks of living together more bearable. After dividing their belongings, Addie and her children depart.

After Addie leaves, the house is quiet, and Sallie feels a new sense of freedom. She begins to run the household and the farm as she sees fit during Eng’s three-day absences. She reads more, lets her children play freely, and finds pleasure in her own autonomy. She also befriends a neighbor, a widow named Nora Owens, whose antislavery views challenge Sallie’s own acceptance of the institution.

The arrangement is harder on Eng, who resents having to cede his authority as head of household every three days. When Addie and her family visit for Easter, the sisters are cordial but acknowledge that an emotional distance has grown between them. They now know each other’s husbands through a strange and unwanted intimacy.

In the spring of 1849, financial difficulties force Eng and Chang to go on tour again. At the insistence of their new manager, they bring five-year-old Katie and Josie with them. The tour is a failure; their fame has faded, and they’re now seen as “objects of ridicule” (206). They return just six weeks after they set out, having lost money. The experience leaves Katie more guarded, as she was subjected to the crowd’s invasive questions and stares.

The humiliation of the tour makes the rift between the brothers bigger. Their arguments escalate into physical fights. Chang’s temper worsens, and one night, he nearly sets the bedroom on fire. Eng reveals to Sallie that during the tour, they secretly consulted with surgeons in New York about the possibility of separation, but they were told that the operation would be fatal for both of them. This confirms to Eng that his fate is forever tied to his brother’s. The constant conflict continues, with Sallie often caught in the middle.

Sallie is summoned to her mother’s deathbed. Her mother confesses a lifelong secret: At 16, she was repeatedly raped by a family friend, resulting in a pregnancy. The shame and trauma led to her reclusiveness and emotional distance. Sallie pieces together that this child—Alston—isn’t her father’s, as Aunt Joan had suspected. Her mother also confesses to knowing that Sallie had been assaulted by Tom Fellows but did nothing, as she saw her own weakness reflected in her daughter. She makes Sallie promise never to reveal the truth about Alston’s parentage, saying that it would destroy his social standing.

A few days after their mother’s death, the sisters’ father also dies. With the family in debt, the farm and all its assets are auctioned off. To Sallie’s horror, she arrives too late to purchase Dinah, Grace’s mother, who had been enslaved by the family her entire life. Dinah is sold to a stranger, and Sallie is left with the task of telling Grace that her mother is gone.

In January 1852, Sallie gives birth to her sixth child, a girl named Rosalyn. The baby is fussy at first but soon becomes a beloved and calming presence in the family. One morning, a few months later, Phoebe is caring for Rosalyn in the kitchen house while cooking breakfast. As Phoebe bends toward the hearth, the sling holding the baby comes loose, and Rosalyn slips out and falls directly onto the hot coals of the fire. Phoebe snatches her back immediately, but Rosalyn’s injuries are fatal; her “quick death” is described as “a mercy” (228). The household is thrown into chaos and grief. Sallie is inconsolable.

It’s the brothers’ final day of their three-day stay at Traphill. Despite Sallie’s desperate pleas for Eng to stay for their daughter’s funeral, Chang insists that they must adhere to their rigid schedule and return to Addie’s house. Eng complies, choosing his duty to the arrangement over his wife’s grief. He and Chang leave before Rosalyn is buried.

The next day, Addie arrives alone, having left her own home immediately upon hearing the news. She offers Sallie comfort and solidarity, and they cry together. For the first time, Addie speaks candidly about her difficulties with Chang. That night, the sisters sleep in the marital bed together. When Eng returns three days later, he’s contrite, but Sallie can’t forgive his abandonment. She believes that his choice reveals that, when forced to choose, his bond with Chang will always take precedence over his marriage. In the following weeks, Eng sends Phoebe and her family away without consulting Sallie, and Chang taunts her about it. Numb with grief, Sallie finds a small measure of solace in the quiet of a Quaker meeting.