Ptolemy Grey lives alone in a filthy Los Angeles apartment, unable to distinguish past memories from present reality.

Hilly arrives at Ptolemy's door to say that Reggie can no longer come to look after him.

Ptolemy arrives at Niecie's house and discovers that his great-great-nephew Reggie has been killed in a drive-by shooting.

Ptolemy meets an eighteen-year-old orphan named Robyn at Reggie's wake and feels an immediate connection with her.

Robyn becomes Ptolemy's caregiver and takes on the enormous task of cleaning his cluttered, filthy apartment.

A social worker named Antoine Church slips a business card under Ptolemy's door about a doctor treating dementia patients.

Ptolemy shows Robyn a suitcase hidden in his apartment containing ninety-four thousand dollars saved from his social security checks.

Ptolemy and Robyn meet Dr. Bryant Ruben, who offers an experimental memory drug that will dramatically shorten Ptolemy's life.

Ptolemy signs the paperwork to begin the experimental drug treatment despite Robyn's strong objections.

Ptolemy wakes up with a fully restored, sharp mind after suffering through five days of increasingly painful injections.

Ptolemy removes planking from his living room closet floor and retrieves a hidden parcel of gold coins and a pistol.

Ptolemy takes Robyn to an antique dealer and a lawyer to ensure she can manage and inherit his estate after his death.

Ptolemy meets Reggie's closest friend Billy Strong at a gym and deduces that Reggie's wife's boyfriend Alfred killed him.

Alfred arrives at Ptolemy's apartment, confesses to murdering Reggie, and Ptolemy shoots him twice with a concealed pistol.

Ptolemy dies in the hospital with Robyn at his side, his farewell words completing the note that opened the novel.

Ptolemy Grey is a ninety-one-year-old man living alone in Los Angeles whose world is upended when his caregiver Reggie is killed in a drive-by shooting. A teenage orphan named Robyn steps in as his new caregiver and begins transforming both his apartment and his mental state through her genuine love. With Robyn's help, Ptolemy connects with a doctor who offers an experimental drug that restores his memory at the cost of his remaining lifespan. Armed with his restored mind, Ptolemy uncovers a hidden cache of gold coins he was entrusted with decades earlier and legally secures Robyn's future as his heir. He then investigates Reggie's murder, lures the killer to his apartment, extracts a confession, and shoots the man before collapsing. Ptolemy dies in the hospital with Robyn at his side, having finally done the one thing right that he believed defined a man's life.

The headline events of Ptolemy Grey's final months.

Hilly takes Ptolemy to the bank and steals a portion of his social security money during the outing.

Melinda Hogarth threatens to beat Ptolemy on the street for money, but Hilly drives her away.

Nina dumps Reggie's two small children in Niecie's care and leaves with her boyfriend Alfred after the wake.

Ptolemy refuses to open his apartment door to Hilly after realizing the young man stole his money.

Robyn pulls out a knife and frightens Melinda away when Melinda threatens Ptolemy during a shopping trip.

Robyn cleans Ptolemy's apartment bathroom on her first day and gets the broken, clogged toilet flushing again.

Ptolemy and Robyn check into a motel room for a day while insect bombs clear the infested apartment.

Ptolemy and Robyn open a savings account together to safely deposit his ninety-four thousand dollars in cash.

Ptolemy and Robyn run into neighbor Shirley Wring outside the bank, a woman Ptolemy once lent ten dollars to pay her electric bill.

Robyn's daybed is delivered to the apartment, giving her a permanent space she can finally call her own.

After regaining his memory, Ptolemy confronts Hilly directly about stealing his social security money during their Niecie visit.

Ptolemy offers Niecie six hundred dollars a month to keep Reggie's two children living in her home.

Ptolemy hides a lead pipe in his coat sleeve and beats Melinda with it when she tries to confront him outside.

Melinda's boyfriend confronts Ptolemy on the street and Billy Strong beats the man badly, leaving him injured in the road.

Two policemen arrive at Ptolemy's apartment to investigate an assault complaint filed by Melinda's hospitalized boyfriend.

While the main plot centers on Ptolemy's renewed purpose, a web of secondary events reveals the predatory world he inhabits and the people who shape his journey. Hilly's theft and Melinda's bullying establish how thoroughly Ptolemy is exploited before Robyn arrives to protect and stabilize him. The physical work of cleaning the apartment — fixing the toilet, setting the insect bombs, evacuating to a motel — mirrors Ptolemy's gradual mental recovery and deepens the bond between him and Robyn. Opening a bank account, welcoming Shirley Wring into his life, and receiving Robyn's daybed mark the steady rebuilding of a life worth living. Once his memory returns, Ptolemy steps firmly out of his lifelong fear, confronting Hilly, striking back at Melinda, and striking a deal with Niecie to protect Reggie's children. The police investigation and physical confrontations with Melinda's boyfriend add pressure to Ptolemy's final weeks as he races to fulfill every obligation before he dies.

The supporting events that shaped Ptolemy's transformation.

The novel opens with Ptolemy's farewell letter to Robyn, revealing he found the strength to do one thing right before dying.

Ptolemy views Reggie's body at the wake and meets the brutish Alfred Gulla, Nina's secret boyfriend, for the first time.

Ptolemy summons courage to pull a heavy tarp off his dead wife's bed alone, exposing years of insect-ridden neglect.

At a fast-food restaurant, Ptolemy tells Robyn that the bedroom tarp felt like a pall covering his own buried memories.

During a fevered memory, Ptolemy recalls Coydog waking him as a boy and showing him gold coins hidden near a waterfall.

Ptolemy's childhood memory reveals Coydog being beaten and lynched by white men for refusing to reveal where the coins are hidden.

During the drug treatment, Ptolemy recalls retrieving Coydog's hidden coins from Mississippi at seventeen and secretly bringing them to Los Angeles.

Ptolemy tells Robyn the secret of the gold coins and takes her to place them in a bank safe deposit box.

Dr. Ruben arrives at Ptolemy's apartment unannounced and tells him he has only about two weeks left to live.

Ptolemy pulls Nina aside on Niecie's porch and she confesses that Alfred killed Reggie, though she claims she learned it afterward.

Ptolemy and Robyn visit a lawyer and a psychiatrist a second time to ensure Niecie cannot contest Robyn's inheritance.

Coydog appears in Ptolemy's dream and slowly smiles, silently approving how Ptolemy has finally honored the gold coin legacy.

Ptolemy sends Robyn to stay at her boyfriend's place for two days and writes her a farewell letter before Alfred arrives.

Robyn tells Ptolemy that Niecie kicked her out of her home after discovering Robyn had been named as Ptolemy's heir.

Robyn moves into her own apartment and prepares to administer Ptolemy's estate and distribute the gold coin wealth to his family.

The novel frames its entire story with Ptolemy's farewell letter to Robyn, and Pool 3 traces the pivotal moments of revelation and decision that give that letter meaning. Haunting memories of Coydog's lynching and the gold coins left in Ptolemy's care have defined his conscience for decades, and recovering those memories through the experimental drug becomes a long-overdue moral reckoning. Ptolemy's restored clarity allows him to extract Nina's confession about Reggie's killer and legally fortify Robyn's future against the greed of his own family. A dream visit from Coydog signals that Ptolemy has at last honored his long-ago promise, granting him peace even as the drug accelerates his death. The final acts of trapping Alfred and dying in the hospital complete the arc from forgotten old man to unlikely hero. Robyn's survival — independent, capable, and building a life of her own — stands as lasting proof that Ptolemy did, in the end, do one thing right.