Too Close to Home

Regan hosts a tenth birthday party for her daughter, Hallie. Still searching for answers about her supposedly deceased husband, Jack, Regan checks the online message boards she has been posting on. She finds a reply on Craigslist’s “Missed Connections” from a woman named Beatrice, who claims to have seen a man resembling Jack at the Bluebird Café and includes a photo. Beatrice reports that the man ordered an apple turnover, Jack’s favorite pastry, but denied his name was Jack when she asked. 

Regan shows the message to her friends Andi and Sasha. Andi is skeptical, reminding Regan that they attended Jack’s funeral and that the remains of his body were officially transported from Columbia by a U.S. consular officer. Sasha, however, is supportive and offers to drive Regan to the café the next day. Though Andi warns that Beatrice likely scared the man away, Regan feels a surge of hope and becomes determined to investigate.

Later, after sending Hallie to bed, Regan hears noises from the basement. Going down to investigate, she is knocked unconscious by an unseen attacker.

Sasha is surprised by a visit from her wealthy father-in-law, Al. He informs her that her son, Drew, has been suspended from school for a week. Based on a conversation he overheard between Drew and Roxie at Blanc’s Barbecue, Al believes Drew forged Sasha’s signature on the notice from school and changed her contact number in the school’s records to his girlfriend’s. 

Deciding against a confrontation, Sasha resolves to investigate her son’s secrets covertly and does not tell her husband, Tom. She orders a GPS tracker for Drew’s car, scheduled for overnight delivery. Shortly after, she receives a text message announcing that Tia has been located.

Andi discovers Tia’s cell phone on the garage floor. She realizes Tia must have disabled her GPS, which is why her location was never traced to the house. 

Andi drives to a scenic overlook to dispose of the phone in the river. As she wipes it for fingerprints, she accidentally redials the last number called—Tia’s husband, Ray. Panicked, she quickly ends the brief call and flings the phone into the river, where it shatters against a rock. 

Worried that the call may have pinged a nearby cell tower, Andi drives to a CVS to buy a new padlock for the freezer. To avoid creating a record of the purchase, she shoplifts the padlock by hiding it in her boot, then pays for a couple of items at the self-checkout. As she exits the store, a clerk follows her out, calling “Ma’am,” and a terrified Andi breaks into a run.

Regan is awakened in the basement by her daughter’s screams. Hallie says she saw a man, and Regan finds the basement has been ransacked. 

Sasha takes Hallie to her house for a sleepover and drives Regan to the hospital. While they wait, Sasha tells Regan that Tia is now believed to be alive because a brief call was made from her phone to her husband, Ray.

Regan spends the night at Sasha’s house, where she observes Drew sneaking out late. Her suspicions aroused, Regan slips into Drew’s empty room and finds a photograph in his backpack. She is nearly caught by Sasha but manages to pretend she was simply looking for the guest room. Once alone, Regan examines the item and discovers it is a photo of her late husband, Jack.

The next morning, Sasha uses a GPS tracker to follow Drew as he skips school during his suspension. He drives to Hartford, stopping at a fast-food restaurant and an arcade before parking at a smoke shop called Vapors. Sasha watches from a distance as Drew emerges from a side door after a brief, serious meeting with an older man. 

After Drew leaves, Sasha enters the building to investigate and hears men’s voices coming from the basement. As she moves closer to listen, she is ambushed from behind, and her head is covered with a plastic bag. Just before she loses consciousness, the bag is ripped away. She finds herself on the floor, surrounded by three men, one of whom crushes her hand with his boot, breaking her finger.

Andi discovers the CVS clerk was only trying to give her the items she paid for at the self-checkout. Badly shaken, she drives home.

After Carson leaves for the day, Andi struggles to move Tia’s body from the freezer into her SUV and then calls a service to have the freezer hauled away the next day. To create an alibi, Andi runs errands in town and encounters Regan and Hallie at the Wild Roast Café. During their conversation, Hallie bluntly asks Andi if she killed Tia, which triggers a severe panic attack, forcing Andi to retreat to the restroom. 

While Andi is gone, Regan takes her friend’s keys to retrieve some Girl Scout uniforms from the car. Andi storms out of the restroom just as Regan begins to open the car’s hatch. Screaming, Andi slams it shut before the contents are visible, snatches her keys back, and speeds away. Later, while driving toward the river to dispose of the body, she is pulled over by the police.

Deeply unsettled by Andi’s erratic behavior, Regan returns home, where Hallie tells her, “We’re not safe” (162). Regan messages Beatrice, the woman from Craigslist, who confirms that the man resembling Jack has not returned to the café. 

Determined to find answers, Regan forces herself to go into her ransacked basement. There, she discovers a heavy, locked safe box she has never seen before. Using a key she found in Jack’s truck, she opens it and finds a driver’s license and Social Security card for a man named Patrick Finch. The photo on the ID, however, is of a younger Jack. An online search for Patrick Finch yields no matching results, leaving her to question who she really married. Regan then receives a text from an unknown number warning, “Jack is dead. If you don’t stop, you’ll be next” (167).