Want to Know a Secret?

Maria starts to suspect that something is going on between Sean and April. April calls him over to her house all the time. Realizing that he is over there now, Julie convinces Maria to go over and see what is going on.

When Julie and Maria get to April’s house, they hear Sean in the backyard. April is flirting with him, trying to convince him to come inside and have a beer. Sean hesitates but then insists that he has to go home. When he comes outside, he runs into Julie and Maria. He repeatedly apologizes, promising that he won’t go over to April’s house again. Julie is sympathetic toward him, realizing that April is the one manipulating everything.

After that day, Maria hates April. She constantly tells Julie gossip about April, like when she found birth control pills hidden in April’s bathroom—despite her insistence that she wants to get pregnant. She also tells Julie that she saw April going through her purse. She thinks that April found her second phone, which she uses as part of her volunteer work. She works with women experiencing domestic abuse and encourages them to call her on that phone any time.

Julie realizes that April might think that Maria is the one sending her messages. She briefly wonders if Maria will be in danger but then dismisses the idea, insistent that Maria can handle her own after what she did to the babysitter at the store.

When Owen’s stuffed giraffe goes missing, he is devastated. Julie asks Leo if he knows anything about it. He is hesitant to answer, insisting that he doesn’t want Bobby to hurt him. However, Tristan tells her that the giraffe is buried in the backyard, as he heard them talking about it.

Julie starts to text Maria and then decides to wait. Just before they go over to April’s for the meeting, she texts her from the burner phone, telling her that something is buried in the backyard.

A few days later, Julie goes over to Maria’s house. She is sitting at the kitchen table eating cookies that April brought over and watching April’s video on YouTube. Maria is upset at how good of a baker April is and how pretty she is. Julie insists that it doesn’t matter, as she is not a good person, and Sean loves her. To make Maria feel better, she posts a rude comment on April’s video.

Julie gets home and sees a young woman looking in the windows of April’s home. She thinks of how she looks like a younger version of April. When Brianna introduces herself as Elliot’s assistant, Julie thinks of how Courtney looks like April, too. Seeing that she is upset, Julie invites her in for tea.

Brianna tells Julie about the baby. She hasn’t told Elliot yet. Julie comforts her, insisting that she should keep the baby if she wants to. She assures her that Elliot could leave his wife for her. Nervous about Brianna’s safety, Julie gives her pepper spray and insists that she should keep it with her. She also tells Brianna that she will help her any time she needs it.

After Brianna is gone, Julie decides that she is going to end April’s marriage. She will use the photo of Mark and make sure that Elliot leaves April for Brianna.

After Bobby pushes Leo off the slide and breaks his arm, Julie is extremely angry. She talks with Keith about suing April, but he insists that she is being dramatic. She wonders why she married him in the first place. She acknowledges that it was just because he was the safe option, as he was nice, handsome, and wealthy. A few weeks before their wedding, she slept with Riley. She wonders what her life would’ve been like to marry him but also knows that it was unlikely he ever would have proposed to her, as he wasn’t that type of man.

A few days later, Julie goes to Elliot’s work. She meets him outside in his car. She shows him the picture of Mark and April together, but Elliot is uninterested. He tells her that he knows April has cheated on him many times. He warns her to get rid of the picture and hopes that April never finds out about it. It dawns on Julie that Elliot fears April.

When Elliot leaves, Julie calls Brianna. The plan was for her to tell Elliot about the pregnancy after he was already angry about April cheating on him. However, because he didn’t get angry, Julie warns Brianna not to tell Elliot yet. Brianna is insistent that she can’t wait any longer. Julie warns her to be careful; she has a bad feeling that Brianna will be in danger when Elliot tells April.

Julie sits and looks at the numbers from the PTA fundraisers. She notices that the numbers from the silent auction don’t match the bids. She then checks last year’s numbers and sees the same problem. After talking to the bank, she learns that a second account was taking a lot of money from the donations.

She asks to speak with April at school. She is shocked that April doesn’t look nervous and is even rude to her. However, she tells April what she found. April is shocked and even starts to cry, making Julie wonder if she is really upset or if it’s just an act like everything else. She tells April that she won’t call the police. She hopes that April will just pay back the money so that there isn’t a scandal.

When April starts to blame Maria, for bringing up the text messages, Julie realizes that Maria may be in trouble. April thinks that Maria is behind everything. Julie regrets confronting her and wonders if it will put Maria in danger.

Julie goes to Helena’s to warn Maria. When she gets there, Maria is busy, so she waits. However, when she sees April come in, she hides behind a dress rack. She watches April look through Maria’s purse and then sees the two of them fight. When Maria walks away, April takes a pair of earrings and puts them in her purse. However, the security guard stops her. Julie takes a photo and sends it to April with the burner phone.

After April is taken into the back, Maria comes to Julie, distraught that April will likely sweet talk her way out of getting arrested. However, Julie insists that she should get April to sign a confession and then help her type one up.

The next night, Brianna calls Julie. She is afraid, telling Julie that April is following her. Julie tells her to hang up and call the police, but Brianna assures her that she is almost home. As she parks, the line goes dead.

Julie contemplates calling the police but realizes she doesn’t even know where Brianna lives. Instead, she calls Riley. She tells him the entire story from start to finish. He promises her that he will look into it and get back to her.

Several hours later, Riley calls in the middle of the night. He tells Julie that Brianna is dead. He got approval to investigate the case. He tells Julie that she needs to back down and let the police handle it, and she agrees.

Julie sits in the living room eating ice cream. She thinks of how she is at fault for what happened to Brianna. She knows she never should have goaded April.

Keith comes in and makes a joke about her gaining weight. She tells him that she wants a divorce. She plans on moving out that day with her children. Keith is furious, but Julie doesn’t care. She is excited to get out of the suburbs and go back to work.

When Julie goes upstairs a while later, she sees movement in Maria’s upstairs window. She realizes that it is April. She then sees Maria walk in the front door. She goes to call Maria and then realizes that she doesn’t have her phone. She has the burner phone, though, so she texts April and tells her that she knows she’s in the house. She sees April check her phone and then pull a knife out of her purse.

Panicked, Julie calls Riley. She tells him what is happening. He is on his way but won’t be there for at least 10 minutes. Julie tells him that Maria needs help now, so she is going over there. Riley tries to stop her, but she hangs up.

April confesses to killing Courtney and Mrs. Kirkland. She is adamant that she is the type of person who will never let others push her around. She plans to kill Maria and make it look like a burglary.

When Maria comes into the room, April is surprised that she doesn’t even have a weapon. She demands that Maria give her the phone, but Maria insists she has no idea what April is talking about. April’s phone goes off with a message saying, “I’m right behind you, April” (376). Confused, April looks up and sees that Maria doesn’t have her phone. She then looks behind her into Maria’s closet. She gets hit in the head from behind with a vase. As she lies on the ground, she looks up and sees Julie.

Julie picks up April’s knife. She hears police cars in the distance, so she sends Maria downstairs to wait for them. When Maria is gone, April begs Julie to help her. She insists that Maria is framing her and that she has been sending her threatening messages. However, Julie admits to having sent the messages, shocking April.

With Riley’s help, Julie explains the situation to the police. Maria corroborates her story. As they arrest April, Julie asks if she can go pick up Leo from school. Riley asks why Keith can’t do it, and Julie tells him that she asked for a divorce.

A few weeks later, Julie and Maria sit in Maria’s kitchen. She is trying to bake cookies, having repeatedly failed at doing so. Julie thinks of how she still can’t believe that April is in jail. Riley has been checking in on her a lot, although nothing romantic has happened between them. She is adamant that she needs time after breaking up with Keith. She sent out her resume to several places and hopes to have a job soon.

Maria comments on the recipe for her latest batch of cookies being April’s recipe. They had promised not to talk about April anymore, but they do so almost every day. Julie notes that April is still adamant that she did not kill Brianna. Maria points out that it’s possible she didn’t, as the only thing connecting her to it is the white SUV—which “everyone” drives, including Maria.

Julie thinks about Maria’s car. She realizes that Maria is right—her car and April’s would look the same in the dark. She wonders why Maria would kill Brianna and then realizes that it would be to frame April. However, she can’t believe that anyone could be that “diabolical.”

As Maria pulls the cookies out of the oven, she sets them down and winks at Julie. She tells her that they will be good this time. As Julie tries one, she thinks of how they taste “just as good as April’s” (386).

Riley visits Janet in the nursing home. Since Janet stopped taking her medication, everything is much clearer for her. Riley initially asks her about Brianna, but Janet insists she doesn’t know anything about her. He then asks about Courtney, and Janet is relieved to finally tell her story. Riley tells her that April will pay for what she did, which confuses Janet, as she is sure that April is dead.

Janet recalls a few nights before. Because Peggy was in charge of her medication, her thoughts were clearer than they normally were. She snuck past the nurse’s station, stole the keys of the nurse on duty, and then went out the doors. She found the nurse’s white SUV in the parking lot.

Janet decided to drive to Elliot’s office, hoping that she could get money from him in exchange for leaving April and her family alone. However, when she got there, she saw April leaving. It was dark and April looked younger than normal, but that only made Janet angrier to think how happy and youthful April was, while she suffered.

Janet followed April for several blocks. When she finally stopped, Janet got out of the car with a snow shovel she found in the SUV. She cornered April, filled with rage at how April ruined her life. She beat her to death with the shovel. After, she felt no emotion.

Deciding that she couldn’t escape in pajamas and with a stolen car, Janet went back to the nursing home. She put the keys back in the nurse’s purse and got into bed, with no one even realizing she left.

Now, Janet thinks of how strange it is that Riley kept talking about April going to jail. She knows that April is dead, as she’s “the one who killed her” (395).