Epilogue: Six Months Later
Addie’s world brightens. In a quiet, hopeful coda, Addie Severson steps into a life that finally feels safe, steady, and hers. The peace she earns sits beside one last secret, tucked into a text on Hudson Jankowski’s phone.
Opening
Six months after the climax, Addie waits in the school parking lot, no longer isolated, no longer afraid. Her friendship with Hudson is steady again, and she has found a new ally in Kenzie Montgomery. Healing is slow but real.
What Happens
Addie narrates from the Caseham High lot as she waits for Hudson. Her life has recalibrated: she and Kenzie are in therapy, bonded by shared trauma involving Nate Bennett. She is no longer an outcast, and Kenzie is the kind of friend who shows up, listens, and understands. Addie reflects on what followed their report to the police: Nate fled town before questioning and is now a fugitive. The investigation into Eve Bennett’s disappearance sputters out when Eve reappears, saying she took a bus to get away for a few days. Because Eve refuses to corroborate Addie’s account of the attack and burial, the case is dropped. Eve resigns from Caseham High and leaves town. Meanwhile, other students come forward about Nate, shredding his reputation and ending his career. Addie can’t shake the thought that if she had used dirt instead of leaves, everything might have ended differently.
Hudson arrives, easy with his football friends who call him “Jay.” He opens the car door, and they head to a diner for milkshakes before his shoe-store shift. Sitting in the car, Hudson gets a text that makes him smile. When Addie asks who it is, he says it’s an “old friend,” a girl who “really liked shoes,” used to visit him at the store, and was “messed up for a while” but is finally happy. Addie assumes he means an ex. The reader recognizes the clue: the shoe store, the secrecy, the timing point toward Eve. Hudson takes Addie’s hand, and they walk in together. Addie decides to get a milkshake with all the toppings because she deserves it.
Character Development
Addie steadies herself. Therapy, friendship, and everyday routines help her reclaim joy and agency, even as she misreads the final clue.
- Addie Severson: Rebuilds trust and community; embraces self-worth (“I deserve a treat”); remains an unreliable lens, missing the Eve connection in Hudson’s text.
- Hudson Jankowski: Loyal, gentle, quietly protective; his coy explanation hints he has been safeguarding Eve’s new life, recasting him as a discreet helper working offstage.
- Eve Bennett: Alive, free, and starting over beyond Caseham; her refusal to confirm Addie’s story protects her escape but collapses the legal case.
- Nate Bennett: Exposed and disgraced; a fugitive with a ruined career, cut off from the power he wielded at school.
Themes & Symbols
The epilogue reframes justice as messy and personal rather than purely legal, completing the arc of Revenge and Justice. Eve’s survival and flight become the meaningful accountability that the system cannot deliver. Nate’s downfall arrives through exposure and exile, not a courtroom.
The scene also turns on Appearance vs. Reality. Hudson appears to be a steadfast friend, yet the “old friend” who loved shoes reveals a hidden network of care protecting Eve. In contrast to Nate’s cruelty, Hudson’s concealment reads as protective, a softer form of Deception and Manipulation used to preserve someone’s safety rather than to harm.
Symbolically, the shoe store functions as the final breadcrumb. It is the nexus of Eve’s escape and the decisive clue that unlocks the epilogue’s twist: Hudson’s mention of the girl who “really liked shoes” signals Eve without naming her, completing the puzzle the reader has been assembling.
Key Quotes
“She…uh…she really liked shoes and used to come to the shoe store all the time... she was having a hard time for a while and was pretty messed up, but she’s doing a lot better now. I’ve known her for a while, and she seems happy for the first time ever, so that’s nice, you know? I want her to be happy. She deserves it.”
Hudson’s halting cadence conceals as much as it reveals. To Addie, it sounds like a vague ex; to the reader, it’s a careful confession that he’s been helping Eve from the background. The language of deserving happiness counters Nate’s abuse and aligns Hudson with quiet, restorative justice.
“I deserve a treat.”
This simple decision crystallizes Addie’s recovery: she validates her own needs and pleasure after a long season of shame and fear. It closes her arc with earned self-compassion rather than denial.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
The epilogue delivers closure with a final turn of dramatic irony. It confirms Eve’s survival and escape while showing Addie stepping into a healthier life. At the same time, it repositions Hudson as a pivotal, unseen ally whose actions undermine Nate’s power from the shadows.
By letting the reader grasp what Addie doesn’t, the narrative underscores its core ideas: justice can be covert, courage can be quiet, and truth can hide in plain sight. The calm of milkshakes and small kindnesses lands as the story’s truest resolution—ordinary happiness reclaimed after extraordinary harm.