- Uncertainty's part of the game, Sara. It's part of the thrill.
This chapter, which takes place a month after the end of Part One, and over a period of two days, introduces a wider range of characters, most of whom are Sara's and Lisa's residence floormates.
Hank, the floor R.A., complains to his girlfriend Clarice about his freshmen being either too quiet and reserved, or too talkative (especially Lisa). Clarice, for her part, says she was worried about his having lost touch with her for a while. Hank admits it's hard for him to show emotions apart from "irritation and general disgust," but will do his best to open up for her.
The quirky, energetic Jade, shown in the previous chapter to be interested in Lisa, asks their floormate Ronnie to give Lisa her note which contains a "challenge." Ronnie, an overweight, sullen guy who sees himself as ugly, agrees to deliver the note, but not without taking offence at, so he assumes, Jade and Lisa deliberately excluding him from their fun. A series of one-panel Flashbacks to his high school years shows that he has difficulty telling whether anything his peers say to him is friendly or mocking. Due to his poor self-image, he tends to assume the latter. Nonetheless, when Jade runs after him to explain, he grudgingly apologizes.
Two other first-year floormates interested in "challenges" are the outgoing Michael and the quiet, enigmatic Marie. They meet when Marie notices him playing Tetris and, after helping him with strategy, invites him to her room, where she presents him with a spatial relations puzzle, saying only, "Make it fit." Although both intrigued by and attracted to her, Michael notices her large collection of empty bottles and, concerned she may have a drinking problem, talks to Hank about it. Hank, with his usual testiness, tells him not to assume anything too quickly on such scant evidence, but rather to accept the "puzzle" she's presenting herself as, and patiently try to solve it. So Michael, after working on the challenge she'd given him, asks her out to a movie that evening. Marie is wordlessly delighted. After the movie, she silently invites him into her room, but Michael, apparently wishing to take things slow, says, "Later?", then qualifies it with "Soon?", eliciting an enigmatic look from Marie before she takes leave of him.
Meanwhile, Sara and Lisa audition on campus for the lead roles of Vladimir and Estragon in Waiting for Godot. When Lisa instantly proves inept at it, the director calls on Jade's roommate, the shy, serious Temperance, instead. Temperance, too embarrassed to admit she's only turned up because of her crush on Sara (who'd tentatively flirted with her during orientation), agrees to give it a try. After the director invites them both to the next day's callbacks, Temperance, having broken the ice, asks Sara to dinner at the cafeteria. Exchanging stories of their "control freak" parents (Iseul, in Sara's case), they hit it off immediately.
Sara's talk of her mother segues into the next scene, which reveals that Iseul is, with considerable mixed feelings, having an affair with Elizabeth, a self-employed travel agent for whom Iseul has been working as an accountant and phone receptionist. A flashback to two years ago shows Elizabeth losing interest in her then-current girlfriend when she overhears Iseul, bored in her marriage to Theo and frustrated over sixteen-year-old, closeted Sara's increasingly angry rejection of her attempts to set her up with boys, privately venting her anger over a problem customer she'd just handled on the phone. The next flashback scene takes place several months later, as Elizabeth offers Iseul wine at the close of the workday and, seeing her drink it too quickly, invites her to open up. Iseul, experiencing her first spark of attraction to her employer as Elizabeth touches her hand, reveals that Sara's been falsely outed to her peers as a lesbian rapist. Iseul feels she's failed her daughter. Elizabeth advises her to trust in Sara's resilience and give her more space, and is quietly dismayed when Iseul says she's even more determined that Sara "find a Theo already."
Back in the present, Theo and Iseul discuss the university's Parents' Weekend, while Sara, who's forgotten that they're coming up tomorrow, has a premonition of something worrisome about to happen.
The next day, Ronnie hands Lisa Jade's message, an easily-decoded booty call request. Lisa reacts in silent shock and horror until he remembers to say it's from Jade. The misunderstanding leaves him once again feeling suspicious as to how women regard him.
Lisa, for her part, eagerly takes Jade up on her offer and proceeds to her room. However, just as they're getting started, there's a knock on the door. It's Temperance's parents. To their daughter's irritation, they've arrived ahead of schedule and at the wrong location. A Slapstick bit ensues in which Lisa and Jade scurry under the bed just before Temperance lets her parents in. Despite a couple of close calls, the parents leave the room without incident (other than Temperance arguing with them over what she sees as their intrusiveness) and Jade proceeds to give Lisa the best sex she's ever had.
Sara, already caught off-guard by having forgotten her parents were visiting, is doubly shocked when her mother agrees with her on something almost right off. As the three have lunch, Iseul, recalling Elizabeth's recent advice that she figure out whom she wants to be with, suggests a visit to Colonialtown, an open-air museum
site. There, the tour guide's talk of "cherished institutions" prompts Iseul to tear up and walk away from the group. Sara goes after her, asking what's wrong; her mother, while trying to pass it off as allergies, begins to sob.
Meanwhile, in their dorm lounge, Michael vents to Ronnie about his uncertainty and frustration as to what Marie wants from him. When Ronnie admits he doesn't have much experience with it, Michael says, "A situation like this? I doubt you ever will!" Although he's referring to Marie specifically, Ronnie takes this as an insult regarding his chances with any woman, punches Michael out, and retreats to his room. The commotion attracts the attention of Hank, whose mother is visiting him. As Michael comes to, Hank tends to him while the ambulance arrives. Then, the incident triggering in him a painful flashback to the murder of someone close to him, he calls the campus police.
Clarice stops by Hank's room, to find his mother, whom she hasn't yet met. The mother asks whether she's his girlfriend, and upon Clarice's tentative response, wonders silently whether she should "clear that up" for Clarice. As they chat, Clarice reflects on how Hank is different from other guys she's dated, in that he treats her and her body with respect, thus making him the first man she's ever been sexually comfortable with. (A flashback panel shows they've gotten to second base.)
Hank makes the rounds of the floor to announce a temporary lockdown due to the fight. When Marie hears from him that Michael's been hurt, she becomes anxious and uncharacteristically verbal, culminating in her nearly knocking him to the floor as she screams at him in anger...just as the police arrive. As the cops put her in their car to have her cool off, she remembers a high school classmate demanding to know why she rarely talks. "Bad at it," was her response, leading the classmate to mock her.
Meanwhile, one of the officers assures Hank they're not going to charge Marie; they simply wanted her, and everyone, to calm down and reflect on how violence can easily lead to the justifying of further violence. Hank, though imagining himself punching Ronnie out in retaliation, sees his point and calmly takes the police officers to Ronnie's room.
In Colonialtown, Iseul suggests to Sara she may have to spend some time at a "clinic," due to "frightening" thoughts she can't repress and had wanted neither Theo nor Sara to know about it at first.
