She simply walked to the balcony, looked at the hotel where it all began, and smiled. She finally understood. The "adultery" wasn't the sex. It was the lie that she had anything left to lose.

She slipped it into the player. There was no film. Just a single, static shot of a hotel room—the very hotel she could see from her balcony. Then, a man’s voice. Low. Calm. "Apartment Wife… 39. You know the number. Call it when you want to feel the crack in the ice."

She begins to write.

247 IESP 459 – Risa Murakami: The Beginning.