In July 2020, at the height of the global COVID-19 pandemic, Noah sends Sally an email asking if the address is still hers. Sally confirms that it is and hopes Noah is doing well in quarantine. Noah is in Los Angeles and Sally is in Kansas City, Missouri, quarantining with her 81-year-old stepfather.

Noah writes to Sally and tells her that while sick with COVID, he started thinking about his life and regretted how things ended between them in 2018. Sally writes back that she hasn’t had COVID yet, but her friends Viv and Henrietta, now both pregnant, did. They write to one another about the Black Lives Matter protests, and their complicated feelings about attending. On the one hand, they don’t want to perform wokeness, but on the other hand, they genuinely care about the movement. Sally also apologizes that they ended their time together at TNO on a tense note. Noah writes back insisting on his own apology, especially for going out with Annabel so soon afterward.

Sally writes that her stepfather, Jerry, is the closest paternal role model she has, though it’s still boring and difficult to be spending so much time in Kansas City.