The Crash

The officer is looking for Tegan—the police found her car. Polly denies knowing anything but is fearful when the officer asks to speak to Hank. Hank also denies any knowledge of Tegan, though she can tell that he’s upset about it.

Polly reveals that after leaving the hospital, she did the bookkeeping for the auto shop and committed tax fraud. Hank found out but helped cover it up. Now, Polly is using that to extort him.

Polly tells Tegan that the snow’s been cleared but that Hank is at work and she can’t get Tegan upstairs without him. She adds that the phones are still down. Tegan tries to convince Polly to take her to the hospital, but Polly keeps making excuses. Later, Tegan thinks about the lighter in her purse, a birthday gift from Jackson. She realizes that she’d been falling in love with him.

Polly leaves a sandwich and cookies for Sadie on the porch again. She tells Tegan that she’ll find a working phone and call for an ambulance, but she’s lying.

Polly mixes Benadryl into Tegan’s dinner. She tells Tegan that the ambulance hasn’t come, several hours after she claims to have called, blaming the slow pace of rural life. They argue, and Polly tells Tegan that she should make better decisions. Tegan stabs Polly’s hand with her fork.

When Hank sees Polly’s wounded hand, she says that Tegan stabbed her because she’s confused. He doesn’t understand what Polly’s goal is but drops the subject after volunteering to go downstairs the next time Tegan needs something.

Tegan notices the odd taste of Benadryl in her mashed potatoes, so she only eats a few bites. Hank comes to take her plate, and she begs him to call an ambulance or let her go, but he ignores her. Tegan threatens to stab Polly’s eye the next time she comes down, but Hank promises she’ll regret it.

At 1:00 am, Hank insists that Polly tell him the real reason for keeping Tegan. She tells him that she can convince Tegan to give her baby to them willingly. Hank disagrees but urges Polly to “make nice with” Tegan so that they don’t get arrested. Polly agrees to placate him.

Convinced that she’ll have to escape, Tegan makes a plan to sneak upstairs after Polly and Hank are asleep and flee in Hank’s truck. When she tries to move her left leg, though, the pain is unbearable. She knows she can’t get anywhere on it.

The next morning, Tegan tries to get Polly to admit that Hank abuses her, hoping that it will help Polly overcome her fear of him so that she’ll help Tegan. Polly is shocked and insists that Hank would never hurt her. Though she knows it will hurt, Tegan agrees to get out of bed and into the wheelchair after lunch to prevent bed sores.

Polly purchases ingredients for “Midwives Brew,” a recipe meant to induce labor. The cashier recognizes their purpose, so Polly has to play along with his assumption that she’s pregnant and past her due date, made plausible by her bulky coat. When she gets home, a strange car is in her driveway, and an unknown man is on her porch.

Tegan uses the lighter from Jackson to set fire to magazine pages, hoping that setting off the smoke alarm will force Polly to call 911 for help.

The man on the porch is Tegan’s brother, Dennis, searching for his missing sister. Polly feigns ignorance and offers him coffee. He hears a crash from the basement, but Polly blames it on a pet cat. She decides that she’ll kill him if needed, but he leaves. Polly smells smoke coming from the basement.

Polly easily smothers the fire that Tegan started with a blanket. She takes the lighter from Tegan and chastises her for being irresponsible with her baby’s safety. Her words are effective; Tegan feels guilty and ashamed.

Sadie comes over because she has no food left at home. Polly gives her a sandwich and then goes to get cookies for her. When she returns from the pantry, Sadie isn’t in her seat, and the basement door is open.

From the basement steps, Sadie hears Tegan call out for help. Polly yanks her back up the stairs. She tells Sadie that the woman is her cousin and that she’s very sick and very contagious. She warns Sadie not to tell anyone because they’ll want to visit and then they’ll get sick too.

Polly helps Tegan move from the bed to the wheelchair. Tegan still won’t let Polly remove her boot, though she knows she’s being illogical. Once Polly leaves, Tegan explores the basement in the wheelchair, looking for weapons or resources to help her escape.

Tegan finds a needle and syringe and plans to use them as a weapon the next time Polly comes downstairs.

After telling Hank that Tegan thinks they’d give her baby a good home, Polly gives Tegan the Midwives Brew, telling her that it’s a natural pain remedy. When Tegan says that someone will find her eventually, Polly brags about Dennis being there earlier and not realizing anything. Infuriated, Tegan throws her mug at Polly and then grabs her and holds the syringe needle to her neck.

Polly manages to break Tegan’s grip and get away from her unharmed. She threatens that Hank will be the one to come down next if Tegan doesn’t hand over the syringe. Remembering Hank’s words, Tegan relinquishes the needle.

That night, having seen Tegan’s injured leg, Hank tries to call 911 from his cell phone, but Polly smashes it. She stops him from driving Tegan to the hospital by threatening to die by suicide if he does. She attempted to die by suicide before, after “The Incident,” in which, after her hospital nursery shift, she wouldn’t give back the baby she was holding. Things ended peacefully, but she had to resign from her job. Now, her threat shatters Hank’s resolve, and he gives in.

Tegan interprets the commotion upstairs as Hank trying to come downstairs to hurt her and Polly stopping him. She’s reassured that Polly is on her side. As Polly moves Tegan from the wheelchair to the bed, Tegan begins having labor contractions. She promises not to go to the police if Polly lets her go. Polly pretends that she’s going to find a way to help Tegan.

As Hank and Polly argue that night, it becomes clear that Polly plans to kill Tegan. She justifies it by saying that Tegan is all alone and that she practically gave them permission when she said that nobody would miss her.

Tormented by her growing fear that Tegan might escape, Polly sneaks into the basement with a hammer in the middle of the night, planning to break Tegan’s kneecap on her good leg. A sudden moment of clarity stops her. She is horrified by what she almost did, yet she knows that she’ll be required to do something like that eventually.