Narrator

The narrator is a middle-aged woman who works as a writer and a professor. By choice, she has never married or had children. She appears to be generally content with her life, although she is worried that, as an aging woman, she will begin to become generally shunned by society. The narrator’s role in the novel appears to be more of a passive observer than an active participant, as her dying friend is arguably the more central subject of the story. The narrator visits her dying friend multiple times in the hospital. When the friend’s diagnosis becomes terminal, with no real chance of survival, the narrator agrees to remain with the friend until the friend dies.

When the friend decides that she wants to kill herself, she asks the narrator to remain with her in the days leading up to the friend’s planned suicide. The...