The Night Shift

Chris attends a party with his girlfriend, Clare, who is a lawyer at a prestigious firm in Manhattan. He observes nothing but hypocrisy and condescension from her corporate lawyer colleagues, but he does bond with the bartender at the party, who also follows Mr. Nirvana’s vlog.

Ella meets with Agent Keller to talk about the case. (Ella has told the lead detective, Joe Arpeggio, that the killer said, “Good night, pretty girl” [77] to Jesse—the exact phrase that the Blockbuster killer said to her years ago.) Now, Keller says that Arpeggio never relayed this information to her, despite the fact that it connects the two cases. The file on the Blockbuster case also has not information on this point. Ella explains that she did not report this detail at the time because she did not remember it until later.

Ella stays at the bar after Keller leaves. She is drunk and is about to leave with a man she has just met when Jesse calls and says that she needs Ella’s help. Jesse has just been caught shoplifting at Target. The security guard explains the situation to Ella, and Jesse asserts her innocence with childish fury. Ella privately tells the guard about Jesse’s ordeal as the only survivor of the Creamery attacks, and he lets Jesse go without punishment.

Unable to sleep, Keller reviews the details of the case with her husband, Bob. They consider the possibility that Ella did tell someone about what the killer said, but does not remember doing so. If this is the case, they reason that she would have told a police officer or an investigator.

Ella offers Jesse a ride home after they leave Target. Jesse declines, then leads Ella through a hole in a fence and through a field to a train platform. Jesse stands at the very edge of the platform as the train approaches, making Ella fear that she will jump in front of it.

After the party, Chris contemplates his relationship with Clare. He believes that she is too good for him, and he wonders why she is still involved with him. For the first time, he tells her about his past and admits that his brother has been accused of murder and has been on the run for 15 years.

A YouTube excerpt describes one of Mr. Nirvana’s vlogs, in which he visits Chernobyl and is chased and cornered by a wolf.

To Ella’s relief, Jesse does not jump onto the train tracks; she just gets an adrenaline rush from standing so close to the train as it rushes by. She calls this activity “catching a train” (95). Afterward, Jesse tells Ella that she lied the night before about what really happened at the Dairy Creamery.

Before Jesse can tell Ella what she lied about, they see police cars approaching. Jesse runs and Ella follows. They end up at an abandoned warehouse, where two teenagers accuse Jesse of breaking their friend’s nose. Ella realizes that Jesse has a violent side. They stay at the house of Ella’s mother for the night—a mansion with tennis courts and stables. Jesse admits to lying about going to the Creamery to use the bathroom. In reality, she went there to confront Madison Sawyer. She hated Madison for gossiping about her.

On the second day after the murders, Keller learns the custodian has an airtight alibi and has been cleared of suspicion. She receives information from the Secret Service about Rusty Whitaker, Chris and Vince’s father. He is involved in a counterfeit cigarette ring, and a raid of his operation is planned for that night. Keller wants to use that bust as leverage to make Rusty reveal what he knows about the Blockbuster killings.

Chris’s client notices a scar on his hand. He got it when his father, Rusty, pressed his hand onto a burner because he drank the last Coke in the fridge. Chris remembers another incident when he was nine; that time, Rusty burned him with a cigar in punishment for Chris’s attempt to shield his mother from Rusty’s violence. Being a victim of abuse helps Chris to sympathize with people who have drug addictions, for he also sees them as victims.

A new vlog post indicates that Mr. Nirvana is in New York City.

Keller and Atticus try to interview Walter Young about the Blockbuster case, in which his daughter, Mandy, was killed. He refuses to talk to them. Keller and Atticus are scheduled to meet with Candy’s mother at 2:00 pm, and in the meantime, Keller wants to talk to Tony Grosso, the lead investigator from the Blockbuster case.

Ella explains why she went to public school and had a job in high school despite her parents’ wealth. Her older brother died of a drug overdose, and her dad thought that his death was the result of being spoiled by the family over the years. Ella’s father died when she was in college. Now, her mother, Phyllis, meets with Ella and Jesse over breakfast. After years of avoiding any discussion about Ella’s experience during the Blockbuster murders, now she tells Ella that it is time to move on.

In a flashback scene from December 5, 1999, the young Ella is working at Blockbuster. Mandy and Candy, who are both seniors in high school, do not care about the work and are irresponsible. Ella and Katie are both juniors and are the more reliable employees. Katie is from a very religious family. The four girls attend a party together after work, where they meet Vince. Katie is mesmerized by the handsome young man.

Keller and Atticus prepare to meet Tony Grosso, who retired shortly after the Blockbuster case. Atticus says that the case file implies that Grosso was overly eager to accept Vince’s guilt, despite discrepancies in the evidence.