An unraveling woman becomes fixated on her neighbor, a beautiful, successful actress. Trapped in a rundown apartment and dead-end job, the unnamed narrator is unhappily childless and recently separated. She can't help noticing that the actress, meanwhile, has her face on the side of every bus, a gleaming house, a husband, and three children. She becomes increasingly unhinged, and an interaction with the actress at the annual block party takes a disastrous turn into a dark and irretrievable madness.
