Content Warning: This section describes and discusses the source text’s treatment of death, murder, and sexual violence.

The novel’s protagonist, from whose point of view the story unfolds, is Margot, a cautious and somewhat timid young woman who attends Rutledge College. In high school, she relied on Eliza Jefferson, who had a more boisterous and confident personality. After Eliza’s death, Margot feels lost and unsure of herself. She then shifts her dependence to Maggie, her first roommate at Rutledge, who helps ensure that Margot doesn’t harm herself during the periods of intense grief and guilt she experiences in the year after Eliza’s death. Margot soon eschews Maggie, however, in favor of Lucy, who reminds her of Eliza, and even in the novel’s final chapters, she depends on Sloane and Nicole. Nevertheless, Margot has brief moments of confidence or self-assertion, such as when she flings Eliza away from her, leading to Eliza’s death, and when she stands up to Levi on Halloween. Margot’s character arc follows her desire to transform herself as she tries to become more like Eliza and Lucy. This desire primarily drives her decisions.

Margot’s role in the novel is to obscure the mystery of Eliza’s and Levi’s deaths, and her cautious attitude is conducive to investigating these deaths.