How High We Go in the Dark

Dennis works as a supervisor for several floors of an elegy hotel, one of many hotels designed to host funerary viewings of the dead while they await the crematoriums. Dennis receives a visit from his mother and brother, joining them for dinner and reflecting on their strained relationships. He resents his brother, Bryan, who is a well-established doctor, which leads him to think about the difficulties of his job. After dinner, they ask Dennis to move back home and take care of his mother, who is dying of cancer. Dennis asks to think about it, infuriating his brother and making his mother cry.

Back at the hotel, he sits on the fire escape with Val, the young widow who works as his floor mate. A week later, they go to a bar, and Val presses him to make a decision. He’s snappish, causing a reflection of an earlier conflict in which Dennis asked too many questions about her husband and Val rejected him for several months. Val is his only companion besides Mr. Leung, a janitor whom Dennis helps in providing under-the-table cremations for local families in need. After one such night of cremations, Dennis again joins Val on the fire escape.