I'm Thinking of Ending Things

After several hours in the car, Jake and the protagonist arrive at Jake’s family’s farm. The house is made of stone and visibly decaying with age. Jake proposes taking a walk around the farm before going in, though the protagonist is hesitant to do so since it is dark and cold. Jake takes her to see the sheep in the barn. Against the side of the barn, two dead lambs are frozen. The protagonist is shaken by their relative lack of decay in the cold and is surprised that Jake doesn’t want to talk about the lambs. Jake dismisses the lambs, claiming they’re frozen and will be burned once they thaw out come spring. Jake then takes her to the empty pig pen and explains how the two pigs his father once raised had been sickly and infested with maggots while alive. The protagonist is sickened by the story and wonders, “What if suffering doesn’t end with death? How can we know?” (82). Before they go inside, Jake shows the protagonist the henhouse. She notes one of the hens is eating its own egg.

Inside Jake’s parents’ house, Jake gives the protagonist a pair of blue slippers to wear because the floors can get cold.