Summary

The non-fiction work begins with Maggie, a 23 year-old woman in Fargo getting ready for her day. She thinks back to being 17 and how a mystery man loved how youthful she used to be. She also reminisced about her father’s recent death and the dissolution of her relationship with the mystery man.

In the present tense, Maggie drives to the local courthouse with her brother, David, happy that her act of going to the police means that her mystery man will have to see her again. She thinks triumphantly that “For six years, he stayed away. But he will come today...You’re worried that you’re going to want him” (27). The freezing cold makes Maggie think how Fargo, much like this day, sometimes feels like a new beginning.

When Maggie enters the courtroom, she notices the two prosecutors, Jon and Paul, and...