Dec. 26, 2016

RACHEL SCHULTZ

When Cody and Rachel both lose their jobs in New York, they relocate to Cody's hometown in Garland to help take care of Cody's sick mother. This causes their marriage to take a turn – Rachel loved their life in New York and hates living in the southwest, and she soon begins to resent Cody for making her move to his hometown.

On their wedding anniversary, Rachel disappears without a trace, and over time, Cody becomes a suspect in her disappearance. Among other reasons, his lack of emotion about Rachel's disappearance and the discovery that Rachel was pregnant when she went missing lead both the police and the public to believe that Cody may have murdered his wife.

In the second half of the blog, the reader learns that the main characters are unreliable narrators, and that they are not being given all of the information. Cody is revealed to have been cheating on his wife and Rachel is revealed to be alive and in hiding, and is trying to frame Cody for her "death" as revenge. Her pregnancy and her diary entries are revealed to be fake; she fabricated them in order to further incriminate Cody. Her plan is foiled, however, when she is robbed at the motel she was hiding in. Desperate, she seeks help from her ex-boyfriend [redacted], who agrees to hide her in his lake house but soon becomes possessive, causing Rachel to feel trapped.

Meanwhile, Cody has discovered that Rachel is framing him for her murder, but he has no way of proving it. Together, he and his lawyer work to change the public's perception of Cody. He is granted an interview with a popular talk show host, and during the interview he pretends to be apologetic for his infidelity and appeals to Rachel to come back. Rachel sees the TV interview and is convinced that Cody really does want her back. She murders [redacted]after seducing him and returns to her husband, fabricating a story that she had been kidnapped and imprisoned by [redacted]. Although Cody knows she's lying, he has no proof, but he soon begins writing a blog detailing Rachel's crimes and deceptions. Aware of Cody's intentions to expose her lies, Rachel uses Cody's semen they had saved at a fertility clinic to make herself pregnant. She then forces him to delete his blog by threatening to keep him from their unborn child. In the end, Cody deletes his blog and chooses to stay with Rachel for his child's sake.