How It All Goes Down
- Skeeter, who narrates this chapter, wakes to the sound of her own screaming.
- She really needs to get out of Jackson. If she doesn't get any of the out-of-town jobs she's applied for, she could be stuck here for good.
- Her mother is feeling a lot better and isn't even upset that Skeeter and Stuart aren't getting married.
- One day Skeeter is at the drugstore and Lou Anne, one of the ladies, calls her over.
- She tells Skeeter that Hilly tried to get her to fire her maid Louvenia. But Lou Anne loves Louvenia and will never fire her. She admires Skeeter and the book.
- She's figured out that the pie chapter is about Hilly. She tells Skeeter that Hilly is now going around town telling everybody the book is definitely not about Jackson.
- That night, Hilly drives to Skeeter's and confronts her. She says she's suing Skeeter and is here to tell Charlotte what Skeeter has done. She claims to have some kind of proof.
- Charlotte comes out, but Hilly loses her nerve. Before Hilly leaves, she tells Skeeter she knows the first chapter is about Elizabeth because the L-shaped crack in her dining room table is described.
- Hilly says she has "big plans" for Aibileen and Minny.
- Skeeter says, "Careful, Hilly. […] Don't give yourself away now" (33.91). Hilly says, "That was not me WHO ATE THAT PIE!" (33.93). Right.
- That night, Skeeter calls Aibileen. Minny's over at Aibileen's house. Skeeter tells them about her confrontation with Hilly. They decide there's nothing to do but wait and see what Hilly does.
- Skeeter tells them she's been offered a job as a copy editor in New York City at Harper's Magazine. She says she can't take it. She refuses leave Minny, Aibileen, and the other maids "in this mess" (33.115).
- Minny and Aibileen convince Skeeter that she must take the job – they remind her that her life here in Jackson is not good. They can take care of themselves.
- Skeeter is thrilled. She's taking the job, and heading for the Big Apple.