Audrina Adare claims she is seven years old when the story opens, but her memory is unreliable, and the truth slips away behind the fog of time. She lives at Whitefern, a looming Victorian mansion, with her father, Damian Jonathan Adare, her mother Lucietta, her aunt Ellsbeth, and her cousin Vera. The family does everything they can to shield Audrina from dates, including her own birthday. Audrina knows she was born on September 9, yet the passage of days feels elastic, and Vera taunts her, calling her insane for clinging to a time she cannot trust.
Damian, in his own quiet faith, believes Audrina “walks in her own time space.” Nine years before Audrina was born, her elder sister—also named Audrina and born on September 9—was raped and murdered in the woods on her ninth birthday. Damian tells Audrina stories about the “first and best Audrina” and tries to guide the younger girl through self-hypnosis—returning to the old Audrina’s bedroom and rocking in her chair—in a bid to reclaim memories and make Audrina feel beloved in the way the original sister once was. He even frames memory therapy as a path to belonging, a hope Audrina longs for more than anything.
Audrina grows up in near-total isolation, with Vera as the only real outside contact. Vera despises her cousin, insisting that Audrina stole Damian’s affection and that the “second and worst” Audrina will never measure up to the first. Vera is a calculating, brittle girl who uses charm and manipulation to pull attention toward herself, often reveling in making Audrina suffer. Audrina, meanwhile, is haunted by dreams of her sister’s rape and is terrified by sexual intimacy at a young age. Vera’s scheming nature shows early: she is a master at convalescence and deception, frequently drawing Damian’s sympathy away from Audrina.
When Audrina is seven, she meets Arden Lowe and his mother Billie, a former ice skater who has become a double amputee. They move into the groundkeeper’s cottage near the woods where the first Audrina died. Although Audrina fears the woods, she willingly visits Billie and Arden, and Damian gradually allows these visits to continue. Lucietta becomes pregnant again, and the family brings in Mrs. Allismore, a psychic, to predict the baby’s gender. The psychic declares the child will be neither male nor female, a prediction Vera calmly accepts as fitting for a “freak” to join the family.
On Audrina’s ninth birthday, Lucietta goes into labor and dies in childbirth, leaving behind a baby girl named Sylvia. The loss weighs heavily on Audrina, who now begins piano lessons with Vera at the home of Lamar Rensdale, a memory of Lucietta’s musical talent kept alive in the house. Sylvia remains in the hospital for more than two years before finally coming home, revealing a child who is mentally challenged. Audrina is instructed to help care for Sylvia, and she begins attending school with Ellsbeth reluctantly agreeing to take on Sylvia’s needs.
As the years pass, Audrina discovers that Vera and Lamar are intimately involved, and Vera becomes pregnant. When Audrina confronts Vera with her knowledge, Vera reacts with anger and a fight ensues, resulting in Vera’s miscarriage. The next day, Vera leaves town with Lamar, writing a note claiming she is Audrina’s paternal half-sister due to a long-ago affair between Ellsbeth and Damian. Damian does not deny the rumor, relieved to see Vera depart, while Ellsbeth accepts the truth.
After Audrina turns eighteen, she learns that Damian and Ellsbeth are lovers again. Ellsbeth threatens to leave Damian unless he will help Vera, who is now alone after Lamar’s suicide. The couple’s tension seems to settle for a moment, but the next morning Ellsbeth falls to her death from a mysterious stairs accident. In the upheaval that follows, Audrina elopes with Arden, taking Sylvia with her, hoping to escape her controlling father. The wedding night is awkward and difficult because Audrina is not yet prepared for sex.
Back at Whitefern, Damian brings Arden’s mother Billie into the fold and invites her to live with them, offering Arden a place at his company since he cannot find steady work. Audrina is uneasy about Damian’s manipulations but tries to keep the peace, wanting Billie and Arden to be happy. Vera returns, and although Damian orders her to leave, Billie is heartbroken by his cold behavior and convinces him to let Vera stay. Vera immediately resumes trying to win Arden away, intensifying Audrina’s fear of losing the man she loves.
As Billie and Damian’s relationship develops, Audrina discovers that they have become lovers, a discovery that Sickens Audrina but also compels her to examine her own feelings. When Billie dies after another fall down the stairs, Audrina suspects Sylvia and protects the younger girl from accusations. The house grows even tenser as Vera rekindles her pursuit of Arden, and Audrina’s sense of stability continues to crumble.
Eventually, Audrina’s own awakening returns with a surge of desire and resolve. She and Arden share a night of happiness, and Audrina wakes in the middle of the night to check on Sylvia, wandering into the room of the first Audrina for the first time in years. There, visions of the past—Arden among the woods and fleeing—sharpen, leaving Audrina confused and emotionally raw. She confronts Arden, but he pushes her down the stairs, leaving her dead for a moment before she slips into a coma. From the coma she can’t move or speak, but she overhears Vera and Arden plotting to disconnect Audrina’s life support, while Sylvia helps Audrina cling to life.
Sylvia’s faith and resilience help Audrina break free, and Audrina wakes. She confronts Damian about the truth behind her older sister’s death and learns a devastating history: the first Audrina never existed as an independent person—the narrative Damyan fed Audrina about her past was a lie. Audrina realizes she herself was gang-raped in the woods, and Damian had tried to erase that truth. He subjected her to electro-convulsive therapy to erase the memory, then manipulated time—changing clocks and ripping out calendar days—to make Audrina believe she was two years younger and that the rape had been committed against a sister who died before she was born. Arden’s presence had known the truth all along but hid it to protect Audrina.
When Damian finally reveals the full truth, Vera appears in the doorway, and Audrina’s memories come flooding back. Vera’s guilt is suggested but not fully proven; Damian accuses Vera, who retorts that he never acknowledged her as his daughter and that Audrina’s purity was the real prize he valued. In a fatal moment, Vera slips and falls down the stairs, dying from her injuries.
Heartbroken and betrayed, Audrina decides to leave Whitefern with Sylvia, hoping to escape the house’s tragic cycle. Yet Sylvia’s simple plea—“home, Audrina, home”—touches Audrina, and she resolves to stay. Rather than run, she chooses to replace the painful memories with new, honest ones and to redefine her sense of self. By facing the truth and choosing honesty over escape, Audrina feels she has finally become the “first” Audrina she has always strived to be.
> "first and best Audrina"
