Nel and Sula slip back into their friendship with ease, humor, and a deeply satisfying pleasure. Nel questions Sula's decision to place Eva in a nursing home. She tries to understand Sula's fear of the old woman and gently coaxes her to find a better solution for her grandmother. Nel's husband, Jude, is intrigued by Sula's unpredictability and odd philosophy about life.
When Nel discovers Sula and Jude naked together, she realizes that her marriage is destroyed and that Sula has irreparably ruptured their friendship. Jude abandons his marriage, and Nel suffers deep, emotional trauma over the loss of both her husband and her best friend. Nel's relationships with both Sula and Jude always meant, for her, a fusion of each of these strong, independent personalities with her own timid, less-secure identity; with Sula — and with Jude — Nel was able to create one significant person. After the breakup of her marriage to Jude and her friendship with Sula, she is emotionally shattered and, for a while, seems to be on the verge of emotional despair.
