Beatrice

Beatrice, known as Bea, is Carl's girlfriend until a few days before everything begins, and the owner of Donut, a tortoiseshell Persian show cat. The two of them share a two-bedroom apartment in Seattle, and one of its rooms belongs entirely to the cat, full of Best-in-Show and Best-in-Breed ribbons, trophies and framed photos of Donut on a show table with Bea and a judge behind her. Bea takes Donut to a show nearly every weekend, and her whole family raises and shows Persian cats. She keeps a firm rule against smoking in the apartment.

At the start Bea is in the Bahamas with friends for New Year's. Carl ends things with her over the phone once he learns her ex-boyfriend came along on the trip, and he agrees to look after Donut until she gets back, since her parents live across the Cascades and the weather has closed the passes.