Hattie

**Hattie Willowby** (married name **Hattie Adler**) is a supporting character in The Smoke Room. She has recently relocated with her teenage son Andy to Echo, the town where her ex-husband William Adler serves as sheriff.

## Appearance

Hattie is a middle-aged wolf with brown and gray fur of varying shades across her arms, neck, and head, along with white fur on her neck, chest, and forearms. She has brown hair and gray eyes with slight wrinkles around them. Hattie wears a yellow dress with a brown top that covers her chest and shoulders. She also wears a yellow ribbon in her hair that wraps around her ears.

## Personality

Hattie is an anxious but resolute woman who tries her best to care for her son despite their struggles. She refuses to accept pity from others, especially Will, and has worked diligently to provide for her family since being left on her own. Hattie still mourns the end of her marriage and feels she must have done something wrong to prompt Will to leave her, often getting lost in her regrets and bittersweet memories as a result. Hattie cares deeply about Andy and her main concern is assuring his safety.

Hattie is still affected by past experiences of having been stalked by criminals targeting Will, and seems to have a good perception of when she is in danger.

## Story

### Before The Smoke Room

Hattie's father is deceased and, according to William, her mother treated her poorly. Will seems to have married her in part to give her an escape from her adverse home life.

Hattie is a good cook and an occasional smoker, though she struggles to light her cigarettes due to shaky hands.

Hattie was married to William for several years before he moved to Echo. From Will's perspective, she was a loving and attentive wife with a lasting beauty and he was lucky to have her. However, their marriage was doomed due to Will's repressed homosexuality, and his inability to come clean to Hattie about it. The couple lived in the Windy City, with Will working to bring down the city's organized crime families and Hattie taking care of the home. Eventually, the two had a son whom they named Andy.

After Will exposed the son of a prominent mafioso, the Adlers were stalked and threatened on numerous occasions over the span of months. This experience shook Hattie greatly. Eventually Will left his family both for their own protection and to escape the feelings that ate away at him regarding his lack of attraction to Hattie, breaking her heart. Hattie was then left to raise Andy on her own, entering witness protection alongside him.

As a single mother, Hattie had a difficult time caring for herself and her young son. She took on many odd jobs such as cooking to support her family, and seems to have moved between various northern cities. Hattie wrote to Will monthly, and kept him updated on her and Andy's lives. Shortly before the start of The Smoke Room, Hattie once again felt that she was being stalked and began receiving threatening letters, culminating with the delivery of a series of threatening photos taken from within her apartment while she was not home and even while she was sleeping. Along with these pictures was the number for James Hendricks III. When later questioned about this by Will, James claims to have not been involved in initially relocating Hattie to Echo, and so the full picture of who is responsible is currently unclear.

On top of this, Andy's emerging desire to join the army worried Hattie greatly. In order to evade their apparent stalkers and leverage Will's influence to talk Andy out of enlisting, she relocated the family to Echo, although the abrupt and drastic move left Andy bitter. After arriving she called James, who offered her a position working as a cook in his household. Hattie accepted the job and made plans to speak with Will, both about their son's future and about the unresolved end of their marriage.

The day before Huxley Greene was killed, Hattie went to Red's General Goods to buy a large pack of tutti-frutti gum for James as part of her domestic duties. A wrapper from this type of gum is found on Huxley's property after his death, which eventually leads William back to Hattie during the course of his investigation into Huxley's murder.

### Will's Route

Hattie is first mentioned when Will and Sam are with James in his automobile; James mentions that Hattie arrived in Echo that morning and is staying at The Hip. Will immediately heads there and has a fierce exchange of words with her off-screen before storming off.

Hattie makes her first physical appearance on the route some time later, following the first day of Will's investigation. As the sheriff searches the Hip's saloon for Sam, he once again finds himself face-to-face with Hattie. She brings up the issues she has faced while on her own and informs Will that she has taken on a job as James' house cook. She then laments having "lost" Will and informs him of her reasons for coming to town, before begging Will to look after their son if anything should happen to her. Will does not provide her with a clear answer before departing.

Will's investigation later brings him back to the Hendricks mansion and he finds Hattie working in the kitchen. She addresses him angrily for his evasiveness, especially after he insists she is still in danger in Echo. She tells him the mansion is the safest place she has ever worked, but is then badly shaken once he explains that all the clues in the murder investigation he is currently pursuing have pointed him back to the Hendricks house. She assures him that the job has been mundane and that James has not made her do anything illegal. However, she does share one inexplicable thing: a vanity containing a large number of hand mirrors, which Cordelia is unaware of, near the entrance to the Hendricks' basement.

Hattie also laments the end of their marriage, longing for a more traditional life. She asks Will outright why he seems to still care about her despite their failed relationship, but he dodges the question, and tells her only that he can say more either when it is safe to or when he has nothing else left to lose.

### Murdoch's Route

After Murdoch and Sam stop by Will's office to drop off the photos of the crime scene, Will hurriedly shoos them away as a woman's voice calls to him from offscreen. This likely implies that Hattie and Will have reconnected in some capacity while Sam was occupied with his new job.

### Nik's Route

Sam joins Cordelia in her kitchen for some ice cream and encounters Hattie working her job as the Hendricks' new cook. Hattie treats her employer with the utmost politeness and helps her set out serving materials, before hinting that she needs to be given some space to work on that night's dinner.

Sam, Nik, and Cordelia see Hattie again after they return from the basement. Cordelia informs her with dismay that someone left the door to the icebox in the basement ajar and so the ice cream ingredients have become potentially contaminated. Hattie looks scared, so Cordelia assures her that she does not blame her but asks for her help in performing an inventory of the supplies. Hattie agrees, and says that Andy can assist them. When Cordelia expresses frustration that they may not have enough ingredients for an upcoming solstice party she is hosting, Hattie promises to have a pie ready for the guests.

## Relationships

### William

Will is Hattie's ex-husband. The two lived together in the Windy City and had Andy together, and it seems Hattie was largely unaware of Will's unhappiness in this relationship. Hattie was devastated by Will's departure from the family and feels she must have done something wrong to "lose" him, with no idea about Will's sexuality. She is somewhat bitter toward Will as a result, though she still trusts him to keep her and Andy safe and hopes that he will serve as a "strong male influence" for their son despite their rift.

### Andy

Hattie has been Andy's sole parent since Will's departure. Hattie loves her son wholeheartedly and has done her best to take care of him throughout the years. She is greatly worried by his desire to join the army and hopes to have Will talk him out of it, as she cannot bear to lose him. Hattie seems to consider Andy's safety her top priority, even over her own wellbeing.

## Trivia

* Hattie is the ancestor of Janice Adler from Echo.
* Hattie's current full name has not been stated explicitly, and so it is unclear whether she reverted to her maiden name of Willowby after her divorce or kept the surname Adler, which Andy also bears.