How Crucial Is It to the Story That It's Being Written in the Retrospective?

The story goes back and forth between whether she is afraid or isn't afraid of these dangers. You can already tell from the beginning of the story that something tragic is sort of haunting the story because of her almost immediate emphasis upon these dangers. Later on, we do learn that because it's being written in the retrospective, that in fact the story is being haunted by the death of a loved one.