The Narrator Timeline and Summary

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• The narrator goes to Ogilvy's observatory to see the Martian lights.
• Friday: Some time later (how long? It's not clear, but we know it's on a Friday), the narrator goes to look at the Martian cylinder that lands in Horsell Common. Nothing much is happening, but when he comes back that evening, the cylinder opens and the Martians come out. And attack. The narrator survives the Martian Heat-Ray attack and goes home to tell his wife about it.
• Saturday: After being assured by everyone that everything's going to be okay, the Martians hit the narrator's house with a Heat-Ray. He rents a cart and horse and takes his wife to Leatherhead. He heads back to Woking that night to return the cart and horse. Unfortunately, Woking has been destroyed.
• Saturday night: The narrator sees the Martian tripods, hides in his house, and meets the artilleryman.
• Sunday: The narrator and the artilleryman travel to Weybridge, which is then attacked by the Martians. The narrator gets to fulfill his wish of seeing a Martian die. He's also burned by hot water because he's focused on seeing the Martian die. He survives the attack, hops into a boat, and drifts downstream. Later that day, he rests on the shore of the river and meets the curate. They travel together and see the Martians use their Black Smoke, which traps them in a house in Halliford.
• Monday: A Martian comes by and gets rid of the Black Smoke around midday, so the narrator and the curate can leave. They go out and walk to Sheen, occasionally hiding in ditches and in sheds.
• That night, they get stuck in a house when a Martian cylinder crashes on it (or at least in the neighborhood). From the ruined house, the narrator observes the Martians. And they're stuck there for the next, oh, say, two weeks (2.1.18).
• On the third day of their imprisonment, the narrator sees the Martians kill (and presumably eat) a boy. (If we're counting Tuesday as the first day of imprisonment, then this is on a Thursday.)
• On the sixth day, the narrator tries to impose a system of rationing so the hungry curate doesn't eat all their food.
• On the eighth day, the curate starts to talk louder. On the ninth day, the curate starts to talk so loudly that the narrator hits him with the blunt handle of a meat cleaver. The Martians hear and come to investigate, which spooks the narrator. He hides in the coal cellar, but the Martians grab the curate.
• The narrator hides for a few days, eventually coming out to get some water. On the fifteenth day of being stuck in the house, he hears a dog in the crater and realizes that the Martians have gone away.
• He goes to Putney that night and sleeps in a made bed for the first time in a long while.
• The next day (Wednesday?), he meets the artilleryman and spends the day with him, talking about the future of mankind and playing cards. That night he decides to leave the artilleryman and go to London.
• The narrator goes to London (presumably the next morning) and wanders around, seeing the destruction and desolation. (Add "and gets fish and chips" and that's pretty much what there is to do in London. Zing.) He hides for a while that night.
• The next morning, he decides to commit suicide by showing himself to the Martians. When he tries to do that, he finds out that the Martians have already all died.
• In celebration, the narrator goes a little mad and wanders around for three days (so, through Sunday?), until some nice strangers take him in. He stays with them for the next… well, it's unclear.
• The narrator decides to go see his ruined house in Woking. While there, he finds his wife. And everyone lives happily ever after.
• Except the narrator is still haunted by what he saw during the Martian invasion.