Chapters 17 and 18 Summary

Chapter 17

After Lena and Dion left, Marie's father came to talk to her. He wondered what happened to Sherry. Marie told him that Sherry was always trying to boss her around. Her father didn't like the looks of Lena and Dion - their clothes, the look in their eyes. Was it race, Marie asked. That was part of it but there was more than that. But Marie liked her. She wanted Lena for her friend. Her father asked her if she remembered all the struggles that blacks had had with whites over the years. She remembered, she told him, but they were living in the 1990s. He reminded her that their neighborhoods were still segregated. She understood that blacks had to stick together. Lena might befriend her then turn on her. Marie blurted out that Lena's mother had died. It softened...