Part 1, Chapter 3 Summary

The town courthouse is closed so the Judge's house doubles as the local court. The Judge reads Elaine and Nathan's charges to them at his kitchen table and tells Elaine she can make one phone call. She should have picked her children up hours ago. She calls her mother, who lectures her about where she has been and what she has done.

Elaine's Mother (Yvonne) is originally from Birmingham, Alabama. She has two children by her boyfriend, Frank Bartlett: Frank Jr. and Frances Elaine (Elaine). She leaves Frank and enters into a relationship with a white man named Ronald Windsor and has four more children: Ronald Jr., Kenneth, Sabrina and Donjuan.

A few years later, Ronald dies of a cocaine overdose and the family is poverty stricken. Yvonne is caught cheating the welfare system and her benefits are taken away. Elaine...