Content Warning: This section of the guide discusses mental illness, domestic violence, food insecurity, and child hunger. Additionally, the novel uses offensive terms relating to people with intellectual disabilities, which this guide replicates in direct quotation only.

Dicey Tillerman looks after her younger siblings, James, Maybeth, and Sammy, in the family’s car, which is parked in a shopping mall parking lot. Their mother, Liza Tillerman, ordered the children to behave before entering the mall. Hours go by, and Dicey grows increasingly alarmed about Liza’s whereabouts. The previous evening, Liza woke her children, instructing them to pack clothes in paper bags, and she began driving them to a relative’s house in Connecticut. Dicey navigated until they stopped at the mall. When Liza doesn’t appear by evening, the children wander the mall looking for her. They eat cheap hamburgers and fries from the cafeteria.

Back in the car, Dicey considers her options. Liza lost her job and can no longer afford rent at their apartment. Dicey doesn’t trust police or social workers, who might split up the siblings into different foster homes until Liza is located. They don’t believe Liza was kidnapped; Dicey and James begin to accept that their mother abandoned them.