Patina “Patty” Jones likes to win. The narrative opens with Patty narrating the events of the first track meet of her team’s season. She watches her teammate and friend, Ghost, win first place after a “false start” (4). Patty expects to win her event but comes in second place. Patty is angry and describes the urge to kick something. Instead, she sits down on the bench and is silent for the rest of the track meet.

The next day, Patty braids her sister’s hair before going to church. Patty explains that she and sister, Maddy, live with their adoptive parents, Momly and Uncle Tony. Patty and Maddy see their mother, Ma, each week for church, and Patty feels that it’s important for both she and her sister to be dressed “all the way up” for when they see Ma (10). Momly drives Patty and Maddy to their old neighborhood, Barnaby Terrace, which Patty describes as a place where “Everybody’s just regular” (10).

Patty, now 12, remembers that she herself was “regular” until six years ago when her father died suddenly in his sleep. After this loss, her mother’s diabetes diagnosis gradually worsened until she had to have both of her legs amputated.