Grace flies to Boston to visit her grandpa, whom she hasn’t seen since her grandmother died a year ago. She is relieved to find him looking healthier, but she is also confused to learn that he has bought an old boarded-up mill that he plans to refurbish. She wants to use facts to puzzle out why he bought the building, but no matter how she tries to tell herself that she is being scientific, she knows that she is “just being nosy” (7). Exploring the building, Grace finds boxes full of old buttons, which her grandpa promises to ship to her house in Illinois. Grace finds comfort in collecting things for reasons which she prefers not “to think about now” (11).

On the first day of school, Grace starts to tell Ellie, her best friend, about the buttons, but Ellie interrupts and talks nonstop for several minutes about all the places she went over the summer. By the time she finishes, Grace no longer wants to tell Ellie about the buttons because it seems insignificant, and she suspects that Ellie doesn’t care.