Piecing Me Together

Jade’s mother intuitively knows that something is wrong between Jade and Maxine. As they eat the leftovers from Soul Food Sunday, Jade confides that she wants to quit the program because it makes her feel like a “charity case” (168). This angers Jade’s mother, who forbids her from quitting. She reminds Jade that she cannot afford to forfeit the college scholarship she will be awarded if she completes the program, also, she does not want Jade to be the sort of person who “walks away” from commitments. Moreover, even if Maxine is “imperfect,” Jade can still learn from Maxine:

‘So what, Maxine isn’t perfect? This girl graduated from St. Francis as valedictorian. She learned how to navigate this white world, and she’s trying to show you how to do the same. You telling me she has nothing to teach you? You better learn how to get from this opportunity what you can and let the rest fall off your back’ (169).

She concludes by saying that Jade needs to “figure it out” (169) and that under no circumstances is Jade quitting the program.

Chapter 43 is a one-page, fragmented retelling of a moment from Jade’s life. Indirectly, it portrays her sadness and internal struggles related to Maxine and Sam through a scene from Mr. Flores’s Spanish class, where they are learning words and phrases related to going to the doctor. Jade observes that “Mr. Flores is always teaching about one kind of thing while I’m thinking about another” (170). The class learns the following phrases: “No me siento bien. I don’t feel well” and “Me duele aqúi. It hurts here” (170). 

Jade skips the next two Woman to Woman outings, as she is still avoiding Maxine. Even though she misses going places she might not have otherwise gone, Jade does not miss “the lectures about how to eat, how to not be who I am” (171). Jade is at home in bed when she hears a knock at the door. It is Lee Lee, who has come to visit Jade after Jade’s mother told her that she needed someone to talk to. Lee Lee insists that Jade confide in her, and Jade admits that she is considering quitting Woman to Woman. Jade says she does not feel she is getting anything out of the program, but Lee Lee agrees with Jade’s mother: Jade should not quit the program. Instead, Lee Lee suggests that she speak to whoever is in charge and let them know what she needs, and what needs to change about the program. 

Jade calls Maxine the following day and asks if they can get together. Maxine agrees right away, and she goes to Jade’s house. When Maxine hugs Jade as a greeting, Jade can tell she feels guilty: “She holds on to me as if to say, I’m sorry for hurting you” (174). They drive to a restaurant for dinner. Fortified by her conversation with Lee Lee, Jade starts voicing her concerns on the drive there:

‘I want something more from Woman to Woman […] I don’t want to sound ungrateful. I mean, I do like going on all those trips, but sometimes you make me feel like you come to fix me; only, I don’t feel broken. Not until I’m around you’ (176).

Maxine apologies for hurting Jade and for not allowing her to speak for herself. She then asks what Woman to Woman can do better. Jade says she would like to learn about “real-life things” (177), like how to create a budget; she would love an outing to Maxine’s sister’s gallery, and to learn about how Mia started her business as a gallery owner. When Maxine asks if there is anything else, Jade brings up Jon—but Maxine stops her. She tells Jade she is right, and then suggests they talk about him over dinner.

Jade and Maxine wait to be seated at the restaurant. Conversation between them flows more easily now that Jade has cleared the air. When they are at the table, the conversation turns to Jon. Jade clarifies that she is not “anti-Jon,” she is “pro-Maxine” (180). Maxine begins to cry and says, “Oh, Jade, you have me in here, getting all emotional. You’re not supposed to be giving me the advice” (180). Maxine agrees that she needs to end things for good with Jon. Maxine offers to strike a deal with Jade: She will quit Jon, and Jade will not quit the program. Jade agrees: “Deal” (180).

Jade is running late for school, and she grabs two Pop-Tarts as she leaves. As she approaches the front door, E.J. asks her from his bed in the living room if Jade has heard what happened Saturday night. E.J. tells her that a 15-year-old black teen by the name of Natasha Ramsey was manhandled by the police at a house party. Natasha has fractured ribs and a broken jaw and is in the hospital in critical condition. Jade leaves for school, disturbed by the news: “I go to class and the entire time all I can think about is Natasha Ramsey. Her smiling face” (183). 

At lunchtime, Jade is still thinking about Natasha Ramsey, but no one at the school is talking about the news:

All day long I’ve been whispering prayers. Natasha’s name haunts me. No one speaks her name or mentions what happened. It’s as if no one in the school knows or cares that an unarmed black girl was assaulted by the police just across the river (184).

Jade is deep in thought in the lunch line when she realizes that the lunch lady, Ms. Weber, is telling her to “keep the line moving” (185). Ms. Weber also tells Hannah, one of Jade’s white classmates, to keep moving. Hannah rolls her eyes and suggests Ms. Weber might be PMS-ing. When Jade laughs, Ms. Weber sends her to Mrs. Parker’s office because of her “attitude problem” (185).

Jade stands against the wall outside of Mrs. Parker’s office while Ms. Weber gives her side of the story. After she is finished, Jade enters Mrs. Parker’s office and explains that even though Hannah was the one being disrespectful, Jade is somehow getting the punishment. Mrs. Parker does not admit that Ms. Weber was lying about how Jade behaved in the lunchroom; instead, Mrs. Parker glosses over Ms. Weber’s behavior and simply says that she is trying to help Jade. She suggests that Jade go home to collect herself so they can start fresh the next day and move on from the misunderstanding.

Sam calls Jade and asks if she is okay after the incident in the lunchroom. Sam says that she is shocked they sent Jade home, but then again, Jade was “mouthing off” (189). Jade points out that Hannah was the one “mouthing off” to Ms. Weber, but she can get away with it because she is white. Sam disagrees, saying that Hannah is able to get away with it because she is rich. Jade responds by saying that that is what people will say about Natasha Ramsey—that her being black had nothing to do with her brutal beating by the police. Sam says “who?” at the mention of Natasha Ramsey because she has not heard about the incident. There is silence between Jade and Sam, and they hang up. 

After hanging up with Sam, Jade calls Lee Lee and asks if she heard the news about Natasha Ramsey. Like Jade, Lee Lee says that she has been thinking about it all day. Unlike St. Francis, Lee Lee’s school had a town hall meeting for students who needed to talk about what happened. Lee Lee says that one of her teachers gave them an assignment to write a poem about any victim of police brutality, but that does not feel sufficient to Lee Lee and she begins to cry. She confides to Jade, who immediately agrees, that the incident just feels “too close” (192), as if either one of them could have been the victim.

That night, Jade cannot sleep. Just before dawn, she starts another collage about York. Jade thinks about how Clark wrote that some of the tribes had never seen a black person before. The tribes “thought York was magic, thought he was some kind of supernatural being. York would tell them he was a black man, nothing had happened to his skin” (194). Jade ruminates on what York must have felt when they said things like that to him: “Did he remember existing in a world where no one thought him strange, thought him beast? Did he remember being human?” (194).

Jade and Maxine go for a walk through Columbia Park, and Jade talks about her problems with Sam. Maxine’s advice to Jade is to say something to Sam about how her actions and words make Jade feel. Jade notes this is another area of her life that she can improve if she makes her voice heard: “Something else I need to speak up about” (196). Jade feels strengthened after her conversation with Maxine; she is not ready to “quit” on herself, her friendship with Sam, and her dreams. 

Jade walks into Mr. Flores’s classroom as he is eating lunch and watching a news clip about Natasha Ramsey on his laptop. Jade joins him to watch the news report, in which a doctor says that physically Natasha will recover. Mr. Flores says he is glad that Natasha will be okay but wonders what the psychological damage will be.

When Mr. Flores asks Jade what brings her to his classroom, Jade tells him that she wants to know why he did not nominate her for the study abroad program. Jade lays out all the reasons she deserved to go:

‘I have an A in your class. You always pick me to help people in the class who are struggling. And, you know this is an opportunity to do volunteer work in and service and that would look really good on my college resume; plus, without the study abroad program, I doubt I’ll ever, ever get an opportunity to travel internationally’ (198).

Mr. Flores’s face flushes with color, and he explains that while Jade deserved to go, he wanted to be fair to his other students, who also deserve opportunities. Jade explains that she does not think the other students were undeserving, but she wishes she could be seen as “someone who can give” instead of solely as “someone who needs” (199). Mr. Flores does not answer Jade’s question and instead reaffirms that he needed to be fair to the other students. Jade thanks Mr. Flores for his time before going to the bathroom, where she hides in a stall and cries.

It is the weekend before spring break, and Jade sits in the living room with Sam’s grandfather while Sam is in the attic, trying to find a suitcase. Jade had promised to sit with Sam while she packs for her trip to Costa Rica. She is doing her best to control her feelings about not being nominated: “I am really trying to be mature and not take my disappointment out on Sam” (203). Jade asks what is on the itinerary for the trip, and Sam replies that she will mostly do volunteer work with school children and help their teachers. Sam tries her best to downplay the trip, but Jade notes that she is “not a good actress” (203). Sam eventually asks Jade if she is mad that Sam is going to Costa Rica; Jade replies no—she is mad because she is not going. Sam says that it is not fair for Jade to be jealous, since Jade is the one who gets to do “cool things all the time” (203). Furthermore, she has always been supportive of Jade, so why is it that Jade cannot be happy for Sam “just this once” (205). Jade replies that SAT prep and tutoring after school are not the same as a trip to Costa Rica; Sam knows nothing about only being included in programs that want to “fix you.” Still upset, Jade tells Sam to have fun on her trip and leaves.

Jade has an entire week off for spring break, and she spends her time hanging out with Lee Lee and Lee Lee’s cousin Andrea. The girls chat about dating, Lee Lee’s ex, and a boy named Tyrell who has a crush on Andrea. The girls walk to Columbia Park and Jade takes pictures: “We keep walking. The whole way, I’m documenting the city, taking photos of strangers I’ve never seen, strangers I see every day. Like the woman who is always sitting on her porch, knitting something” (208). As the girls continue to walk, they see a police car with its lights flashing in the distance: “White cops have pulled over a black woman. We walk closer. Stop at enough distance not to be noticed but close enough to be witnesses” (209). The girls try to stay calm, but each of them is having a nervous reaction: Lee Lee’s hand shakes, Andrea’s breathing gets heavier. When the police write the woman a ticket and release her, the girls breathe a sigh of relief. Jade takes Lee Lee’s hand and gives it a reassuring squeeze; she reminds them that they are okay, and that the woman is fine. 

Jade prints the photos she took that day. When she starts making her next collage, she is startled by how it unleashes a flood of emotions, all related to racial injustice:

Every tear I’ve been holding in goes onto the page. Tears for Mom’s swollen ankles after a long day of work, for her jar of pennies. […] Tears for what happened with Mrs. Weber, the lady at the mall, the boys at Dairy Queen. […] Tears for every name of unarmed black men and women I know of who’ve been assaulted or murdered by the police are inked on the page (211).

When spring break ends, Jade knows that Sam has returned from Costa Rica, but for some reason Sam does not ride the bus to school that day: “Not having Sam’s company makes the ride seem longer” (213). When Jade arrives at school, she sees Sam in the hallway and they wave at each other from a distance without smiling. 

Jade and Maxine go to the Esplanade along the Willamette River; Maxine asks what has been on Jade’s mind lately. Jade tells her that she feels as if she keeps being “stitched together and coming undone” (214). Maxine says that she can relate to that feeling and that she often felt that way at St. Francis. They bond over how, as some of the few black students at St. Francis, they often had certain things assumed about them—Maxine admits that her fellow students often assumed she was on scholarship. They agree that it is “exhausting” to have to combat people’s expectations and assumptions of them simply because of their race.

Maxine also goes into more detail about how race-related assumptions had an effect on her upper-middle-class upbringing. For example, Maxine’s father, a real estate agent, would always advise his black clients to remove any African American artwork and photos from their homes in order to have greater odds of selling their house. Maxine says that this made her feel conflicted about her blackness. Maxine says, “I guess it made me feel like blackness needed to be hidden, toned down, and that whiteness was good, more acceptable” (216). Jade assumed Maxine had no idea about her struggles related to race, but now she sees Maxine differently. Maxine is reminded of what her grandmother used to say about the importance of talking it out—“bearing witness,” as her grandmother called it: “I think what my grandmother was saying is that it feels good to know someone knows your story, that someone took you in […] She’d tell me, it’s how we heal” (218). 

The next time Jade sees Maxine, Woman to Woman is holding its inaugural Money Matters workshop. Due to Jade’s suggestion, not only is Woman to Woman having a workshop on a more practical topic, but it is holding the event at a location within the community it is meant to serve: “We’re having the meeting at a small church not too far away from my house. The pastor is letting us use the space. I love that I didn’t even need to take a bus or get a ride from Maxine to get here” (219). Sabrina, the founder of Woman to Woman, thanks Jade for suggesting this topic and introduces the panelists who will discuss the best ways to make and manage money in college. Jade takes copious notes, which she wants to pass on to her mother, E.J., and Lee Lee: “Bring back something other than food this time” (220). 

Chapter 60 is a one-page chapter about Jade’s usual routine of posting her weekly schedule to the dry erase calendar she and her mother keep on the fridge. Jade puts a “big circle” around the third Saturday of the month, which is when Woman to Woman will visit Maxine’s sister’s art gallery. Jade is excited for this outing, so much so that she counts the very hours until the outing: “Three more weeks. Twenty-one days. Five hundred and four hours” (221).