- Sammy comes running up to Dicey as she bikes to work. He’s all wound up about something.
- Turns out Gram came to his school that day and busted a move with the marbles on the playground (in 1982, grown-ups can do that.) She beat everybody, winning all their marbles.
- Gram, apparently, called herself the Lone Marble Ranger and made the boys let the girls play, too. Then she gave everybody their marbles back and gave Sammy her old ones.
- Apparently Gram never lost her marbles after all. (Sorry, you know we had to.)
- Dicey goes to work and is busy washing the windows when Miss Eversleigh comes in.
- After apologizing for not paying attention in class, Dicey says she can’t promise Miss Eversleigh she’ll try harder, because she hasn’t thought about it yet.
- Well, we'll give her props for bluntness.
- Back at home that night, Gram has an apple pie and news: they’re adopted!
- The next day at lunch, Dicey finds out that Gram has also, apparently, gone to visit Mina’s family, just to check them out. Everybody liked each other.
- Mina tells Dicey she wants to go to college to be a nurse. She asks Dicey what Dicey wants to do with her life, and Dicey says she never thinks more than a day ahead.
- Jeff meets Dicey after school, walks her to work, and asks her to the upcoming dance, but Dicey says she’s too young. Jeff agrees to wait a year, until Dicey’s in the 9th grade.
- When Dicey gets home, Gram’s grouchy: the welfare check came. But there’s more to it than that. She tells Dicey to go pack her suitcase, because they’re going to Boston.
- Mr. Lingerle drives them to the airport. Gram has sold the silver serving spoon to pay for the trip, but Mr. Lingerle gives them an envelope of money anyway, which Gram accepts.
- Gram won’t tell Dicey anything about what’s going on through the entire flight. They check into a motel when they get to Boston, but Gram’s still not talking.
- All she’ll say is, "Tomorrow."
- The next morning, Gram takes Dicey to the mental hospital to see Momma. The woman at the front desk throws them some shade about visiting hours and such, but Gram insists that both she and Dicey are going to Momma’s room, no matter what, thank you very much.
- A nurse named Preston meets them in the hallway and takes them into Momma’s room. Which is actually a big room full of lots of psychiatric patients, some of them catatonic, some of them rocking.
- One of the catatonic people is Momma.