As Sara wanders the streets, she thinks about a girl she read about who worked in a shop by day and studied at a night school. Before long, the girl obtained a degree and became a schoolteacher. Sara decides that this is what she wants to do with her life. She searches for a room to rent, but most people will not rent a whole room to a single woman. She offers one landlady a month’s rent in advance, and the landlady gives the room to her. Sara gets a job as an ironer at a laundry. At night, she goes to the Grand Street Cafeteria where working girls can get cheap food after their shifts. After eating, she goes to the night school and signs up for classes five nights out of the week. Sara studies late at night after her classes and wakes up early for her shift every day. She studies English and arithmetic and has trouble focusing, but she resolves to continue to study.

Sara fantasizes about food every day because she does not have enough money to eat. She becomes so distracted by her hunger that she accidentally burns a the shirts at work, and the manager takes it out of her wages.