Birdie begins eighth grade at the local school. Just as at Nkrumah, she learns to fit in with the popular girls, changing her hair and style to mimic those around her: “I wore Nikes, Jordache jeans, and a fluffy pink angora sweater with silver sparkles sewn in. Mona’s mother had cut my hair into layers so that it feathered around my face” (234). There’s no real insight into how Birdie feels about these changes. She seems happy to fit in and at this point does not feel that her change is a betrayal of the person she was before.

Two major plot points occur in this chapter. The first is that Birdie goes through a bag of her mother’s things and finds a postcard from her aunt Dot, who returned from India and is living in Boston. Birdie wonders why her mother did not tell her about the postcard. She feels betrayed because this is the first secret her mother has kept from her.

The second major plot point in the chapter is Birdie’s encounter with Samantha Taper, a mixed-race girl at her school. When Birdie asks about her, Mona says: “She just moved here last year from Maine. She’s disgusting. We call her ‘Wilona,’ you know, like the lady on ‘Good Times.’ The boys call her ‘Brown Cow’” (223). Wilona Woods was a character on “Good Times” who provided comic relief, and the students see Samantha as an object of ridicule. Mona tells Birdie that Samantha is adopted, and Birdie notices that Samantha is awkward, with nappy hair and ashy skin. She knows Samantha’s white mother does not know how to moisturize her skin, and Birdie thinks back to how she and Cole had to figure that out for themselves. One day, Sandy and Birdie encounter Samantha in the grocery store. Seeing the mixed-race girl and her petite white mother startles Sandy. She seems confused, drops a jar, and calls Birdie by her real name. The incident leads Birdie to slip up later, when she retorts that her mother only wants her to be nice to Samantha because they are both black. Sandy reacts with a bizarre laugh that makes Birdie uncomfortable.

Chapter 11 covers Birdie’s first school year and summer. She did better in school than she expected and easily made a close group of friends. She wonders about Nicholas, who is away at a summer exchange program, and fantasizes about going to boarding school. She realizes she would not fit in because she has become “a New Hampshire girl” (244). She goes to the YMCA with her friends and flirts with high school boys. A group of boys call her anti-Semitic slurs, and after that, she takes off the Star of David necklace. She says that her mother does not notice.

When the new school year begins, Samantha returns having transformed into the “black swan” Birdie dreamed of becoming. She wears stylish clothes and has glowing skin. To hide their jealousy, the other girls make up lies about Samantha being a slut. A new black student, Stuart Langley, comes to their school. He is popular because he is a football player, and Birdie notices that he ignores the other students’ fake slang and racist jokes. Their classmates try to set Stuart and Samantha up, but neither seems interested. Each ends up dating a white classmate.

A major plot point develops when Jim takes Sandy, Birdie, and Mona to New York City. Birdie and Mona hang around outside while Sandy and Jim visit a museum, and Birdie sees a group of black and Puerto Rican teens with a boom box listening to rap, which she calls “talking music” (259). It is notable that, being in New Hampshire, Birdie has never heard this new genre of music. Being in the city among other black and brown people reminds Birdie of how long she has been away from her community, and she thinks: “I wanted, suddenly, for the first time, really, to run away” (258). Birdie tries to dance with the circle of people who have gathered around the break-dancing boys, but Mona is nervous. When Sandy and Jim come to get them, Jim makes a comment about the “ancient African instinct” (261) that must account for the boys’ dancing ability.

Jim gets lost on the way home and gets into a confrontation with a group of black teens who throw a rock at his car. Mona uses a racial slur to describe the boys, and Birdie punches her in the arm. One of the boys knocks Jim down, but Sandy takes charge of the situation, taking Jim back to the car and telling the kids to stop their “silliness” (264). She reprimands Jim, telling him he did not have to get out of the car and calls him a “honky” (265). Jim, stunned, asks her whose side she is on.

Birdie thinks the incident will break them up, but instead it brings them closer. On Christmas morning, Jim reveals to Birdie that Sandy has told him about their false identities and their past. Birdie cannot believe that her mother revealed their secret without consulting her. Birdie asks Jim if Sandy told him about the “nappy-headed” (271) daughter she abandoned. Sandy responds that having Cole is what sparked her activism: “It hurts to see your baby come into a world like this” (275). The statement makes Birdie realize that Sandy has thought of Cole as her only black daughter and has always thought of Birdie as white.

Birdie has been living as Jesse in New Hampshire for two years, and she seems to have completely integrated into local life. She enjoys hanging out with Mona in her family’s trailer and riding in Dennis’s—Mona’s older half-brother’s—truck. She even seems to have come to like rock and country music.

At Dennis’s party, she sees Nicholas, who has been kicked out of boarding school. His hair is long, and he laughs at how much makeup Birdie is wearing. They go outside and kiss, but Mona interrupts them, saying that they need to talk. Mona is upset because Samantha is dating a boy she likes. Mona vomits, and Birdie leads her into a bedroom to lie down. Afterwards, Birdie tries to use the bathroom, but the line is too long. She goes into the woods and realizes Samantha is there, too. Birdie has never spoken to Samantha, and the encounter is awkward. Finally, she asks Samantha what color she is, and Samantha answers, “I’m black. Like you” (285). Samantha returns to the party, but Birdie walks home. She quietly packs her things, takes her mother’s emergency cash, and heads to the bus station.