Baltimore

Baltimore is the city in Maryland where Cee is born and grows up. She resides here with her mother Charlotte, father Bernard, and younger brother Wayne. After Wayne drowns during the family's trip to the beach, Cee struggles to reorient to her life in Baltimore without her brother. Scenes depicting Cee's early and adolescent life are set in this location. She later returns to Baltimore in Part II for her father's mother Grandma Lu's funeral.

Bethany Beach

Bethany Beach is the place where Wayne died. At the start of the novel, Cee says that Wayne drowned during an afternoon at the beach together. The Williams family was renting a house in the Bethany Beach location, and the siblings spent their mornings by the water together. Then one day, Cee temporarily lost track of her brother. She found him swimming, and moments later, watched as the current carried him...