Summary

Chapter 12 begins with the family avoiding phone calls from the bank. The mother asks Gavin to start getting the mail for her, leading him to sprint to the mailbox and back to avoid being seen. She does not explain why. The mother also spends a significant amount of time calling for information about her father.

Gavin goes out with Collin and the other children. Later, he finds Natty in the woods, who tells Gavin he is “looking for Ruby” (126). In the next scene, the mother asks the children to help her pull some potatoes out of the ground that they had planted the previous season. While they collect the potatoes, she announces that her father died four weeks ago, and that she had missed his last call.

In the last scene of Chapter 12, Gavin starts the sixth grade, and Natty starts kindergarten. Gavin discovers...