Patch hears the mailman and rushes to the door, hoping another school letter has arrived, but Ivy takes the envelope first. When she sees the St. Louis postmark, she kisses it, revealing how much hope she has pinned on the possibility of leaving Monta Clare. Patch remembers her recent interview at the botanical garden, where he watched happy families while she tried to secure a better future for them both.

The hope vanishes when Ivy reads the letter and her shoulders drop, signaling rejection. Their rented house feels increasingly permanent despite Ivy's efforts to resist being trapped there, and the empty refrigerator underlines their poverty. Trying to comfort her, Patch tears up the letter and tells a story about the pirate Black Bart Roberts, turning failure into a lesson about surviving setbacks and seizing unexpected chances.

The chapter then shows the strain between mother and son. Ivy notices a bruise on Patch's face as she straightens his clothes and hair, and she scolds him for fighting because he is all she has. Patch resists when she reaches for his eye patch, then deflects the tension with a joke, while privately carrying the burden of wanting to grow stronger and no longer feel weak.

At breakfast, Patch pushes the food toward Ivy and lies that the school will feed him if he forgets to eat, suggesting he is trying to protect her from one more worry. Ivy asks whether he is nervous about the new school and insists that this must be a fresh start, free of stealing and fighting. She explains that she cannot afford more scrutiny after a woman from the school visited and made her feel judged as a mother.

Although Patch knows he usually does not start the trouble, he promises Ivy there will be no more of it. When she asks if he is walking in with Saint, he nods. The chapter closes with ominous foreshadowing: later, Ivy will have to answer questions from a first responder and Chief Nix after Patch is found, and she will be haunted by how much of her son's life she failed to see.