P.S. Be Eleven

Delphine realizes one day that boys and girls have begun to socialize with each other instead of being enemies. She feels left out because she does not receive attention from the boys, unlike the girls who were once her close friends. A more general social gap widens when those same friends brag about getting seats together at the upcoming Jackson Five concert. They tease Delphine about not having bought her ticket when the concert is only weeks away.

In Mr. Mwile’s class, Delphine’s group decides to make their presentation a boy-versus-girl debate on whether women are suited to be president. The girls will take the affirmative side supporting women, and the group will put the question to vote after the debate. Delphine is increasingly able to conceive of a woman president as a possibility.

Pa comes home with Marva and all her belongings one day. The couple just got married at the courthouse with no family present. Everyone, but especially Big Ma, is stunned and hurt by this development. Delphine shares the news with Cecile in a letter; she also emphasizes that she is now 12. Cecile still signs her letter with the postscript that Delphine should be 11 and argues that childhood and adulthood are not just about chronological age.

The debate presentation in Mr. Mwile’s class goes well. When the class votes on whether a woman is suited to be president, Lucy sides with the boys, so the boys win. Delphine is disappointed. At home that night, Big Ma is glad when Richard Nixon wins the presidency. A bright spot for Delphine is that Shirley Chisholm wins her campaign to become the first Black woman elected as a United States congresswoman. Delphine believes that this win was unthinkable in the past. Delphine also wonders if Chisholm’s win is “real power like the Black Panthers mean power” or just a “taste of power” (207). Vonetta has also gained a taste of power by becoming the saver of the girls’ money, but Delphine still holds actual power to tell her what to do.

Sundays at the Gaithers are filled with tradition, and Pa and Marva’s marriage does nothing to change this. Pa agrees to go to church (an unusual choice for him) and backs Big Ma when she insists that because Marva is now a married woman, she must wear a hat to church. When the family returns home from church, the mummy jar is empty; Darnell has stolen the money. Delphine realizes that Darnell has substance use disorder.

Pa refuses to replace the stolen money because he believes that his daughters need to learn the meaning of disappointment and unfairness while they are young. When Marva tries to intervene, Pa tells her that decisions about raising his daughters are his alone. Marva packs up and leaves. When Fern and Vonetta cry and insist that Pa or Marva can replace the money, Pa grows angry. He threatens them with physical punishment as they get more vocal. Delphine feels that she must be “one of those loudmouths” and stand up for her sisters in the face of this injustice (216), but even she fails to sway her father. Delphine gets her sisters to retreat to their room, and all three girls spend the night crying.

Big Ma is devastated by Darnell’s actions, so she goes to the home of Frieda Banks’s mother for support that night. The next day at school, Freida capitalizes on her knowledge of the visit to gain attention. She embarrasses Delphine by asking about Darnell and Big Ma in front of everyone. Delphine feels so hurt about Freida’s gossip that she ignores Freida’s efforts to make up throughout the day. When Delphine walks home from school, Danny the K bullies her by referencing Darnell’s struggle with addiction. Matters with Pa remain tense. Delphine suspects that he never intended to help them buy their tickets to the Jackson Five concert.

Thanksgiving arrives. Big Ma believes in cooking slow food that nourishes her family, but this Thanksgiving, she just sits still, holding her Bible. Marva returns and makes a slapdash meal just like Delphine does on the nights when she has to cook dinner. When Big Ma begs Pa to continue looking for Darnell, he refuses and says that Darnell will return when he wants to. The girls retreat from the Thanksgiving table when Big Ma and Pa get into a loud argument.

Relations at home remain strained. Darnell leaves a note explaining that he cannot return. Big Ma stops being the center of the family (other than beating Vonetta for insulting and labeling Darnell). She decides to return home to her native Alabama, but she also promises the girls that the separation need not be permanent.

Christmas arrives. Delphine receives Things Fall Apart from Cecile, alongside a note asking Delphine to wait to read the book until she is older. Marva gifts the sisters with a long-distance call to Big Ma, who sounds both happy and sad.

Over Pa’s objection, Marva gives Delphine her first adult piece of clothing, a royal blue coat trimmed with rabbit fur. Marva even had the coat tailored to fit her stepdaughter. The coat once belonged to Marva and reflects her modern style. The coat causes a stir when Delphine wears it to school. Danny the K insults Delphine by asking if the coat is from Cecile, whom he calls Delphine’s make-believe or absent mother. Delphine and her peers are shocked when Ellis Carter comes to Delphine’s defense. Freida and Delphine reconcile when Freida sits next to Delphine and compliments her on the coat.

Valentine’s Day arrives, and so does the night of the sixth-grade dance. Delphine doesn’t have a date, but she decides to go anyway so that she won’t miss out on this rite of passage. Marva has helped her style her hair, and Pa drives her. On the way to the dance, Pa offers to take her to a movie instead, just the two of them. Delphine loves being alone with her father, but the pull of the dance overcomes this desire. She instead takes the opportunity to ask why Pa never married Cecile. Pa says that he does love Cecile but refuses to explain why they aren’t together.

Despite her fears about being too tall and not having a date, Delphine has a good time at the dance. She and her friends reestablish their bonds by dancing and taking pictures together, and Delphine ends up doing a slow dance with Ellis Carter. Ellis surprises everyone by doing a full split on the dance floor as he and his peers dance to a popular James Brown song. When Delphine arrives home, a valentine from Hirohito, the boy she liked in Oakland, is waiting for her.

One day in spring, a Jackson Five album arrives by post for Vonetta. Darnell sent it from Walter Reed Hospital, the military hospital where he is receiving treatment for his substance use disorder. The sisters listen and dance to the album all afternoon. Delphine wants to hold onto this moment of closeness with her younger sisters. She knows that she is so much older than they are in terms of emotional maturity, and she is also aware that moments of bonding like these are coming to an end. She feels the absence of Big Ma, Cecile, and Darnell as she listens to another Jackson Five song about lost love. She reflects that Michael Jackson, the lead singer on the track, cannot possibly understand losses like those that the Gaither sisters have experienced.