What Night Brings

Marci attends a Girl Scouts meeting. She finds herself bored again. The group plays a game in which they say what animal they would choose to be. Most of the girls choose unimaginative answers; Marci says she would be a saber-tooth tiger. Marci learns that the troop will get to decide how to spend its time, but she is interested in few of their options. 

Marci is convinced that she can be turned into a boy because her cousin, Raylene, “is a girl. But when she was born, she was a boy” (25). Delia doesn’t give Marci many details about Raylene’s story, saying only that “the doctors made a mistake” (25). Raylene and her family now live in another state, leaving Marci curious about “how she changed into a girl” and “if she was going to like girls like me” (26).

Marci’s family moves to a nearby apartment. While playing football alone, Marci meets 16-year-old Raquel, whom she is immediately attracted to. Marci goes to the library and asks the librarian, Miss Buck, if she has “’ever read anything about a girl changing into a boy’” (28). At first, Miss Buck can’t think of any books on the subject, but as Marci leaves, Miss Buck suggests The Christine Jorgensen Story, about “a man who decided he was living in the wrong body and got an operation to become a woman” (29). Several people in the library overhear Miss Buck and stare at Marci.

At night, Marci asks God to change her into a boy by 12 years old, “so people could get used to the fact that I was a boy while I was still little” (30). Marci worries that her wishes won’t come true. 

As she begins to feel overlooked by God, Marci meets Randy, “a big sissy kid who lived down the street” (31). Randy doesn’t like sports, which angers his father. After swimming in a neighbor’s pool, Marci, Corin, and Randy start to make mean jokes about their mothers. Delia overhears them and demands the girls come home.

Eddie stays out late after work. Delia tells Marci and Corin to sleep on the floor between their beds—she wants Eddie to think they have left. Corin knows Eddie will find them, and Delia suggests asking Tommy to pick them up. Marci “thought either way it was a waste of time. If we really wanted to leave, then we should go someplace for good” (36). She doesn’t want to pretend.

Eddie arrives home and finds the girls sleeping on the floor. Delia gives herself up, though Eddie doesn’t have much of a reaction.

The next morning, Marci asks her mother to take her and Corin to their grandmother’s house in New Mexico. Delia has already forgiven Eddie.

Marci spends time outside, hoping to catch Raquel’s eye. One day, Raquel comes home with a boy her age. Eddie is outside, and Marci catches him staring at Raquel “like he was seeing through her clothes” (39). Frustrated, Marci goes to the garden she has started in their backyard.

As Marci tends to the corn she’s growing, Raquel begins a conversation with her from the neighboring yard. Raquel invites Marci into her own vegetable garden. Marci learns that Raquel is curious about the world. She likes to watch the stars at night because “they give me a feeling there’s more out there than we’ll ever know” (42). Raquel hopes to leave home and suggests that Marci will do the same.

Raquel gives Marci a few vegetables in exchange for some of Marci’s corn when it’s ready for harvest.

Marci recalls the night Delia stopped showing her affection. While in church at eight years old, Marci mocks a woman who “sang loud, but her voice wasn’t on the same note like everyone else’s” (44). Delia corrects Marci.

Bored with the service, Marci rests her head on her mother. But Delia “shook her shoulder and used her elbow to push me away. Hard” (45). Though Corin doesn’t see it happen, Marci knows that her younger sister will face the same refusal of love.