A Duet For Home

In the chapel, Tyrell practices with June until Marcus and Lulu’s family arrive. They want to hear June perform, but she isn’t ready. Abuela and Ms. Vega push her to be more confident, with Ms. Vega telling her to stretch her arms to the ceiling as if she were six feet tall. June plays “Viola Concerto in G Major” by Georg Telemann, and Tyrell plays a work by Shinchi Suzuki. Tyrell tells June that she’ll “rock” the audition.

Before her audition, June does Ms. Vega’s stretch—the “superhero pose.” June makes it into the orchestra and also earns the opportunity to perform a solo. Excited, June doesn’t notice her absent sister until Charlie asks about Maybelle’s whereabouts and a school police officer jogs toward her.

Marcus tells Tyrell about Maybelle’s disappearance. Tyrell, Marcus, Mrs. Yang, and Humberto drive to Chinatown. Ms. Gonzalez also arrives because Marcus texted her, and Tyrell hugs her. Realizing where Maybelle might be, Tyrell grabs Humberto’s phone and finds the location of the animal shelter.

Running through the Chinatown streets filled with tourists and shops, Tyrell ends up at Mott Street Animal Shelter and finds Maybelle playing with Nana. The others arrive, and as Mrs. Yang hugs her daughters, Tyrell suddenly feels left out.

In Cantonese, Mrs. Yang tells her daughters that she is sorry and that she loves them. June remembers walking through Chinatown’s narrow streets with her father, buying fruit and fresh pastries. She also remembers going to the playground with her sister and mother. At the same time, June thinks of Huey House and Marcus, Mamo, Domenika, and Tyrell and realizes that Huey House feels like a home too.

On the ride back to Huey House in the van, the Yangs sit together, so Tyrell continues to feel left out. Stephanie gives him a letter from Juan Ortiz—Bolívar Ortiz’s brother. Juan prays for Tyrell and wants him to have peace. He doesn’t want Tyrell’s past to limit his potential. In the chapel, Tyrell tells June that his father killed a person. They cry and hug, and June says that they’ll both be “okay.”

June wakes up and sees her mother helping Maybelle get dressed. Mrs. Yang is trying to “get better,” and Ms. Gonzalez helps her by getting her a counselor who speaks Cantonese. Mrs. Yang sees the counselor twice a week and takes medicine. Mrs. Yang explains that she was “so sad,” and she now hopes that June will forgive her. June is speechless, but she feels hopeful.

Tyrell looked forward to meeting with Ms. Gonzalez, but he dreads meeting with Mr. Fernsby. In between “ahems” and “hehs,” Mr. Fernsby tells Tyrell and his mother that they have found an apartment for him in Jamaica, Queens; Tyrell and his mother must move out next Tuesday. Tyrell’s mother protests that they cannot move because she doesn’t have a job. Mr. Fernsby tells her to get one.

In Lulu’s room, the characters discuss how Ms. Gonzalez helped Jeremiah and his mother find a nice apartment through a different program. They then mention another resident who, through HSP, moved into an “old motel” that is two miles away from a subway station.

To accommodate June’s rehearsal schedule, Marcus has Humberto drive to Chinatown, take Maybelle to visit Nana at the animal shelter, and then swing back to school to pick up June and take them back to Huey House.

Before the first practice, June has an unpleasant encounter with Henrietta Woo. They are performing “Concerto in A Minor” by Antonio Lucio Vivaldi, but Vivaldi wrote the piece for the violin, not for the viola, so the conductor, Ms. Tang, has transposed—or changed —the piece to fit the viola.

The practice room is the school’s cafeteria, and the conductor’s podium is a wooden apple crate. Eugene invites June to get bubble tea, and Henrietta and her friends look at June and laugh.

Ms. Tang tells the musicians that Vivaldi taught girls how to play instruments at an orphanage. She sees an orchestra as a family and stresses that each musician must listen and respond to the other. After June performs her solo, people congratulate her, but Henrietta makes fun of June for riding what she calls the “homeless bus.”

June calls Tyrell. She needs him to come to her school now. Using the emergency MetroCard from Ms. Gonzalez, Tyrell manages to get from the Bronx to Chinatown in 40 minutes.

June tells Tyrell about Henrietta, and she announces that they’re going to City Hall to talk to the mayor. Eugene runs toward them, and June finally tells him the truth about her living situation. Eugene expresses his sympathies and goes with them to City Hall, where a police officer refuses to let them in. He directs them to a website and declines Tyrell’s jellybean bribe. However, June hears the mayor’s advisors preparing for a press conference tomorrow afternoon at four o’clock; the conference will focus on HSP and unhoused people.

Back at Huey House, Tyrell and June organize. They tell Marcus about the press conference and make a digital graphic that Marcus sends to his contacts. Maybelle offers to make signs, and Tyrell tries to call Jeremiah, but no one answers.

Ms. MacMillan’s assistant gives Jeremiah’s numerous phone messages to June, who learns that Stephanie suppressed them. Maybelle pretends to be sick so that they can miss school and make posters for the press conference. Abuela convinces the people in the shelter to go to the press conference, and Marcus arranges for Humberto to drive them to City Hall.

Tyrell wants to go to Jeremiah’s house, but they don’t have time to take the train, and Humberto is tasked with picking up a new family. Because Domenika has a car, she drives them to City Hall even though she’s performing for the prime minister of Canada later. Domenika’s car has plastic bottles in the backseat, and her driving is erratic. Bartok gets sick, and to prevent him from vomiting, Tyrell reads excerpts from an adult romance novel.

The characters arrive at Jeremiah’s building, and Jeremiah hugs Tyrell before punching his shoulder. Tyrell explains why he didn’t return Jeremiah’s calls, and everyone starts talking about City Hall. They get back into Dominika’s car, and Jeremiah wonders why Tyrell is reading a book with half-naked people on the cover.

To get to City Hall on time, Domenika cuts in front of taxis and trailers alike. June thinks that they might die in a car accident, but they make it, and many people are there, holding signs about saving Huey House and wearing T-shirts proclaiming that unhoused people are not “invisible.”

Johnny Cleaver, a public relations person for Health and Human Services, tries to speak about HSP, but the crowd interrupts him with screams about restoring the jobs program and providing secure shelter. They began to chant, “We are not invisible” (392). June goes up to the podium to speak. Cleaver doesn’t want her to do so, but the crowd wants to hear June’s voice. The mayor also wants to hear what June has to say.

Because June gets a case of stage fright, Tyrell joins her on the stage and speaks first. He notes the benefits of Huey House before Cleaver interrupts him. Once again, the mayor encourages June to speak.

Tyrell gently pushes June to the microphone and reminds her of the “superhero pose.” June introduces herself and testifies to the benefits of Huey House, saying that the shelter introduced her to Ms. Gonzalez and Domenika and made her family “whole.” She doesn’t think that the government should displace families just to make their policies “look good.”

Cleaver turns off the microphone, but the mayor turns it back on. She admits that she doesn’t often hear feedback from her constituents, and she agrees to suspend HSP. The crowd cheers, and June’s mother expresses her admiration for her daughter. June looks at her watch and sees that the time is now 4:44 pm.

Tyrell watches June and her mother, but this time, he doesn’t feel left out or alone. The Huey House residents move to the steps of City Hall, and Tyrell sits next to June and Jeremiah and feels optimistic about life.