Patina

A few key scenes in this section of chapters develop central themes and characters. Patty begins to learn what it means to be a teammate as her first track practice after her second-place finish opens with a reminder from Coach that “You can pout and shout, but you cannot check out” (48). The relay baton emerges as an important symbol for teamwork as Patty learns to trust others on and off the track team. Coach explains in his pep talk with Patty that if a teammate decides to drop the baton, or refuses to pass it, “that energy is knocked off balance and your teammates are left empty-handed. Weakened” (47). Patty is used to carrying the metaphorical baton on her own: She refuses help from her adoptive parents, runs solo events on the track team, and resigns herself to doing all the work in her group projects. Coach’s speech is an early indicator that this lesson is one Patty will navigate through the rest of the text.

Despite the friendships she has with fellow track team “newbies” Lu, Sunny, and Ghost, Patty still feels like an outsider on the Defenders. Her assignment to the 4 x 800 relay team alongside Brit-Brat, Krystal, and Deja illustrates this. Her relay teammates fool around with each other and have an easy rapport. The girls remind Patty of her friends at her old school, but she states, “I didn’t feel like I could really join in” (52). Even after the newly formed team successfully falls into a rhythm with one another during the waltz exercise, Patty feels alienated when she learns that Brit-Brat, Krystal, and Deja all ran the relay together last year. Patty’s relationship with her relay teammates will continue to play an important role in her character development and the plot as the story progresses.

The motif of running is developed in this section, as is the theme of the effects of childhood trauma. Patty admits that she did not begin to take on adult responsibilities because she wanted to, but because she saw it as necessary to survive the aftermath of grief and its effects on her family. Patty’s father’s sudden death sets a chain of events into motion: Ma tries to treat her grief with large amounts of sweets, which Patty recognizes as a “way of staying kinda connected to my dad” (70) who put himself through culinary school and dreamed of opening a bake shop. This leads to Ma losing her legs to diabetes, which in turn causes Patty to feel like she must act “strong and brave and big” (70) when really, she wants to be a kid.

This chain of events reaches an apex when Patty tries to explain to Maddy that Ma’s legs had to “go away,” which Patty admits is “really hard to explain” (71). It is difficult not only for Maddy, only age four, to understand, but for Patty who now must take on the caregiving role for her younger sister when Patty is still so young herself. This scene emphasizes how ill-equipped Patty is to handle such a heavy conversation at her young age, and that her determination to help Maddy make sense of things comes at the expense of her own well-being. Running becomes Patty’s way of coping with the anxiety brought on by her promise to Maddy that she will prove that her legs “ain’t going nowhere” (73).

Momly and Uncle Tony become more rounded characters in these chapters through the ways they try to support Patty. Momly cannot help Patty with things like Maddy’s weekly braids due to her lack of knowledge about Black hair care but shows her love in the ways that she can. For example, Momly makes turkey wings for dinner “Every. Single. Night” (75) because Patty said she liked them the first night she and Maddy came to live with their adoptive parents. Momly can sense the pressure that Patty puts on herself to help with things like Maddy’s homework and dinner preparation. Momly doesn’t yet directly address it with Patty, but she tries to lighten Patty’s burden (grab the baton, as Coach might say) by saying things such as “Didn’t want you to have to worry about it” (66). While Momly is more serious, Uncle Tony is gregarious and connects with Patty and Maddy through humor. He is often described as a clown (81), and when he tries to give advice to Patty about how to run faster, he breaks into “The Running Man” dance.