Tiger returns home to a gossipy sewing circle at her house. Tiger’s mother and grandmother are making her dresses for the upcoming school year; Tiger is thankful but embarrassed by how plain and childlike the dresses are. Later, Tiger’s grandmother teaches her how to make her secret chicken and dumpling recipe. That night, feeling guilty that she isn’t more thankful for her parents, Tiger retreats to her grandmother’s bedroom. Her grandmother tells Tiger just how much her parents love her before they go to sleep. The next day, Tiger’s playing is interrupted by her mother screaming in the distance.

In one of the central scenes of the novel, Tiger’s grandmother dies while picking crops in their home garden. Corrina finds her and is devastated (this is the screaming that Tiger heard at the end of the last chapter). Tiger realizes that her grandmother likely knew she was dying. Aunt Dorie Kay comes down from Baton Rouge to help with the funeral preparations. Tiger is thankful for her presence and resents that her parents aren’t able to do more. Tiger wonders at the different ways that her mother and her aunt show grief; her aunt attends to the practical things while her mother refuses to get out of bed.