54 pages • 1 hour read
Mike LupicaHeat
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2006A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 19-21Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 19 Summary
After Ellie leaves, Michael is sure that everything will go wrong: “No baseball […] no Ellie” (132) and no family, once Uncle Timo’s acting fails. This means that Michael would have future. He “[doesn’t] feel like practicing today,” or like “doing anything” (132), when he realizes that everything in his life threatens to disappear.
When he gets home, Michael knocks on Mrs. Cora’s door, and she welcomes him into her apartment. As Mrs. C refers to him and Carlos as “her boys,” Michael worries for her declining health. He worries “that Mrs. C would be the next person he loved to leave him” (133).
He helps himself to a cup of iced tea and two of Mrs. Cora’s cookies, as she explains that she will make him dinner. She is sure that “there’s always something on [his] mind when [he comes]” to her apartment” (134). Michael tells her about Ellie.
Michael is “trying to figure out what [he] did that was so wrong,” but to Mrs. Cora, it is clear: he “called her a liar” (135). She defends Ellie, explaining to him that, as “the daughter of the great baseball pitcher” (135), there is only one way people can see her. The way Mrs. Cora explains it, Ellie does not want to “give up” (135) having two friends who like her for who she is.
Michael admits that he “messed up […] the same way [he’s] been messing up all over the place” (136). Mrs. Cora encourages him not to be so “resentful” (136) and to start by calling Ellie to apologize. As Michael starts to feel himself “filling up again” (136), Mrs. Cora draws him in to play the “game” of imagining “happy endings” (137). As they move through his dreams together, Mrs. Cora draws him in, and he feels “safe” (137) again.
Chapter 20 Summary
Before Mr. Gibbs’ visit, Carlos meets up with Uncle Timo at McDonald’s to prepare him for the visit. Michael expresses concern about what will happen when Uncle Timo tries to act, and Carlos admits that they are “the crazy ones” (138) for thinking that the plan will work. Michael grows anxious when Uncle Timo does not show up on time, but Manny encourages him to relax. Finally, Mr. Gibbs arrives, and Michael has to tell him that his father “had to run an errand” (140).
Mr. Gibbs recognizes Manny and settles in. He asks if Carlos is coming, but Michael explains that Carlos is at work. Michael “[tries] to remember his manners” (140) and asks Mr. Gibbs if he would like a drink. When Michael tells Mr. Gibbs that his “father” will not be home for long, that he has to return “today or tomorrow” (141), he realizes that this is not an answer he’s coordinated with Uncle Timo. As conversation turns to baseball, Michael expresses that he “[thinks] we need a miracle” (141). At that moment, Uncle Timo arrives. This time, he “[isn’t] Uncle Timo […] [he] had turned himself into Papi” (141).
Chapter 21 Summary
Not only does Uncle Timo wear Papi’s clothes, but he has also tidied his facial hair and shaved his head in Papi’s style. He faked a tattoo on his arm just like Papi’s. And, as he stretches his arms “wide the way Papi always did when he came through the door, hugged him close, kissed the side of his face,” Michael gets the feeling that he is “with a ghost” (142).
In a perfect accent, Uncle Timo streams out Cuban phrases. He speaks in broken English, thanking Mr. Gibbs for “taking an interest” (143) in his son. He and Mr. Gibbs discuss Michael and Mr. Gibbs’ work at the ACS, and the men decry the number of children “in the system” (144). Mr. Gibbs explains that he tries to be “too nosy” rather than “not nosy enough” (144).
Manny and Michael go to grab lemonade for everyone, then whisper, in the doorway, about Uncle Timo’s good performance. Although Michael thought Uncle Timo “was a clown when he met him” (145), he concedes that Uncle Timo does a good job playing his father.
When the boys bring back the lemonade, Uncle Timo continues the great performance, asking Mr. Gibbs to do what he can to support Michael’s cause. When he finally embraces Michael in a father-like hug, Uncle Timo whispers, barely audibly: “Top that, dude” (148).
Chapters 19-21 Analysis
Mrs. Cora, the primary female force in Michael’s life, is the “safe” (137) place to which he returns when the rest of his life feels hopeless. She is the center of his recovery from his frustration, and she is the person who encourages Michael to be positive again, to return to the dreams that characterized his life before his lies caught up with him. The idea of a “happy ending” (137) is something that no one else can connect him to in the same way, and in a world in which men constantly threaten his safety, Mrs. Cora initiates a string of hope.
That hope continues to build as Uncle Timo miraculously “becomes” Papi. Imitating Michael and Carlos’ father is not simply a matter of dressing in his clothes and faking his tattoos but also of speaking in his language of Cuban phrases. While Mr. Gibbs seems to go along with the act, Michael does too, thinking, against his better judgment, that he is “with a ghost” (142). While Mr. Gibbs’ motives truly do appear authentic, Uncle Timo nonetheless sustains his act.
Still, Uncle Timo reminds Michael that he is merely acting like his father; though some situations might be repaired, losing his father cannot be. Returning to the past is merely a matter of acting effectively. This irreparable problem contrasts with Michael’s problems with Ellie, which, Mrs. Cora reminds him, can be fixed with an apology. In Chapters 19 to 21, Michael’s problems cease to revolve around baseball and start to refocus him on the people around him whose friendship, care, and love he relies upon.
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By Mike Lupica
