The day D Foster, an eleven year old who has seen lots of foster homes, enters Neeka and her best friend’s lives, the world opens up for them. D comes from a world vastly different from their safe Queens neighborhood, and through her, the girls see another side of life that includes loss, foster families, and an amount of freedom that makes the girls envious.
However, the three soon realize they have a lot in common – including their love of Tupac – his lyrics, his life, and the way he keeps on keeping on. This helps them move through the years between 11 and 13 in search of their Big Purpose even as the narrator’s brother is wrongly accused of a crime and gets sent to jail. In addition, D’s absent mom keeps disappointing her. Although all of them are crazy about Tupac Shakur’s rap music, D is the one who truly understands the place where he’s coming from. Through knowing D, Tupac’s lyrics become more personal for all of them.
The girls are thirteen when D’s mom swoops in to reclaim D—and as magically as she appeared, she now disappears from their lives. Tupac is gone, too, after another shooting; this time fatal. As the narrator looks back, she sees lives suspended in time, and realizes that even all-too-brief connections can touch deeply.
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