The Girl Who Fell From The Sky

Sometime in the past, in a hospital room where a little girl is recovering from a fall, a boy who calls himself Brick finds a man in a military uniform playing a harmonica. The man shows him how to play the harmonica and invites Brick to visit the girl, whose name is Rachel, anytime he likes. Brick returns the following day and the day after that, and during his visits, the man drinks alcohol from a flask. Brick learns how to play the man’s harmonica.

Back in the present, in Portland, the end of the school year approaches. Rachel wins a race on Race Day, beating Tamika and all the other students, and a beautiful classmate named Carmen mocks Rachel while putting the first place medallion around Rachel’s neck. Rachel puts her tears into her blue bottle and thinks about her birthday the next month, when she will turn 12.

At some point in the past, a black American man named Roger meets a Danish white woman named Nella at a dance club in Germany. They flirt, dance, and spend the night together.

In the present in Portland, Aunt Loretta and Drew take Rachel to see the Multnomah waterfalls. The height and the beauty of the waterfalls make Aunt Loretta emotional. Rachel feels fear as she looks down from the bridge. After the visit to the waterfalls, Aunt Loretta changes: She becomes more creative, setting up an easel in the house and painting pictures of people and animals every day.

Back in the past, at the hospital in Chicago, Brick visits the little girl. He asks the man, Roger, what he does for a living, and the man tells him that he makes maps for the military. The man drinks from his flask as he plays games with Brick; at one point, the man tickles Brick and holds him too tightly, calling him “Charles” and weeping. When Brick goes home to his apartment, the man who looks after pigeons on the rooftop of their building accosts Brick angrily and accuses Brick of telling the police that the man had been on the roof when the family fell to the ground. Brick reflects on the man’s anger, realizing that “[s]ince the moment Brick said his new name he had not thought of the story that created it” (87).

Brick goes to the hospital the next day to see the man and the little girl. Brick tells Roger that he did not see a man on the rooftop, which upsets Roger. Roger explains that he cares only about Rachel’s safety.

Roger tells Brick about his past. Roger and his wife Nella had married in Denmark, and soon they had a son named Charles. Nella drank alcohol heavily during her pregnancy with him. Charles is a sickly child, and Roger’s games are often too rough for him. In frustration and impatience for his son’s weakness, Roger physically abuses him. One night, when Nella’s sister Solvej is visiting, they drink too much; Roger kisses Solvej, upsetting Nella. That night marks “the first time Roger hit a woman” (93), and Nella leaves the house with her sister. Roger passes out while holding a lit cigarette, which ignites the house on fire. Charles dies in the fire. While telling the story to Brick, Roger screams aloud, and nurses rush in to Rachel’s room. They ask Roger, who is still drinking from his flask, to leave. He agrees, giving Brick his harmonica and lamenting the loss of his family. Roger gives Brick the responsibility of telling Rachel what happened to Charles.

In the present, in Portland, a year has passed since Rachel’s last secret meeting with Anthony Miller. She goes to church with Grandma with an itchy scalp because her hair has been chemically straightened. Rachel receives even more attention for her eyes now that her hair is straight, and she gives the credit for her beauty to “what was Mor’s: my eyes, now my straight hair” (97).

Aunt Loretta and Drew are engaged to be married. However, when they are playing tennis one Sunday morning, Aunt Loretta falls and cuts her face on a piece of glass. At the hospital, she has a bad reaction to antibiotics and dies two months later, disfigured and feverish.