In this middle-grade story, twelve years old, Jessica Smith has put up with a drug abusing mother for a long time. Though she knows she can take care of herself, she misses her mother each night when her best friend's mother calls her family for dinner.
Sometimes Jessica wonders what it would be like if her mother checked homework and cooked dinner like Sara's mom. But wondering won't change the fact that Mama comes in late from drinking. And though the Children's Welfare Department has been called, Jessica's world is turned upside down when she is taken to the children's center where she can no longer come and go as she chooses. Feeling like a captured bird, she keeps away from the other girls as she struggles with feelings of loneliness and despair
Then comes the unwelcome news that she is being placed in a foster home. Troubled and lonely, she is afraid the new family won't like her. Her decision to ignore them seems the best solution. However, her resolve is shaken when they treat her like a member of the family.