111 pages • 3 hours read
Monday's Not Coming
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BetaChapters 9-11Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 9 Summary: “One Year Before the Before”
Monday asked Claudia which boy she liked as they sat in the library after school, watching Monday’s little brother, August. Claudia insisted there were no boys she liked. Monday gently teased her about being gay. Claudia came up with a lie, inventing an older boy she claimed to have a crush on.
Boy crazy, Monday had a crush on Jacob Miller, “hands down the finest boy in our school. Been fine forever. Every girl liked him and he knew it, which made his cockiness ugly to me” (60). She wanted to be with him in high school next year and wanted Claudia to find a boyfriend, too, so they could double date.
Monday checked over Claudia’s English homework and lost her temper over it. She told Claudia she needed to do better if she wanted to get into the good high school with Monday. Monday rewrote Claudia’s paper for her.
August came back to their corner, his hair tousled. Monday disciplined and cared for him like her own child, which she found exhausting. She fixed his hair, and Claudia told her she should charge others to do their hair. Especially the boys.
The next day, Claudia marched straight up to the boys at school, including Jacob, and offered to do their hair for seven dollars each. One took her up on it. The popular girls hovered near, pretending not to watch. She did a good job, and the others got in line. That night, the girls gleefully relived the afternoon. They decided to try to do girls’ hair, too; Claudia would also do nails.
As they changed for bed, Claudia noticed that Monday’s back was covered with purple bruises. When she asked, Monday’s face temporarily went blank. Then she shrugged it off, saying she fell off a bunk bed she shared with April. Claudia believed her, thinking that if her best friend was lying, it had to be for a good reason.
Chapter 10 Summary: “The Before”
Claudia met with her guidance counselor about applying to Benjamin Banneker Academic High School, the school Monday wanted to attend. The application process was intensive, and the strict application requirements included a personal essay. Claudia’s grades had been suffering in Monday’s absence. The guidance counselor suggested she get extra tutoring at The Learning Center, which triggered Claudia deeply.
She asked the counselor why Monday hadn’t been at school. The counselor thought Monday had moved, but Claudia told him she hadn’t. He promised to check up on it.
Walking to class, Claudia heard whispering behind her. Two girls gossiped about Monday getting kicked out of school for being bisexual, like her sister. They brought up a rumor about Claudia and Monday getting caught having sex in the bathroom. They also said that Ed Borough was being closed down. Developers had claimed they would build different residences for the previous tenants to move back into, but the girls believed it was a lie.
Claudia took refuge the library. Ms. Paul asked about Monday, but Claudia covered for her. Ms. Paul said that Monday still had a book out: Flowers in the Attic, a book she’d checked out over and over. The last time Monday checked it out was a week before Claudia left for the summer.
One night at home, Claudia reflected on spending Halloweens tied to the hip with Monday. That Halloween, they had planned on being sexy cops. Claudia painstakingly worked on a project for which she would have depended on Monday for help: “My project stank of failure” (76).
Ma asked her what was wrong, and Claudia exploded into tears, saying she didn’t have any friends now that Monday was gone. Ma offered to take her to Monday’s house to talk to Monday’s mother. In exchange, Claudia agreed to join the teen ministry group at church, despite her initial resistance to the idea.
Chapter 11 Summary: “The After”
Claudia writes to Monday, telling her how lame the church’s Halloween party will be and how much she wishes they were sexy cops together, as they’d planned.
Claudia stands alone in the church basement. Someone comments on her frozen posture. It’s Michael, a classmate who used to be overweight but is now lean. He gently flirts with Claudia, asking her what go-go songs she likes and telling her he hopes she will join the dance ministry again because she’s such a good dancer.
He wonders why he hasn’t seen her at the youth ministry party before. She says she used to trick-or-treat with her friend, then quickly tries to sound more adult. Michael asks her to hang out sometime, but Claudia is suspicious. She asks if her mother said something to him about being friendly to her, and Michael admits that Ma did. Claudia storms off.
Chapters 9-11 Analysis
This section looks back on the girls’ coming of age. Claudia is applying to area high schools and worries that she won’t be admitted to the more prestigious school that Monday wants to attend. Claudia’s guidance counselor recommends tutoring, which upset Claudia. She’d depended on Monday to help her with her schoolwork—a fact that Monday was starting to resent—and though she struggled in Monday’s absence, she didn’t want to be seen going to The Learning Center.
In addition to thinking about high school, the girls continued to grapple with their emerging sexual interests. Monday was drawn to boys like Jacob, with whom she would later have a sexual experience. The girls also planned to dress as sexy cops for Halloween, a costume that hinted at their wish to project their sexuality. The rumor that Claudia and Monday had a sexual experience together in the bathroom at school is brought up more explicitly, referring to a cyberbullying incident that will be revealed later.
Monday’s terrified reaction to her mother in the previous section, the bruises on her back, her blank expression when Claudia asked what happened, and her obsession with Flowers in the Attic all suggested that Monday was being abused at home. Even though Claudia knew something had happened, she couldn’t convince adults like her school counselor to be concerned. When she finally broke down and told her mother that she didn’t have any other friends besides Monday, Ma offered to take her to speak to Monday’s mother.
In Chapter 11, the story returns to the present, where Claudia talks to Michael for the first time and is drawn to his warmth and kindness. She then realizes that her mother put Michael up to talking to her, which makes her angry. Claudia doesn’t realize that both Ma is concerned for her because she’s struggling with time.
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