This chapter turns back to Irwin Brunson, the fourth grader at the Fullerwood Elementary School in February 1964. The beginning of school had been traumatizing for Irwin, filled with isolation and bullying. At one point during a parent-teacher conference, when his father, Charles, learned that Irwin was behind on his work, he summoned his son to the front of the room and beat him in front of the class.

For a short while at the beginning of the new calendar year, things seem to ease for Irwin. But they take a much darker turn before long, first by the torching of his family car while his parents attend a PTA meeting, and then by the firebombing of his next-door neighbors’ house. Like the Brunsons, the Robersons had sent children to integrate Fullerwood, and now their house is all ablaze.