The Smiths stay in Horse Mesa. Lily keeps teaching and Jim becomes the inofficial mayor of the small village. Little Jim and his wife Diane are living in a suburb of Phoenix now and have two children. Rosemary and Rex Walls, on the other hand, move from one town to another, never settling anywhere. Rex takes the jobs he gets and keeps making plans that will never be put into action anyways.
In 1960, Jeannette Walls, the second daughter of Rosemary and Rex, is born in a hospital in Phoenix. Lily pays for the hospital bill since Rex is not able to afford it. Right away, she feels a special link to her grandchild. She wants to be the (only) constant feature in her grandchildren’s lives, which she expects to be difficult and unsettled.