Summary
At the start of this chapter, Chiron has grown into a teenager. In his high school science class, a bully named Terrel makes fun of Chiron for being effeminate and is kicked out of class. After school, Terrel and some other bullies wait for Chiron, who hesitates to leave.
As Chiron hesitates, Kevin approaches, apparently still one of Chiron's close friends. Kevin explains that he got detention for having sex with a girl in the hallway at school. He tells Chiron to refrain from telling anyone about this indiscretion, saying, "I know you can keep a secret, dawg." Kevin goes to detention, saying, "See you, Black," his nickname for Chiron.
Chiron eventually returns home, only to be told by his mother that she's having company over tonight and has found "somewhere for [Chiron] to be." Later, he eats dinner at Teresa's house; Juan is notably absent. Teresa notices that Chiron is upset, but he doesn't want to talk about it. He tries to change the sheets on his bed there, and Teresa teases him, teaching him how to make a bed properly. She mentions Juan's name, and Chiron noticeably tenses up.
That night, Chiron appears to wake up and walk through Teresa's house only to find Kevin having sex with a girl in the backyard. Kevin turns around, feeling Chiron's presence, and asks, "You good, Black?" Chiron wakes up, finding it was only a dream.
The next day, Chiron comes home to find his mother, appearing crazed, pestering him about where he was. She asks how Teresa is, saying she hasn't seen her since Juan's funeral, and calls Teresa Chiron's "play play mommy." Paula badgers Chiron for the money she knows Teresa gives him, eventually wresting it from his pocket. Armed with more money for crack, Paula warns Chiron, "You're my child. You tell that bitch, 'you better not forget it,'" referring to Teresa. Chiron heads to school in the same clothes he wore the previous day.
On his way to Teresa's house after school that day, Chiron intersects with Terrel and his fellow bullies. They make sexual comments about Teresa and Paula, implying that they are both prostitutes, to which Chiron instinctively reacts, grabbing Terrel by the shirt collar. Terrel easily escapes from Chiron's grasp and assures him that he's not gay. He badgers Chiron further about his jeans being tighter then leaves, calling Chiron "Little." Chiron looks as if he means to pursue them but thinks better of it.
Instead of going to Teresa's, Chiron takes several trains and buses to the beach, where Kevin approaches and sits down next to him; apparently, this is Kevin's smoking spot. Chiron asks Kevin why he calls him "Black," saying, "What kind of dude walks around giving other dudes nicknames?" Kevin shrugs this off and starts sharing a blunt with Chiron. They laugh, and Kevin says he didn't know Chiron smoked. Chiron admits he's smoked all kinds of things his mother leaves around the house. The two talk about times they want to cry, and Chiron says he wants to do many things that "don't make sense." Kevin pushes him on this, putting his hand on Chiron's back. They kiss, and Kevin gives Chiron a hand job. Chiron apologizes, and Kevin asks what he has to be sorry for.
Later, Kevin gives Chiron a ride home and asks if that was his first time doing anything sexual. Chiron gets out of the car, and the two try to act natural as Kevin calls Chiron "Black." They shake hands, betraying their sexual chemistry.
Chiron arrives home and notices his mother sleeping on the couch. As he puts a blanket over her, she wakes up and says, "You don't love me no more...You're my only, and I'm your only."
At school the next day, Terrel asks Kevin if he remembers playing the game "knock down, stay down" as children, asking Kevin if he'll beat up whoever Terrel points out. Kevin responds in the affirmative. After school that day, Terrel asks Kevin to hit Chiron's "faggot ass," and Kevin does. Kevin urges Chiron to "stay down" so that he doesn't have to punch him again, looking as if he'd rather be doing anything else. Chiron defiantly continues to get up after each punch until he is knocked out. The other bullies pile on, beating Chiron to a pulp.
In the principal's office, Chiron is urged to press charges and give the school the names of the boys who beat him up. He cries, telling the principal she doesn't understand. At home, Chiron ices his face and stares in the mirror fiercely.
The next day, Chiron walks into school, determined. He enters his science class, picks up a chair, and slams it into Terrel's head. Terrel falls to the ground, tightening his fists but mostly still. Chiron is arrested and put into a police car outside school, and Kevin comes out to watch. The two exchange deadly eye contact.
Analysis
At the start of this chapter, we are instantly introduced to the structure of the film, which we learn will fracture Chiron's life into sections between which he will age. When we meet Chiron here, we realize that he's grown into a high school-age young man, yet is still haunted by the issues that plagued him as a little boy: his sexuality and his relationship to his mother. We also quickly learn that Juan has died in the space between the first and second chapter, a shockwave that we watch echo through Chiron's relationships with Kevin, Teresa, and Paula in this section.
The motif of nicknames also persists into this chapter, echoing Juan's earlier story about when he was given the nickname "Blue." We learn that Kevin has begun referring to Chiron as "Black," which Chiron confronts him about on the beach. "What kind of dude walks around giving other dudes nicknames?" he asks. Kevin puts him off, acting natural, but the notion of nicknames and how they inform one's identity is a theme that will persist throughout the film.
Questions about identity, and whether one determines it for oneself, loom large in this section, chiefly in the form of Chiron's ultimate decision to respond in kind to the violence of his bullies. In the context of Juan's advice to "decide for yourself who you're going to be," Chiron's decision to seek revenge on Terrel seems like a perversion of the notion that one can shape one's own future. All the same, it ties into the themes of fate and identity that govern the film's look at individual characters in the context of a cutthroat Miami environment.
Terrel's manipulation of Kevin in this section also echoes the childhood games that we see Chiron playing (or rather, fleeing) in the first chapter. Of course, there is an obvious parallel between Kevin forcing Little to wrestle him in order to show the other boys he's tough and the scene in which Kevin beats Chiron to a pulp at the behest of Terrel. However, there is also a palpable difference between the scenes. Whereas Kevin was once interested in Chiron performing strength for their peers, Kevin is now the one performing for the bullies; he beats up Chiron against his will and is ultimately weaker than his friend, since Chiron chooses to rise to his feet after each blow. Thus, this scene underlines some of the film's overarching themes of masculinity and performance, as well as those of childhood games and their equivalent in the adult male world. Of course, Kevin and Chiron also play at performed toughness or masculinity on the beach when Kevin pretends he doesn't cry, whereas Chiron admits he does.
Because this section also includes Chiron's tryst on the beach with Kevin, which will become one of the most identity-forming moments in his life, it confronts the film's themes of love and its frustrations. Although this scene on the beach is in some ways a victory for Chiron, because it marks the first time he's able to act on his sexuality, it also kickstarts his downfall by lulling him into the security that comes with reciprocated love. This is foregrounded when he arrives home after Kevin drops him off to find his mother asleep on the couch. She tells him, "You're my only, and I'm your only," likewise a double edged sword, as it reminds him he won't find her pure, familial love anywhere else. In a way, this proves true when Kevin betrays Chiron by beating him for public show, a knife in the back of his new lover.
