Sal was brought up on a farm in Bybanks, Kentucky. She is 13 years old and is a "country girl at heart." Like her mother, she has long black hair and is proud of her Seneca Indian heritage. Her parents tried to name her after the name of the Indian tribe to which her great-great-grandmother belonged, but they made a mistake. They named her Salamanca instead of Seneca. And because her mother thought trees were beautiful, Tree became her middle name. Trees play an important role in Sal's life. She prays to trees (because there is always a tree close by), and she has a "singing" tree on the farm.
Sal's inner journey through the grieving process is evident throughout the novel. She denies that her mother is dead. She insists that her mother will be coming home again. She longs for everything to be the way it was. Sal is angry and, at times, she is "ornery and stubborn as an old donkey." She wants someone to blame for her mother's abandonment of her, but her father is too good and her mother is a part of her.
Sal takes a road trip with her grandparents. She wants to see her mother's grave, but is afraid at the same time. At first Sal wants to rush to get to Lewiston, Idaho, because she feels she has to be there in time for her mother's birthday, but as they do get closer, she wants to slow down because she is scared. When Sal finally sees her mother's grave and headstone with a tree engraved on it, she knows once and for all that her mother will never be coming home.
