Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of bullying, physical abuse, and racism.

“Darlene rolls her eyes—again—like I’m the stupid one. White-skinned. No accent. Good in school. I’m not her idea of a Latina at all. I could point out that Cameron Diaz is Latina, too, but why bother? It won’t change Darlene’s mind.”

When Darlene warns Piddy that the Latin girls, like Yaqui, mean business, Piddy says that she is Latina too. However, Darlene, who is white, mocks her. Because Piddy has lighter skin, no accent, and good grades, she does not fit the racist, stereotypical image that Darlene has in mind. Noting Darlene’s stubbornness, evidenced by her rolling her eyes, Piddy highlights how stereotypes narrow people’s perceptions. Piddy also faces judgment from the Latinx community at school and struggles to belong as a result.

“She’s just alive in a way that Ma is too tired to remember. It’s like Lila can still hear the rhythm in a salsa on the radio and not just complain about the noise.”

Piddy compares her mother, Clara, to the woman’s best friend, Lila. Her mother’s fatigue derives from a hard life and past heartache that Piddy knows almost nothing about. She sees a vivaciousness in Lila that her mother lacks, juxtaposing Lila’s aliveness and appreciation of salsa music with Ma’s tiredness and complaint about “the noise.” This is foreshadowing because Piddy, too, will become a shell of herself once Yaqui begins bullying her.

“I open the yearbook and start paging through it as fast as I can. Basketball games, Ping-Pong, Yearbook Club, Drama. I check the cover to make sure it’s not a mistake. It’s like I’m reading about another place entirely. The school in this book has nothing to do with the place where I spend my days, the place where three in ten of us won’t graduate. It doesn’t show the empty air around me as I wait alone in the school yard, the bathrooms I won’t go into, or the dead look I have to keep on my face as I go from class to class.”

The difference between the yearbook and Piddy’s experience highlights the contrast between perception and reality. The yearbook represents the superficial positives of Daniel Jones High. The reality, however, is a low graduation rate and bullying. Likewise, teachers and adults only perceive a student who is usually alone and appears not to care; they fail to understand why Piddy behaves the way she does due to