Front Desk (Front Desk #1) (Scholastic Gold)

by Kelly Yang

“Poor people can do stuff too!” I shouted at him as I slammed the piano cover and walked away.

“We’re immigrants,” she said. “Our lives are never fair.”

“And because we’re brown,” she said quietly.

Lupe explained. According to her dad, there were two roller coasters in America—one for rich people and one for poor people. On the rich roller coaster, people have money, so their kids get to go to great schools. Then they grow up and make a lot of money, so their kids get to go to great schools. “And ’round and ’round they go,” Lupe said. “And poor people?” I asked. “We’re on a different roller coaster. On our roller coaster, our parents don’t have money, so we can’t go to good schools, and then we can’t get good jobs. So then our kids can’t go to good schools, they can’t get good jobs, and so on and so forth,” Lupe said.

I used to think being successful meant having enough to eat, but now that I was getting free lunch at school, I wondered if I should set my standards higher.

“I think being successful in this country means having a living room without a bed in it,” she decided. I immediately wanted to run over and cover up my parents’ bed in the living room so she wouldn’t see it.

“You know what you are in English? You’re a bicycle, and the other kids are cars.”

“Free rent? I’m sorry, but I don’t think you qualify,” he said. “What do you mean?” my mom asked. “You can’t get free rent and free health care,” he said, crossing his arms. “But we’re dirt poor!” I said. “It says so right here.”

“You want to charge these poor people three thousand four hundred and eighty dollars? Can’t you see they just got the crap beat out of them?” he asked the supervisor, almost yelling.

The point was sometimes, you have to take matters into your own hands. And you have to be creative to get what you want.

America may not be perfect, but she’s free. And that makes all the difference.” I finally understood what my parents meant by “free.”

That’s not what “free” means! Free means innocent until proven guilty, not guilty no matter how innocent.

was the most incredible feeling ever, knowing that something I wrote actually changed someone’s life.