When I Was Puerto Rican: 10. Dreams of a Better Life Summary & Analysis

When Mami returns for Negi at Tío Lalo's house, she tells Negi and Angelina that when she returned from New York, she found the house locked and learned from the neighbor that Papi "packed off the kids" and went back to Macún. Negi thinks that there's something different about Mami. She came back from New York with painted nails and a haircut, but she also seems prouder and more confident now. Negi is simultaneously frightened and enthralled. She thinks Mami looks more beautiful than ever.

As Mami and Negi walk to the bus, men stare, whistle, and catcall Mami. Mami ignores them. Negi is both proud and afraid: she's afraid that Mami has become public property and that one of the men is going to take Mami from her forever. Negi wants to punch the men and spends the entire bus ride miserable.

Their new home is near a golf course and next door to an aunt and uncle with a television set. Negi and her siblings watch Tom and Jerry, Mickey Mouse, Superman, and Tarzan. Rather than watch television, Papi spends his time in a shed reading. He becomes withdrawn and morose. Negi sneaks into Papi's shed one day and studies the books written in formal Spanish. She sees a bottle of amber liquid and a bowl with ashes, and leaves the shed scared and chilled.

Negi gets her own room in the new house, which she's allowed to decorate with cut pictures from food packaging. The first night, Negi struggles to sleep totally alone for the first time. She gets up when she hears the rooster crow and tiptoes to Mami and Papi's room. She walks in to find her parents sitting in bed naked, and they blush, pull their covers up, and send Negi back to bed. Negi sleeps on the couch and falls asleep to the sounds of her parents having sex.

Negi tells the reader that love makes people do crazy things, and lists some violent newspaper headlines. The radio, however, is different: the men are decent and the women, though often downtrodden, are optimistic and cheerful. Negi comes home from school daily to sit and listen to romantic radio programs. She imagines that she looks like the heroines. At night she daydreams her own fantasies of being rescued by an Armando or Ricardo. According to these soap operas, Negi will fall in love at first sight and will have to suffer, and she dreams of the suffering road to happiness every night.

As Negi dreams these fantasies, Mami and Papi's relationship gets even worse. Though they've been together 14 years, they're not married. After returning from New York, Mami began insisting that they get married, and they fight about it constantly. When the fights start, Negi goes to her room and imagines that men and women can be gentle, kind, and loving to each other.

One day, a boy named Johannes Vélez offers to carry Negi's books for her. Negi snaps at him, even though she likes when he looks at her and wants to give him her books. She fears that letting him carry her books will mean giving him more, even though she's not sure what "more" is. She tells him he can carry her books tomorrow and walks home angry that she didn't let him carry them today.

Negi asks Mami what to do if a boy offers to carry her books. Mami says to let him, and asks who wants to carry Negi's books. When Negi mentions Johannes, Delsa, Norma, and Alicia taunt Negi about having a boyfriend. Mami doesn't recognize Johannes' last name and Edna and Raymond join to taunt Negi even more. Finally, Mami sends the children away and turns to Negi, who's embarrassed and confused.

Mami tells Negi to invite Johannes to the house, but Negi starts to cry when Mami mentions that Negi is “casi señorita” (almost a woman) and needs to make boys respect her. Negi asks when she's going to be a real señorita, and why she should do all these things because she's casi señorita. She breaks into heaving sobs. Mami comforts Negi and sends her to her room to lie down instead of go to school. Negi undresses and feels as though the world is cruel and horrible, and Mami asks God to help her get through her children's puberties.

Negi describes the space under the house, which she and her siblings divide up into clearly defined play areas for each of them. Negi spends a lot of time there and takes special interest in a nearby gardenia bush that has never flowered. She asks Papi and Mami how to help the gardenia flower, and she begins pruning and watering the bush. One day, while Negi waters the gardenia, Johannes appears at the gate and greets Negi. Negi is furious he came uninvited.

Mami appears with the rest of Negi's siblings and greets Johannes. Negi is embarrassed and, at Mami's prodding, asks Johannes in. He sits on the sofa while Negi's siblings arrange themselves so they can watch Negi and Johannes. Negi asks Johannes where his "funny name" came from. He blushes and says he was born in Kentucky. Negi persists in this line of questioning until Mami calls her into the kitchen and tells her she's being rude. She suggests Negi take Johannes outside.

Negi reenters the living room and asks Johannes if he'd like to "see a tree." Mami rolls her eyes, but Johannes follows Negi outside. She asks Johannes what he's doing at her house. They stand by the creek and Johannes talks about his father. Negi feels that she can't compare Johannes to her adult male soap opera lovers and doesn't want to listen to him. Negi steps towards the creek and falls in. She emerges, covered in mud and crying, and tells Johannes to go home. He leaves laughing.

One day Mami leaves Negi at home to watch the children while she takes Edna and Raymond shopping. Negi reads a romance novel instead of doing what Mami asked. A man comes out of a nearby house wearing a straw sombrero. Negi thinks he looks like a Mexican movie star and thinks his name must be Ricardo. Her heart skips a beat. She wills the man to look at her and fall in love, but he sits by the stream and stares into it. Negi goes inside, brushes her hair, and unbuttons a button on her dress to show off her not-yet-developed cleavage.

When Negi goes back outside, the man is lying down with his sombrero over his face. Negi cuts a flower from her budding gardenia bush and buries her face in it. The man stands up and looks at Negi, and Negi feels older and bold and stares back. The man tips his hat at her, and she puts the gardenia flower in her open buttonhole. The man laughs and Negi moves the flower to behind her ear. She leans against a mango tree and puffs her chest out as the man watches, until Mami interrupts Negi's reverie.

Negi buttons her blouse and the man walks back towards a rich man's house. Mami asks who the man is and Negi feigns ignorance. Mami sends Negi inside, telling her the romance novels are trash.

The fighting between Mami and Papi escalates even further. Negi hears them breaking things as they yell, but she finds no broken pieces when she wakes in the mornings. She begins spending time in the library to avoid being at home. One day, as Negi helps Mami butcher a chicken, she sobs that nobody loves her, and laments that Mami and Papi keep fighting. Mami wrestles with the chicken as Negi keeps whining, and Mami finally tells Negi that her relationship with Papi isn't Negi's business. Negi cries that life isn't fair, and Mami finally comforts her on the steps. Negi notices that Mami is both crying and laughing, but Mami won't explain why she's laughing or crying.

Papi tells Negi that she'll be a teenager next week and explains how Americans came up with the word "teenager." He tells Negi that she'll like rock and roll, even though Negi insists that she doesn't like it. Papi seems happy and Negi pouts. Papi tells Negi that Mami is talking about moving to New York, shocking Negi. Papi calls to Mami to confirm. Mami tells Papi she has no choice and he's cruel for what he's doing.

Papi insists that he doesn't know what Mami wants. Mami says she wants him to marry her, but Papi insists that he's done everything he should. Their fight gets louder and angrier. Negi crouches against the wall and watches them fight. Her siblings join her and watch their parents. Negi says that in this moment, her parents were only real to each other.

Mami begins to prepare for the move to New York. She buys suitcases and decides that Negi, Raymond, and Edna will go with her, while Delsa, Norma, Héctor, and Alicia will stay until Mami can afford to send for them. Mami and Papi both refuse to talk to Negi about what's happening, but Papi does tell her that he'll never go to New York. Negi doesn't see how Mami can think that Papi is a good man when he won't fight for them.

Papi drives Negi, Mami, Raymond, and Edna to the airport. He unloads their bags and kisses them goodbye. He tells Negi to write and Negi follows Mami to the plane. She turns around to look at Papi and her remaining siblings, but Mami ushers her onto the plane. Negi tells the reader that for Mami, New York would be a twisting adventure. For Negi, the move created a hybrid, and she'd never fully forgive this move.