How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents

Carla attends a different Catholic school than her sisters do, a year into their time in America, because the school the younger kids are at does not have any openings in seventh grade. Laura Garcia believes that public schools are places for “delinquents” and does not like that they teach evolution there. While at school, Carla is picked on by boys who throw stones at her in places where bruises will not be left. One day, one of the boys pulls up her shirt and comments on her lack of breasts. This brings her shame, which she already feels over her changing body. This change is occurring alongside her change from Dominican Republican to American. It is hard for her to be in a family of four girls where there is very little room for individuation.

The next day when she is walking to school, a man in a car summons her. When she gets to the car, she notices that the man is naked from the waist down. He tries to get her into the car, and she cannot speak, but she does run away. Laura calls the police, but the girls are afraid of the police because they are the ones they escaped back on the Island.