The previous group of chapters found Esperanza being pulled by her emotions and physical feelings toward a sexual relationship with a young man. For Esperanza, such a relationship is still indefinite: "a boy" is what she dreams of; the only specific boy in her thoughts is one who now has a girlfriend, and Esperanza's interest in him seems more theoretical than practical. Yet the forces drawing her toward such a relationship with someone are powerful, coming from within herself and reinforced by her culture, which designates early marriage as the norm for young women. Now, in the chapters from "No Speak English" through "Minerva Writes Poems," Esperanza is concerned with women whose response to this imperative has resulted in terrible unhappiness. Thus the tension between what she feels and what she sees, what she knows of herself on two different levels, is again expressed.
Of the women described here, only Sally — who is certainly no older than Esperanza — is unmarried. She is, in the parlance of the time, a "bad girl," sexually promiscuous (if the boys' stories are true). Sally, at a fragile age when controlling the forces within and around her is well nigh impossible, is in a double bind. As she develops into a young woman, her father attempts to resist this inevitability by forcing her to hide her own sexuality (and, as we shall see in a later chapter, by beating Sally). Although her father is probably acting mainly out of a desire to protect her, his attitude and actions make Sally even more desperate to get away from him, and the only way she knows of doing this is to try to attract boys and young men, the very kind of behavior that gives rise to her father's fears and jealousies.
