Three friends living in Spanish Harlem are going about their daily lives, hanging out on the streets. They are Chino, Sapo, and Blanca, and they are almost teenagers but not quite. Chino already has a reputation for being a brave person and a loyal friend. They go to high school as their relationships begin changing. Sapo shows signs of dishonor (he bites when he fist fights), and Blanca means more and more to Chino as time goes on. He feels he loves her. After high school they get married and Blanca becomes pregnant.
They are unsure how to proceed, because their plans were to go to college and find a career later, but the financial pressures of parenting are fast approaching. Chino meets Willie Bodega through Sapo. Chino is suddenly introduced to the gravitational pull of the local gang leader who is also a cult of inspiration in the neighborhood. Chino feels that he can help the career criminal and become a king of the neighborhood in the same network. Chino's apartment is burned to the ground.
Before long, a death occurs. Someone killed a man called Salazar, and Chino suspects it was Bodega who has been in serious mood swings because of an on-again-off-again relationship with Vera. Vera decides after some tumultuous time that she will also cut ties with Bodega, as Chino also decided to do, but she asks Chino to wait until she breaks up with Bodega to betray him, in case she needs Chino's help in anyway. Both Bodega and Vera's husband die when Vera attempts to leave her husband. Soon, Chino discovers that the apartment burning was an attempt on his life, and he rats on everyone to the police—everyone except Sapo.
