Jesse

Jesse enjoys a night in with Abel, Leslie, and Glenda. Abel has suppressed his crush on Glenda, but Leslie is very interested in her. At school, Raul is on the cover of the paper. Jesse’s art teacher tells him that he’s improving.

Abel gets a girlfriend, a young woman from school named Maureen. To assuage his newfound loneliness, Jesse joins Raul’s student group, MEChA (Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán, or the Chicano Student Movement of Aztlán). He goes to a MEChA party, where the group members drink and debate the war in Vietnam. Jesse lies that he’s 18 years old, and that he’s already ripped up a notice of service from the army.

Abel gets more serious with Maureen, who helps him get a job in her father’s prosthetics business. Jesse decides to enter one of his drawings in an art exhibit at school; his drawing depicts United Farm Workers picketing in Delano. Jesse’s mother visits the exhibit with him so she can take a tour of his school. She doesn’t like the experimental art she sees in the exhibit, and without knowing which one is Jesse’s, spots his drawing and speaks badly of the Chicano Movement.