Sophie Gee

I'm just wondering because she's the first girl ever to be a senior prefect, isn't she?

I know that's a pretty big deal.

And little Washington says, she's about like everyone else here.

Really?

She seems different.

Little set the bottle of oil on the counter, it's hair oil, another race marker, and leaned in close to the mirror, peering at her skin.

Then she said, she's rich.

That's what Gates is.

Her family has a whole lot of money.

She stepped back and made a face in the mirror, sucking in her cheeks and arching her eyebrows.

It's the kind of thing I'd have done alone, but never in front of another person.

I thought Gates was from a farm, I said.

a farm that's half the state of Idaho, where people grow potatoes.

Bet you didn't think such a nasty little vegetable could be worth so much money.

So the conflict in the first chapter is a conflict based on class.

It's about how much money you have.

But ultimately, it's a conflict about the way that the underserved, the unprivileged white character perceives privilege versus the way that the underserved, poor black character perceives white privilege.

Yeah, it's true.

And it's, you know, one of the things that's really skillful about this novel, and it comes up in this chapter, it's an allegory for the way in which the person with the wealth, the person with the power is

is the one who gets to take out the other character, right?