Sometimes in life, people want things they don't have. No matter how much people wish for a star or a candle, the wishes never seem to come true. Everyone felt that bitter disappointment on Christmas morning when they finally realized they would never get what they wanted. These are the exact same sensations that the characters in Cisneros' The House on Mango Street feel. Unlike us, the disappointment for these characters lasts throughout their childhood. Esperanza, Rachel, Nenny, Sally and Lucy are among the children growing up on Mango Street. Everyone wants friendship, love, and a better life, but all these kids have to face the harsh reality of the "real world." In the society where Esperanza and her friends live, love takes a back seat when it comes to relationships. One day I will have a best friend of my own, one to whom I can tell my secrets, one who will understand my jokes without me having to explain them" (11). These are Esperanza's words of desire. Growing up on MangoStreet, Esperanza finds herself in a community to which she feels she does not belong. She wholeheartedly desires a true friend to whom she can tell her dreams and who will understand her for this. These wishes seem easy enough to fulfill, but Esperanza soon discovers that behind the friendship there is 'is more. "If you give me five dollars, I will be your friend forever" (29). Esperanza finds that she can't get anything for anything. Rachel and Lucy definitely become her friends, but only after she helps them to pay for the bicycle. Esperanza never really finds a true friend who shares her same goal because all the friends who... middle of paper ......ango Street, would always be a small tag that followed her. She is like this because she learned and grew up in that house. He may think he doesn't belong, but he belongs just as much as the four trees that were on the road. Esperanza and her friends always knew that in their hearts there was no escaping the life they lived. The residents of Mango Street all had their own ideas about love, about friends, about the good life, but what they got was totally the opposite. The reason is that they didn't fight for what they wanted, but waited for it to come to them. That's why they ended up with what they got. It's amazing that the line between fantasy and reality is so thin. Fantasy and reality are often confused with each other because, being part of human nature, it is the only way we can deal with disappointment.