The Plan 3

"This summer, we are going to study for the SSAT's."
"Of course," he heard himself say.
"You will need to memorize the meanings of about 2000 words."
"I know."

Derek really wanted to go along with his mother's program. At the same time, he thought it was strange that he felt no resistance to her program. He learned the words as fast as he could, about 50 to 100 a day.

"What you want to learn those words for?" John asked.
"These are the words used in the textbooks I am going to be reading."
"Why can't those textbooks speak in plain English?"
"That's just the way they are written."
"You're going to one of those elite private school, aren't you with Like 3 Afro-American students..."
"And 10 Asian students..."
"Derek, do you really want to do this?"
"John, I really want to excel at something. Look at the world around me? Do you see any Asians in Hollywood except maybe a martial arts star now and then? But in academics... business, medicine, law and science, the field is wide open for us. I really want to see if I can beat the Caucasians..."

He stopped:
"I can't believe I said that."
"You meant it though. Let me tell you, you can never beat the Caucasians. They run the whole system. And what makes you think you can do any better?"

Derek didn't know. He realized he had been a bit jealous of the Caucasians. They were 90 to 95% of the Middle School he wat at. Of course, a large majority of them were Jews and many Jews were friedly toward him, but he still felt left out of this society. The jocks and pretty girls were at the center of this society, not him and his brains.

He studied all that summer and got a nearly perfect score on the SSAT's. He looked at the 2 problems he got wrong. How could he get those problems wrong? His mother grounded him for the weekend.