Dante, Pook, and Wyatt, 8th-graders in a rundown West Oakland, California school plagued by guns, gangs, drugs and violence as well as inept or indifferent teachers, don't have many choices in life. Dante, 13, was born to a crack-addicted mother and needs an expensive heart operation if he hopes to reach 30. Pook is newly 14 and, though handsome and muscular, with a dream of becoming a doctor, is an outcast because he’s gay. Wyatt, 13, is enormously fat, though his biggest handicap is being smart in a stupid place.

Dante’s father, though loving, is an engineer on a tugboat and often absent from Dante’s life, but Wyatt’s single mother, who owns a little cafe and lives in Dante’s building, provides ample mothering and most of Dante’s meals; while Wyatt’s younger brother, Cheo, provides a little brother figure. Pook, whose crack-addicted parents are mostly indifferent to him, usually cribs with Dante; and all the boys have known each other for most of their lives.

The boys also know the odds are against them: they are trapped in an evil Babylon which is ruled by hate, violence and greed; an environment which, both blatantly and subtly, encourages young black men to fight or kill or exploit each other while discouraging any dreams they may have of someday getting out. The elusive magic formula for escape is mostly composed of money, and the only people around them who seem to have any money are hustlers, drug-dealers, and gun-toting thugs.

Nevertheless, and thanks mostly to Dante’s strong father and Wyatt’s formidable but caring mother, the boys have thus far managed to stay as good as they can. This becomes obvious when they take in Radgi, a homeless, alley-dwelling 12-year-old.

Then, real hope of money appears when Dante and Pook witness a major drug deal on the waterfront at night... a deal that goes bad when cops chase Air Touch, a 17-year-old wannabe gangster sent to make the buy. Air Touch, fleeing in his Dodge Viper, throws his gun and a suitcase-sized package out the window where they tumble beneath a parked truck. Confident because he’s clean, Air Touch pulls over, even though with his powerful car he might have gotten away. But, his thuggish bluster soon crumbles when he finds that the cops want the drug money and aren't enforcing the law. Finding no money, the cops Rodney King Air Touch and leave him unconscious in the gutter. Dante and Pook, hiding beneath another parked truck, snatch up the gun and the package, believing the latter to be full of cash.

But their hopes are dashed when, arriving home and getting Wyatt to share their fortune, they discover that instead of bundles of bills, the package contains pure cocaine just off a ship. At first they consider flushing it down the toilet, but then Dante begins to speculate how much money it might be worth. Enough for his heart operation? Enough to put Pook through medical school? Enough for Wyatt to go to college?

Pook and Wyatt are hesitant: if they did manage to sell the coke, it would likely be cooked into more crack and end up back in their ‘hood. But Dante argues what’s the difference between paper or powder? Don’t people kill each other for money? Isn’t money evil, even if you need it to have choices in life? For the first time in their lives, the boys’ friendship is put to a test. Finally, though Wyatt is still reluctant and Pook remains troubled, an agreement is reached that Dante will try to find a buyer. But, if this becomes too dangerous, they will flush the stuff and try for the best of the choices they have.

And it does become dangerous -- VERY dangerous -- not only for Dante but for all of his friends.