How two young women bond while plotting to escape poverty in L.A. [latimes.com]

Yecenia Perez, 17, says she doesn’t feel safe commuting to school and home, a one-hour trek each way by bus and two trains.

“I’ve had men push me up against the fence outside school,” she said, and she also described an attempted assault by a neighbor.

When Perez gets home to her family’s one-bedroom apartment in the evening, north of Koreatown, she has no privacy. Tight quarters bring tension and bouts of depression.