What does Alfonso do in this passage?
What is Alfonso's reason for his actions?
Alfonso sat on the porch trying to push his crooked teeth
to where he thought they belonged. He hated the way he
looked. Last week he did fifty sit-ups a day, thinking that
he would burn those already apparent ripples on his
stomach to even deeper ripples, dark ones, so when he
went swimming at the canal next summer, girls in cut-
offs would notice. And the guys would think he was
tough, someone who could take a punch and give it back.
--"Broken Chain,"
Gary Soto