Read the excerpt from "Broken Chain." He asked his mother if he could have braces, like Frankie Molina, her godson, but he asked at the wrong time. She was at the kitchen table licking the envelope to the house payment. She glared up at him. "Do you think money grows on trees?" His mother clipped coupons from magazines and newspapers, kept a vegetable garden in the summer, and shopped at Penney's and Kmart. What is a theme expressed in this excerpt?

Spending money is not always an option.

Explanation:

Theme is the subject to be developed in the text. In this text the theme is "Spending money is not always an option". This can be proven by the text, when the mother, who was licking the envelope to pay the house, asks if her son thinks that money is born in a tree, when he asks for braces. That is, spending money is not always an option because, somentimes, people only have enough money to pay bills.

I think the theme is that money doesn't grow on trees so you must be conservative and save your money.