Molly+S

That Was Then, This Is Now By: S.E. Hinton 1.) Bryon and Mark are two teenage boys living in the city. They don't have much money and Mark's parents killed each other when he was young. Bryon's mom took him in because she loved kids and animals, and they became best friends. 2.) When Bryon and Mark went to the hospital to visit his mom, who had just recieved an expensive surgery, she told them about Mike, a boy their age across the hall who had no visitors and asked them to visit him. Mark agreed to go, but Bryon thought it was a waste of time and went downstairs to get a burger. When he is at the table, the waitress recognized him and started talking to him. Bryon thought she looked familiar, but he couldn't remember her name. When she came back, he realized that she was M&M's sister, Cathy. After talking to Cathy, he went back upstairs to get Mark, but Mark brought him into Mike's room where Bryon learns that he was hurt in a fight. 3.) Bryon and Mark are friends with Charlie, the owner and bartender of the bar that they always go to. Charlie always looked out for them, but one day when Bryon and Mark left the bar, visitors from Texas got mad at them and tried to kill them. At the last minute, Charlie came out of the bar and saved their lives, but ended up getting shot in the head and killed. 4.) At the dance, there was a fight and Mark got hit in the head with a glass bottle. When he passed out Bryon thought he was dead and called an ambulance. Mark was okay, but he had to get stitches. 5.) When Mark is in bed talking to Bryon, they notice that they are changing amd things aren't like they used to be. They realize that they are growing up and that they have their own personalities instead of just blending in with a gang. 6.) When Bryon and Mark were at Charlie's bar, they played pool against people visiting from Texas. When they left the bar, the people from Texas were mad at them and tried to shoot them. Charlie then came out of the bar with a shotgun, but ended up getting shot and killed himself. Bryon felt really guilty about it and thought that it was his fault, but Mark tried to convince him that it was okay. 7.) Mark and Cathy don't like each other because they both want Bryon's attention and their personalities clash. Mark is easygoing and can get out of any situation, but Cathy believes that you need to work hard and have your life planned out. 8.) When Mark, Bryon, and Angel left the party, Angel got drunk and fell asleep. Mark wanted to get back at her for hurting Bryon, so he cut off her hair while she was sleeping. 9.) When Bryon and Mark are in the car talking, Bryon realized why everyone liked Mark and wanted to be his friend. Whenever something bad happened to Mark, it didn't effect him. Mark was different and brave, so everyone wanted him to be their friend. 10.) When Bryon was at Terry's house, Tim and Curly beat him up for letting Mark cut off Angels hair. Angel told everyone that she was sick of her hair and got it cut off at a salon, but she told Terry the truth and asked him to get back at Bryon for her. When they beat up Bryon, Mark came to help him and Bryon got sick of all the fighting that was heppening 11.)When Bryon and Cathy went looking for M&M, Mark told them where he was. They went to the house and found him, he was sick. They found out that he had taken drugs and gone on a "bad trip", which could leave him crazy for the rest of his life. This mad Bryon angry for letting a kid do something like that to themself. 12.) When Bryon is back from the hospital, he runs out of cigarets and remembers Mark's stash of them under his mattress. When he reaches for the cigarets, he instead finds a cyllinder full of drugs, way too many for one person, and realizes that Mark is selling them. After what happened to M&M, Bryon gets angry and calls the cops. The cops arrested Mark when he got home, and when they left, Bryon realized that what he had done had hurt both Mark and his mom, and if he had asked Mark to stop selling the drugs, he would have. 13.) By the end of the book, Bryon's life is completely different. One of his friends hates him and is in jail, another one got killed, and another did drugs and has permanent mental damage, but it's not just his friends that are different, he changed, too. Bryon's attitude towards life was different, and he no longer liked the same things. He used to like fights, but he ended up hating them and not wanting to get revenge on the people who hurt him, like he used to. 14.) At the end of the book, Bryon was confused about what happened to all of his friends. He wondered what would have happened if M&M had had a good trip instead of a bad one, of if he hadn't called the cops on Mark if he would be in jail of not. Eventually, he wishes he was a kid again, when his life was more simple. 15.) I loved the book, it was really good! I think the life lesson in this book is to enjoy your childhood because as you get older, things get more complicated. It also teaches you to think before you act and that a small mistake can completely change your life.