Darla+C.

That Was Then This is Now By: S.E Hinton

1) Bryon is a self proclaimed lady-killer, hustler, and he lives in the rough part of the city with his mother and Mark. Mark has lived with Bryon ever since he was 9 and Bryon was 10. Mark`s parents shot eachother in a druking argument, which is why he went to live to live with Bryon, their both like brothers. 2) Byron meets a young girl in the hospital cafiteria, she is M&M`s older sister, her name is Cathy. The other is a young boy named Mike Chambers, who got attacked by a gang when he was driving a girl home. 3)Bryon and Charlie are pretty good friends,Charlie even loaned Bryon his car. Although Charlies a buisness man first, and whoever doesn`t pay Charlie beats up. 4) Bryon takes Cathy out to a dance, later at the dance he meets up with Mark, Curtis, and his ex-girlfriend Angela Shepard. While Mark and Curtis are in the parking lot, Angela talks another guy into picking a fight with Curtis. When he starts to fight Curtis, Mark steps inbetween them to breakup the fight, the guy cracks a bottle over Mark`s head. Curtis runs to get Bryon, then the ambulance comes, and Bryon gets in to be with Mark. When they get to the hospital Mark`s okay, he just needed some stiches in his head, then Curtis comes to the hospital with Cathy to pick up Bryon and Mark. 5) When Bryon and Mark begin to talk with Mark he finds out that even though Mark has been through so much, he didn`t even let it leave a mark on him, at that moment Bryon relizes why everyone wants to be Mark`s friend, who wouldn`t want a lion standing between them and their troubles. ﻿ 6) One night when Bryon and Mark are hustled a couple of Texans, they waited in an alley way outside Charlies bar, when Bryon and Marked leaved, they took them into the alley way, and Dirty Dan put on brass knuckles, and was preparing to teach them a "lesson" about hustling, Charlie steps in with a shotgun and saves Bryon and Mark. Then one of the texans shoots and then Mark grabs the shotgun and fires, when its all over, Charlies dead. Bryon feels horrible, because Charlie died saving them, while Mark thinks that Charlie knew the risk he was taking, and what happens, happens. 7) Mark doesn`t like Cathy so much, because Bryon cares about her so much, Mark just deals with it. Cathy thinks Marks beautiful, but she doesn`t like him so much. 8) Mark cuts off her hair, because she told that guy to pick a fight with Curtis, which ended with Mark in the hospital with stiches in his head. 9) He starts to relize that Mark and him are drifting apart, Mark has no laws, no rules, and doesn`t care about anyone but him. 10) The Shepard`s beat him up because they cut off Angel`s hair, and afterwards he`s done, he doesn`t want revenge, and he just doesn`t want to fight anymore. 11) M&M not only runs away, but he moves into a hippie house, and tries LSD. He practically looses his mind, and the hippies had to take turns holding him down, because he kept trying to jump out the window. 12) Bryon finds drugs in Mark`s matress, he calls the police and Mark gets arrested. 13) He doesn`t date Cathy anymore, he just forgets about Mark, and he gradually makes better choices and changes his life for the better. 14) Bryon begins to study and gets straight A`s, he gets promoted to clerk, and stops all of his violent, irratic behavior. 15) I thought the book was great, there wasn`t one chapter that was boring. I think th life lesson was that no matter how many mistakes you make its never to late to start over.I think the parts of the book that teach the life lessons are, when Bryon gets beaten by the Shepards he doesn`t want revenge, he just wants the cycle of distruction to stop. Another part of the book was at the end when Bryon talks about how his life has changed, and how he feels about how everything that happened to him. Another life lesson that the book teaches is how even though things change, for better or for the worse, change is a part of life, and will always be, thats way its important to really cherish the care-free times with family and friends. I don`t think the boys got the same lesson though, Mark was going to be bad his whole life if he could get away with it, while Bryon made a change for the better before he ended up in prision or worse, Mark has to learn the hard way he had to be caught and thrown in prision by his own friend to learn why he should make a change.