I certainly don’t approve what Mark was doing, but to me, what Bryon did, was also something low. Mark was his brother, and the only reason he actually started selling drugs, was because of the money issue. His police records wouldn’t let him get a decent job and he did all he could’ve done to bring in his share in the family. Bryon was so consumed by Cathy, that he didn’t think about the consequences in his own best friend, nearly brother’s life. He knew if he had asked Mark to stop, he would have done it. Mark would have done anything for Bryon and Bryon didn’t even see, nor realized it. He feels guilty at the end because he knows inside that what he did, could have not cause the entire drift between him and the person who counted the most at his eyes. It was SO not a good idea what he did, and Mark didn’t deserve this. He tried doing something, despite the fact he knew if he got caught he would be in trouble , but the poor guy never thought his own brother would have call the cops. 

In conclusion, Bryon’s actions were a complete disaster and in my opinion, he didn’t handle the situaton well, at all! 

Personally, the ending was a bit too fast. Too many important events happened way too quickly and I think, as a reader, that I would have enjoyed it more if it had a couple more chapters explaining thoroughly what happened to M&M, Cathy, Mark and Bryon’s mom. It was that predictable though. I didn’t expect at all that Bryon was going to call the cops. I expected more of a confrontation, or even a fight. On another hand, their relationship was already doomed, because of them going seperate ways, but for them to end it this way more than I expected. It was also the foreshadowed part in the ending. They were drifting apart, and we could predict this fact throughout the book. In the beginning, Mark also stated that he would never forgive someone who would hurt him. Eventually at the end, after he got arrested, we see that he will never forgive Bryon and always hold a grudge towards him. This leaves  him to also become “mean” since he doesn’t care about anything anymore.

Bryon and Cathy’s relatonship most likely ended because of how Bryon was feeling at that point of the story. He feels like he’s responsible to ever meeting her and also causing her to be hurt because of what happen prior to the break up. He doesn’ tthink that he deserves her since he’s blaming everything  on him. He first started with Cathy, and started to block his mom too. It was more about him not being ready than a couple’s problem. He is in grief to what happened to M&M and also, his best friend. 

In my opinion, Bryon decided to call the cops because he felt like Mark was to blame in M&M’s bad trip. Let’s not forget that at that point in the book, both of them are not close anymore and Bryon is spending a lot of time with Cathy, even though Mark despises her a lot. Bryon didn’t even think twice about what he was about to do and the consequences it might have lead afterwards, such as Mark’s trial and their entourage breaking up.  

Throughout the last chapters of the book, several clues led us to think that Mark was possibly doing something such as drugs. At first, Bryon notices that his brother doesn’t even spend a lot of time either with him or home. He even started bringing in some serious money, even though he didn’t have a job. Also, let’s not forget that he was the one who knew where  M&M. This states that either he was hanging out with hippies or a more logic reason : he was selling drugs to them, since it is known that they consume them. He must’ve been doing it for a couple of weeks too, because as we can notice, he knew most of the people and the surroundings pretty well. 

In my opinion, Mark knows where M&M is, not because he’s becoming a hippie, but more because of the way he can get some drugs, since they are much present there. We can say that he was sincere when he told Bryon that he didn’t smoke, and it isn’t the first time he’s coming down here. One way to look at it would be that either he’s only wants to hang around or the other one, he’s involved somehow in the drug bussiness happening down there. If we think about it, he always come up with a way of getting some money and he doesn’t have a job. We can predict that either he is an intermediate in the drug business, or he is only involve somehow in that hippie house and it brings him enough money, and this is how he knew where M&M was.

In chapter 7, we can see that Mark and Bryon both took advantage when Angela was drunk. She had hurt Bryon in the past and was the reason why Mark was beaten up on the dance night.  They saw that she was drunk and was blabbing about her married life and how she did care for Bryon.  They took her in and while she was sobbing, Mark got hold on a rum bottle and a pair of scissors. In revenge to what she had done, he decided to cut her hair, even though at first Bryon wasn’t too sure, but quickly changed his mind. They know that her hair was something that made her proud, but as Bryon said, she’ll come up with story saying she was tired of that hot mess, but deep down Mark knows that it would kill her, since it was the night he saw Angela Sheppard being vulnerable.

First of all, I do not agree with Mark. From everything he had been through, he saw both his drunk parents kill each other when he was only 9 years old. On another hand, his opinion might change if we consider how M&M’s life have become. He is only 13 years old and because of all the insanities that his own father told him he was, he decided to run away at a young age. Cathy even had a suspicion on him using harder drugs and knowing how easy he is to influence, he wouldn’t be able to overcome any problems alone. At 13 also, he used to be his little brothers and sisters role model since he was the one babysitting them. He had bigger responsabilies when he’s still a kid and not being able to express the way he would like to be, he decided to go to the hippie house.

In my opinion, Bryon’s mother didn’t do a good as being a mother. Yes, as it is mentionned in the book, she loved Mark and Bryon, but she had never set any groud rules whatsoever in order to keep them in the right path. If she had been more present in Bryon’s life, he would have been able today to know what is good and acceptable to do or not. The only adult who made an impact on them was Charlie. Also, by not being so close to his mom, the boys didn’t know how to respect properly a girl. Yes, there was Angela and Cathy, but mainly all the other girls whom Bryon dated never interested and for him it was only a game. Another thing would be that she never put a curfew or check their grades or anything like that. Not having any authority on the, they used to come in late and fight a lot since they were kids and even didn’t bother about their education. The main consequence of the absence of their mother would be that they didn’t have someone to support them and to get out of their economic and social problems. It took something really hard to make Bryon realize that he had to do something but for Mark, it doesn’t seem that he bothers. Lastly, without the parent figure, Mark and Bryon would always do something, it could be good or bad, but they wouldn’t think about how it might come back in the future. By example, when Bryon cut off Angela’s hair, even though all he wanted was a little bit a revenge towards her, he didn’t think that she had her brothers and would probably be beaten up later on.

In my opinion, M&M chose to ran away because he felt like he didn’t fit in, that he was too different. He tried making a point about how violence was not the right solution, but no one would actually care about what he would say.  Also, he is not happy at home and he’d rather be anywhere else than be in the same house as his dad. Cathy even described him as being someone who is easily influenced and could easily be addicted by hard drugs. He is known for being someone who isn’t stable since the beginning of the book, and by running away, he will actually find peace on what everybody say about him.  He couldn’t take any of what people use to tell him anymore, so in my opinion, he ran away partly because of that.