the person in this picture is really me.

It was too vast a problem to be just a personal thing. There should be some help, someone should tell them before it was too late. Someone should tell their side of the story, and maybe people would understand then, and wouldn’t be so quick to judge a boy by the amount of hair oil he wore.

I was desperate for something to read that dealt realistically with teenage life, and I thought others might be, too.

You still have a lot of time to make yourself be what you want. There's still lots of good in the world. Tell Dally. I don't think he knows.

He died violent and young and desperate, just like we all knew he'd die someday.

I go straight from thinking about my narrator to being him.

I used to be sure of things. Me, once i had all the answers. I wish i was a kid again, when i had all the answers