In the beginning, Ryan hated Sam. In fact, he almost couldn 't stand being in the same room. He thought “ Well, it 's my senior year. I don 't want a little-kid roommate. I want to have fun.”(25) Ryan wanted nothing to do with Sam because he just wanted to have fun in his last year just like real seniors do. Throughout the book, Sam tries to be a Ryan 's friend by being annoyingly kind and not tell on Ryan when he sneaked beers from Spotted John. Ryan can 't stand how nice Sam is to everyone until he got in a fight with JP in the locker room. Then he said “ Sam Abernathy’s presence was like a punch in the gut to JP Tureau.”(280) Ryan, who was naked at the time with only a towel, would have been beaten by JP, if not for sam. Sam somehow knew that something was going on when JP was yelling at Ryan in the locker room, so he got in between them. This situation sort of changes what Ryan really thought about Sam. But only at the end of the book is when Ryan Dean realizes how good of a friend Sam Abernathy is. He says to Sam, ” I said, “ Okay. I’ve washed my hands. take two. Stand up. I want to give you a hug. (390) ” ” looking back at all the things Sam had done for him, Ryan Dean couldn 't stop himself from finally accepting Sam as a true friend. This quote clearly explains just how much Ryan wanted to thank Sam because Ryan …show more content…
Ryan hated Sam Abernathy, but then he started to change his feelings and actually started liking him at the end. Ryan was very affected by joey’s death in the beginning. He wasn 't able to say all the things that were happening to him because of it, but in the end, he was able to think for himself and get help with the school therapist. I could relate to how Ryan handled Joey’s death because a couple of years ago I found out that my Aunt had died in Kakuma. I was close to her. Those few days after finding that she had died, I had nightmares and couldn 't get the courage to tell anybody about it. I think that these days everyone including teanagers go through a traumatic event and they never really talk about it just because of how much it affected them and Ryan handled it the same