What happened to Michael? Tell the story from the first time he left home to the last time he left home.
             Michael had first left home when he was three, they were in the city and he had run off they later found him in a milk bar eating a chocolate malt, he claimed that he wasn't lost and that he knew exactly where he was.
             Even after the incident he kept on running away, they thought the reasons were because of peer group pressure, underage drinking and bad company.
             The mother seemed oblivious to Michael problems so he continued his frequent getaways, until the mother could no longer handle it and left him homeless in the city.
             What sort of boy was Michael? What sort of relationship did Michael have with his mother? What did ms lynch do to Michael at the end of the story, and why?
             To me Michael seems like an unhappy boy, he used to run away all the time, he drinks and gives in to peer group pressure, I think this is mainly because he must have problems at home, he continues to run away but his mother seems to be ignoring the fact that he is troubled. They don't sound very close, the mother says in the book (pg 26) all those night he ran away. But we always found him and bought him back. And he hated and fought and swore. But he was ours. This tells me he didn't want to be with them, that he was unhappy being around them. I get the feeling she was very over protective, she always thought of Michael as a little boy and wanted to protect him from the world, she said things like; He was ours, inside these four walls he was ours. The world could not get to him; He would rather stay home and play in the garden with me (referring to not wanting to go to school).
             In the end I think ms lynch realized that Michael was addicted to drugs and alcohol, and that she had lost the boy she had once known as her son. She didn't want him encouraging his younger brothers so she kicked him out, as she said on PG 27, I drove ...