This is our first line in chapter one, which lets us know right off the bat that having a reputation is important to Nick…and that he doesn't have a good one. Although we can think of several things worse to be than a "mandork."

We wonder if the loser corner of the cafeteria is cordoned off from everyone else. Is it separated by a moat? Who are these losers in the corner? Nick acts like every single person in the school is popular except for himself.

Nick has found himself at the bottom of the social totem pole, and that means that everyone is free to pick on him simply because he's unpopular. And he's unpopular because people pick on him. It's a vicious cycle. But that sure is how it works in high school.

Nick will sacrifice himself to protect his mom's reputation, even though Stone doesn't technically say anything that isn't true about her.

Kyrian has tons of money, so he doesn't seem to care who has it and who doesn't. He is drawn to people whom he respects or admires. And Nick, lucky for him, happens to be one of those people.

Nick is pretty desperate to change his lifestyle. Early on, it feels like this could be foreshadowing—like, Nick might have to kill someone to escape. But it turns out that he doesn't, so this line is simply characterizing Nick as a character who has no problem with violence if it acts as a means to an end.

Nick has violent tendencies, but he rationalizes these tendencies by only being violent toward people he thinks deserves it. These two tourists are innocent, so Nick is aghast that his friends attack them—and so he defends the tourists.

Nick is very protective of his mother. She is also very protective of him, so it's a relationship that works out well.

Here the fact that Nick's mom is a single mother is alluded to, and it helps explain why the two are so protective of one another. But why is Nick's dad out of the picture? Does Nick think he is better off without his dad in the picture anymore?

Nick's family is poor, but they really want to be rich. Nick's mom seems to think she can be wealthy through osmosis. She only buys this tacky shirt because it comes from a rich family.

As proud as Nick's mom tries to be of what little they have, Nick has a hard time keeping up with her positivity. He doesn't like his situation at all, and he wants to change things. It's not easy to be the poor kid in school, even if you're not at a hoity-toity school for rich kids.

Money can't buy happiness, but it can buy stuff. And Nick thinks that stuff will make him and his mom even happier.

At least Nick and his mom are able to make jokes about their situation. It makes it a little less difficult to live the way they do when they have a sense of humor about it. Does being poor, in a certain way, make Nick and his mom a little stronger than others?

These poor jokes are cheap. Pardon the pun. Anyway, it just goes to show you how nasty and petty people can be, even about things—like how much money your family has—outside of anyone's control. Speaking of which, why is it that the privileged kids are so nasty?

Nick's situation is pretty bad. He and his mom don't just have to scrimp and save to be able to afford clothes; sometimes they can't even afford food. That's a terrible situation to be in.

There are a lot of types of love represented in this book, not just romantic love. The love between Nick's mom and her son is very prominent. She loves him unconditionally.

There is plenty of romantic love in this novel, too, if that's more your thing. Nick falls for Nekoda at first sight. Is it destiny? Or is it lust, because Nick is only fourteen? Or is everybody wrong when they say that teenagers only know about lust and infatuation and not about love?

As a teenager, it can be especially difficult to believe that you have any sort of free will, since your parents control everything you do. And when you're parents aren't controlling you, then there's school. And then at school, there is the terrifying, Darwinian nature of social life that controls you, too. Yikes.

When Nick is stressed out or feels threatened, his first reaction is to turn violent. This will become a problem for him later on. He might have an easier time resisting the dark side if he were more levelheaded.

Ah, that answers our previous question. But we're still not sure what Nick's problem is with his father. All we know is that Nick is glad he is not in the picture.