Awesome / Tangerine (1997)

• Antoine Thomas convincing Paul to speak out about witnessing the attack that led to Luis' death.
  It's time to start telling the truth, little brother. Do you understand what I'm saying?
• Antoine's own decision to report what he knows about the same event, and come clean about his eligibility to play football for Lake Windsor. This voids all of Antoine's football wins, records, and milestones, for his entire high school football career. He's a senior in high school, and he just sacrificed four years of his hard work. (It also has the side effect of voiding Erik's senior year, right before he would be applying to college.)
• And Mr. Donnelly's column defending Antoine. Mr. Donnelly was the previous record-holder of one of the records Antoine broke during his football career, and Antoine's confession reinstates his record. While people like Paul's father are trashing Antoine for ruining the careers of their kids, Mr. Donnelly writes that none of this changes the fact that Antoine Thomas is the greatest football player in the history of Tangerine County. Everyone knows that.
  Thanks, Tangerine County Sports Commission, but no thanks. I'm not putting this thing back in my trophy case. I wouldn't even put this thing out in a garage sale. This is nothing to be proud of.
• Paul telling the police the truth about Luis's death, including that the blackjack is still in Erik's friend's car. This comes after his parents managed to convince the neighbors to not press charges for the thefts of their personal objects, and Paul has had enough. This leads to Erik being put under house arrest; while we don't see the consequences, their father implies that the justice system isn't done with Erik.
• Earlier in the book, a sinkhole appears at Lake Windsor Middle and threatens to swallow up several classrooms. Despite the danger, Paul, Joey, and Gino race to the collapsable classrooms and help everyone get out. Paul never mentions this to his parents, with only the kids at school knowing what he did.
• When he's first brought to Lake Windsor Middle School, Paul's mother claims he's legally blind (which is technically true, but he's still able to see reasonably well) so she and Paul can get a tour of the school. Later, the disability form she filled out gets Paul kicked off the soccer team. Paul calls her out for it, as he reminds her that he can see, but she always pulls out the legally blind excuse so she (and possibly he) can get special treatment. Mrs. Fisher is floored, because he's completely right. She makes up for it when she takes him to Tangerine Middle, and completely fails to bring up his disability (meaning nothing can stop him from playing).
• The confrontation that Paul's grandparents have with his parents; they accurately say I Told You So because they knew Erik should have been punished for hurting Paul, while also acknowledging that there is no easy answer for finding out your son is a violent monster. They then leave after seeing the house, and tell Paul So Proud of You. Paul's mother at least does agree that it was a terrible mistake to make, though Paul's father not so much. Being estranged of them, as well as not talking about his own parents to neither of his sons does give you some sort of idea who he is, but he is not a bad person at the most.
  • While what the parents did to their own son is downright terrible, they later admit what actually happened and feel utterly ashamed. Even given the fact that they have lied to their own son about his vision, and to him, probably preferred that he would grow up hating himself more than he would his brother for his actions (his father probably more so considering his intense crying reaction). His parents are not terribly bad people and do love him regardless. His relationship with his mother is especially heartwarming, and somewhat awesome to say the least, because even though his mother does have her noticeable faults when it comes to caring for Paul, earlier on and in the present, she does mean well and you can tell throughout the story that she clearly loves him and is much more supportive of Paul than either her husband or Erik are (she even takes him on errands), and she does try her best to care for all her family.
• Also Paul's response to being expelled from Tangerine Middle School, and his mother waived his right to appeal the decision; he tells his mother they'll make an exception for him, and plans to play with his teammates as soon as possible.
• After the memorial service for Mike Costello (the one where Erik and Arthur got beat up by Victor and Tino, and then Paul let them escape by cannonballing the football coach (which is a Moment of Awesome in and of itself)), Paul finally brings back the memory he'd been repressing of Erik spraying paint in his eyes (causing his terrible eyesight). He goes to his parents and tells them he knows, calling them out for years of lies and manipulation trying to keep Paul from hating Erik (and denying to themselves that Erik needed help). Paul finally breaks them when he asks if protecting Erik's (and their) image was worth sacrificing Paul's self-worth.
• Even before Antoine offers his testimony about Erik and Arthur killing Luis, he and his friends set up Erik's last football game so that their team won, but Erik had no chances to show off.
• The sequence of events that leads to Arthur and Erik getting arrested for murder just as their parents get them off the hook for burglary. Antoine Thomas, a football player who has to lie about his eligibility to play for Lake Windsor in order to attract the college recruiters and scholarships he needs to secure his future and who has been watching Erik and Arthur get away with everything but murder all school year, has to confront the fact that he can either keep quiet about witnessing the murder of Luis Cruz, or he can report what he saw and ensure that Erik doesn't get reap the benefits of being the star football player any longer. After a talk with Betty Bright, he chooses to not only confess his ineligibility and void both his and Erik's football careers, but to tell the police everything he saw. The police, while looking for Erik's friend Arthur, come across Joey Costello, the younger brother of another Lake Windsor football player who died from a lightning strike earlier in the year, and whose death meant Arthur Bauer got into a game sometimes— something Erik and Arthur openly mocked him about to his face. Joey is the one who calls Paul and tells him the police are looking for Arthur. Paul, who has spent the entire book terrified of Arthur and Erik, who has watched them poison his friendships with both Joey and Tino Cruz with their bullying, and has just watched his parents and Arthur's basically blackmail their neighbors to not press charges against Erik and Arthur for burglary, tells him yeah, Arthur's right here. Joey gets to pass that along to the police. The police then arrest Arthur and put Erik under house arrest in front of everyone who just got swindled into not pressing charges against them for petty burglary. Then, just as the police leave, Paul's grandparents show up and Mrs. Fisher worriedly asks, "What are we going to tell them?" The catharsis is real.

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