- Exposition - There is a character named Deepak who is small and scrawny. There is a gang inside the facility called the 3-5-7, who got some of their members to jump him because he was weak. The main character Reese is a privellaged criminal who gets to go to a old folks home called Evergreen, while he was there he met a old man names Mr.Hooft who was racist and just plain rude. In the beginning of this book there is alot of disagreement and violence including fights and disputes between characters.
- Rising Action- One thing that happened during the rising action of this book is when Mr.Hooft is starting to open up torwards Reese and tells him the story from when he lived In Java and the Japanese invaded and took the boys and men to work camps and separated families. Next Reese finds out that Mr.Hooft was shot when he was younger and has a large bullet hole.
Next during the rising action Reese's mother and sister (Icy) came to visit him and they were talking about how he needs to have a plan for when he gets out of progress. She also tells him how his brother Willis has been running the streets and she is worried for him and wants him to join the army to stay out of trouble. Since Willis wont listen to her she wants Reese to send him a letter explaining why he should enlist. He wrote the letter to his brother telling him not to join the army because all his mom wants is the money, but he tells him just to avoid trouble. In the rising action these guys named King Kong and Diego were planing to jump Toon once again, when Reese decides to jump in and stop them. Reese got caught by Mr.Pugh trying to defend Toon and gets sent to detention once again everyone in progress is starting to lose hope in him. In the rising action Reese's friend Toon tried to end his life by hanging himself and he gets moved to another wing of the prison. - Climax- Investegators come to get Reese because the drugs he stole got someone killed. So he needs to clear his name before is in Progress even longer.
- Resolution- Reese gets released from the facility and regains his freedom along with others. They all decided to try and do good things with their lives and meanwhile his brother Willis is in jail hoping to make a rap cd when he gets out and Toon is out of jail barely hanging on.