Friends can be a big influence on who you become. Both S. E. Hinton in The Outsiders and Rodman Philbrick in Freak the Mighty explain the importance of friends. S. E. Hinton writes about Ponyboy and his gang. His friends influenced him in many ways, good and bad. One example is, “Everyone sat down to have a smoke and relax” (12). Ponyboy started smoking at a young age. His whole gang smoked, so he did, too. Ponyboy thinks it's okay to smoke because no one objects to him smoking. This is just one way Ponyboy’s friends influenced him. Rodman Philbrick writes about Freak and Max, two eighth graders who become good friends. Freak struggles with Morquio Syndrome and Max is dyslexic. Other people have low expectations for them. One example of Freak’s