Chapters 1–2: A Name and a New Neighbor第 1–2 章：名字與新鄰居

The narrator, John Coogan, tells us that almost everyone calls him "Crash." The name comes from a family story: when he was very small, he got a football helmet for Christmas, crouched in a football stance, and knocked his cousin Bridget out the front door into the snow. Then he jumps back seven years, to a summer day when a small, scrawny boy came up the sidewalk, whistling and wearing a large button. The boy, Penn Webb, had just moved from North Dakota, a state of flat prairie, and he happily shared facts about his family. Crash would not shake his hand, made up a fake name, and buried Penn's button in the hole he was digging. The next day Crash rode his bike to Penn's tiny home, which used to be a garage, and stood there gawking at it. He told more lies, borrowed Penn's pet turtle, and left it upside down on the sidewalk. Penn stayed friendly the whole time, and Crash could not understand why.敘述者約翰·庫根告訴我們，幾乎每個人都叫他「克拉許」（Crash）。這個名字來自一個家族故事：他很小的時候，聖誕節收到一頂美式足球頭盔，他擺出足球的預備姿勢（stance），把表姊布莉姬從前門撞進雪地裡。接著故事倒回七年前的一個夏日：一個瘦巴巴（scrawny）的小男孩吹著口哨、胸前別著一個大徽章，沿著人行道走來。這個男孩叫潘恩·韋伯，剛從北達科他州搬來，那裡是一片平坦的大草原（prairie）。他開心地介紹自己的家人。克拉許不肯跟他握手，報了一個假名字，還把潘恩的徽章埋進自己正在挖的洞裡。第二天，克拉許騎腳踏車到潘恩小小的家，那裡原本是一間車庫，他站在那裡呆看（gawk）。他又撒了更多謊，借走潘恩的寵物烏龜，然後把牠翻過來丟在人行道上。潘恩從頭到尾都很友善，克拉許完全搞不懂為什麼。

Spinelli writes in the first person, so we hear everything in Crash's voice: short sentences, slang, and jokes. Crash tells us exactly what he did, but he does not always see that it was cruel, so readers notice things he misses. The book also begins in the present and then jumps back seven years. Going back in time like this is called a flashback.史賓納利用第一人稱寫作，所以我們聽到的全是克拉許的口吻：短句、俚語和玩笑。克拉許清楚交代自己做了什麼，卻不一定意識到那很殘忍，因此讀者會注意到他沒察覺的事。這本書也是從現在開始，然後跳回七年前。像這樣回到過去的寫法叫做倒敘（flashback）。