Friendship 6

“A friendship that can cease has never been real.” This quote by Saint Jerome is mirrored by the two friendships in Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck and A Separate Peace by John Knowles. Best friends are loyal to one another and always have each other’s backs. A true friendship does not end by a failed plan or a disaster. Friendship lasts only as long as people are willing to keep it going.
Friends always stick together even if it’s a burden or if fear is holding them back. “No look! I was just foolin’, Lennie. ‘cause I want you to stay with me.”(Steinbeck, 13) This quote takes place when George is mentioning how easy life would be without Lennie. Lennie offered to go off and live in the caves and that is when George says this quote, and forgets the mean things he said about how life would be so much easier without Lennie. “The beach was hours away by bicycle, forbidden, completely out of all bounds. Going there risked expulsion, destroyed the studying I was going to do for an important test the next morning, blasted the reasonable amount of order I wanted to maintain in my life, and it also involved the kind of long, labored bicycle ride I hated.”(Knowles, 37) Phineas brought up the insane idea of going to the beach, and Gene was quite frightened it would get him in trouble but still said yes. Gene knew then what it takes many people their whole lives to figure out. This is that friendship means more to someone than avoiding trouble and living in the shadow of fear that the earth displays.
There are different kinds of friendship some are based on loyalty like George and Lennie’s and some are based on rivalry like Gene and Finny’s. “Funny, I used to have a hell of a lot of fun with ‘im. Used to play jokes on ‘im ‘cause he was too dumb to take care of ‘imself. But he was too dumb to even know he had a joke played on him. I had fun. Made me seem God damn smart alongside of him. Why he’d do any damn thing I tol’ him. If I tol’ him to walk over a cliff, over he’d...