LUCKY FOR HIM, I did not see Chet the next day, because my breakfast tray was brought in by Mr. Bob himself, the first time I’d seen him since the welcoming reception. He wore the same pristine white tracksuit and as he placed my tray on the table next to my bed a couple of splashes of juice hit it but appeared to vaporize on contact.
“Neat, huh?” Mr. Bob said, smiling. He moved to the French doors that led out on to a veranda and threw the curtains open. Like every other day at the WHC, perfect sunlight streamed through. “Want to try something else?” Mr. Bob gestured at the tray. I picked up a small jar of raspberry jam and twisted off the top. Mr. Bob nodded, giving assent. I spooned out some jam and flicked it toward Mr. Bob’s chest. It should’ve been a direct hit, but the fabric was as brilliantly white as ever.
“I bet that saves on dry cleaning,” I said.
Mr. Bob laughed way louder than anyone should have. “Ha! Ha! Ha! You are a funny man, just like they said.”
I was about to say, “To what do I owe the pleasure?” when he made his way over to the side of my bed and sat like he was going to read me a nighttime story. “You owe the pleasure to the fact that it is time for your progress report and diagnosis.”
“Diagnosis?” I said. “I didn’t know I was sick.”
“Of course you did,” Mr. Bob said, “but we all agree you’re getting better.”
“That’s good,” I replied. I squirmed under the sheets; he’d semitrapped me with his weight.
“It’s very good,” he said, “and now that we know what’s going on, we’ll do even better. Would you like to hear what we’re thinking?”
“Sure, of course.”
“Wonderful,” he said, smiling with his lips, but not his eyes. “You’ve had some truly remarkable successes in your career, amazing things, but one trend we have noticed is that they have just sort of happened. Now, I’m not saying they would have happened to anybody, but to some degree it seems like they could have happened to anybody. This is not unusual in the grand scheme of things, but for someone so famous as you, it’s very, very rare. We think this probably also explains your reversal of fortunes. You are simply prone to being buffeted around, if you will. Sometimes the buffeting nudges you skyward, while other times it hurls you to the ground.”
He stood up and I took advantage to throw off the covers and sit on the side of the bed. “But you are changing here, that is clear,” he continued. “You are coming to understand the power of desire, true desire, focused desire. For instance, I believe last night you had some unpleasant thoughts towards Chester.”
“I wanted to kick his teeth in.”
“And why didn’t you?”
“It didn’t seem like the right thing to do.”
“Ah!” Mr. Bob said, pointing at the ceiling like he’d made a big discovery. “This all depends on what your definition of ‘right’ is, does it not?”
“I suppose,” I said.
Mr. Bob came over and removed the covering from my plate on the tray, revealing a perfect egg-white omelet, fresh fruit, and synthetic bacon. “And right now, you’re thinking that you might like to take a poke at me, even, yes?”
I wasn’t thinking that, or at least I didn’t know I was thinking that until he said something, at which point an image of me flattening his pointed nose popped into my head. “Yes.”
“And why don’t you?” He was close enough that I could’ve.
“I guess I don’t really want to, or maybe it’s that I don’t need to.” He stepped away, hands clasped behind his back. “Yes, you see it now. We make our own right, our own wrong. You are in charge. Wonderful, isn’t it? Now, go ahead,” he said.
“Go ahead, what?”
“Ask your question?”
“What question?”
“About Ms. Tisdale. If you did not care, you would not want to have strangled Chester.”
“Okay,” I said. “How’s she doing?”
Mr. Bob began pacing, like it was the movement that helped bring forth the answers. “Ms. Tisdale is an interesting case. The opposite of you in some ways. She has no lack of desire or direction in her. It may be that she simply has too much, that it is uncontainable. This is a significant power, but power that cannot be controlled is ultimately harmful.”
“Actually,” I said, “I was just wondering if she enjoyed herself last night.”
Bob seemed pleased at this response, like I had passed some kind of test.
“You will have the chance, I am sure,” he said, “to ask her for yourself. Enjoy your breakfast, and the rest of your stay here at the White Hot Center.”
He bowed, pivoted, and left the bungalow. I never saw him again. What he left behind was the knowledge that for the first time in a long time I cared about something again, that I was looking forward to what was next.
I wanted something.