Summary

Marcy was right that Charlie had had other scares in the past. However, he did not believe this made him a bad person. He called Barbara at work. Though she asked if the doctor had called, Charlie ignored her questions. Instead, he begged her to call Marcy about "flying home" (71). Barbara agreed. The narrator knows that though Charlie loves Barbara, the children still do not.

While writing a letter to Bruce Crowder, Charlie thought about the TTAA.

Charlie's parents met "at the Vermilion County Poor Farm on the Catlin-Tilton Road" (76). They were in their early twenties when Delwina got pregnant. Her family forced them to marry. They could not marry in a church because they had had premarital sex. Charlie liked this story so much he often told the narrator, a writer, "what a great novel it would make...