Summary

Pete meets David’s son Dale in Chapter 13. Pete thinks Dale is something of a dunce, “graceless, slack-jawed, unsmiling, loud” (316). Miriam, David, Dale, and Pete eat dinner at Miriam and David’s house. After dinner, Dale and Pete drink at a pub. Dale explains conspiracy theories to Pete, like the idea that governments put fluoride into water to “make you passive” (324). Pete is not entirely immune to conspiracy theories, and he finds many of the things Dale suggests to be somewhat convincing, or at the very least, he takes time to “mull it over” (325). Later, they do cocaine in the bathroom. Pete is starting to feel much better, and the world around him is starting to “seem much brighter already” (327). He and Dale do MDMA, and Dale says that if he had “a girlfriend I’d marry her...