Chapter 4 Summary

After Beth runs away with their son Christopher, Fat attempts suicide by taking massive amounts of Digitalis and other drugs, slashes his wrist, and sits in a running car. The combination fails miraculously to kill him, and he is put in the Orange County Mental Hospital (OCMH) for 48 hours observation. Previously, Kevin had told Fat about painful Australian bush initiations akin to Fat's impacted wisdom tooth and analogies between his colors and journeys to the next world in the Tibetan Book of the Dead. During his first evaluation, Fat claims to have learned his lesson, and sits watching a woman vomit her overdose of Thorazine, while he wishes that dream-time - the only real time - would come. He needs the action of the gods. He recalls the upper and lower realms of astral determinism and contemplates how the Empire has never ended...