Acceleration

The previous fall, Duncan and his father had a talk. Upon noticing Duncan walking around “like a zombie” (77), Duncan’s father told him about one of John F. Kennedy’s Secret Service guards. Fifteen years later, the guard still blamed himself for failing to save Kennedy. Duncan’s father understood this guilt well:

It doesn’t go away—that thing, the belief or whatever, that one day you’re going to be a hero. All guys think that. It’s bred into you. Every movie you ever see tells you that one day you’ll get your chance. It doesn’t go away, either. I’m still waiting for mine (79).

He told Duncan to let go of the past as it would destroy him (and was worrying his mother). Duncan remembered getting caught during a toilet burglary with Wayne, his mother’s disappointment being the worst part. He says the “head doctors and the pills” (80) didn’t work.

Residents of the Jungle are desperate for cool weather and take refuge in the Ignatius Howard Public Library, the “Igloo”—Duncan and his friends included. Duncan picks a book called Death: Inside the Mind of a Serial Killer by former FBI profiler Mason Lucas.