Chap­ter X opens with the deliv­ery­man paus­ing in the intense silence, seem­ing­ly con­tem­plat­ing what to do with the baby mice he had dis­cov­ered nest­ing among his Bibles. His expres­sion, tense and uncer­tain, sug­gests he is con­sid­er­ing extreme options, such as poi­son, drown­ing, or per­haps even offer­ing us as a meal to a cat. As he slow­ly removes his wilt­ed car­na­tion and loosens his pink neck­tie, his rolled-up sleeves reveal a gaunt chest beneath his worn-out over­alls. Cross­ing his arms, two names appear on his fore­arms: Car­lene, etched above a black rose, and Rhon­da, inscribed below a heart adorned with the word “Mom.”

As I observed, some­thing pecu­liar happened—the let­ters on his arms seemed to ani­mate, shift­ing into the like­ness­es of the two women, Car­lene and Rhon­da. Their voic­es echoed the ten­sion in the air as they bick­ered about Lester’s per­ceived weak­ness­es. Car­lene accused Rhon­da of caus­ing Lester’s soft nature, claim­ing he lacked the nec­es­sary fight to stand up for him­self. Rhon­da, not to be out­done, blamed Lester’s weak father and argued that Car­lene demand­ed every pen­ny he earned from deliv­er­ing Bibles, there­by lim­it­ing his chances of suc­cess. This sur­re­al trans­for­ma­tion gave the scene an almost com­ic-book-like qual­i­ty, fur­ther con­tribut­ing to my unease as I recalled the urgent mis­sion I had before me—to wake up Pop­pa.

The atmos­phere was thick with dis­com­fort, yet I felt a reas­sur­ing touch from Sam­son, ground­ing me amidst the chaos. The deliv­ery­man, still jit­tery, broke the silence with a melod­ic yet ner­vous voice, ask­ing what we were doing. Car­lene, from with­in his mind, urged Lester to show some back­bone and mocked his appar­ent lack of gump­tion, fur­ther exac­er­bat­ing the ten­sion. The grow­ing sense of unease was pal­pa­ble, and I felt the weight of the moment as I cau­tious­ly approached the deliv­ery­man.

I stepped for­ward care­ful­ly, ask­ing if he was head­ed to Kansas, explain­ing that we need­ed to reach Sali­na for a fam­i­ly emer­gency. Lester, clear­ly over­whelmed, stum­bled over his words and seemed slow to catch on. It became appar­ent that he was strug­gling with the sit­u­a­tion, unsure of how to han­dle our request. Despite his hes­i­ta­tion, he final­ly mut­tered that we could not ride on his bus, although his shaky fin­ger point­ing toward us revealed his uncer­tain­ty about the deci­sion.

Unde­terred, I con­tin­ued to explain that my par­ents were in Sali­na and that he would be help­ing us by allow­ing us to ride with him. Car­lene, still present in Lester’s mind, taunt­ed him, pre­dict­ing he would cave in to our plea. Rhon­da, on the oth­er hand, lament­ed Lester’s timid­i­ty, under­scor­ing the ten­sion between the com­pet­ing forces in his mind. As I con­tin­ued to plead with him, I could feel the pres­sure mount­ing on Lester, torn between his com­pas­sion for us and the fear of fac­ing con­se­quences from his boss.

After a long moment of hes­i­ta­tion, Lester slumped into a seat, clear­ly bat­tling his reluc­tance and weigh­ing his options. He final­ly broke the silence with a hes­i­tant ques­tion about where we were from, sig­nal­ing a shift in his resolve. His ques­tion marked a sig­nif­i­cant moment—Lester was sur­ren­der­ing to the inevitable, prepar­ing to help us despite his inner con­flict. This moment of sur­ren­der encap­su­lat­ed the human strug­gle between fear of author­i­ty and the dri­ve to do what feels moral­ly right. It was clear that, in that moment, Lester’s com­pas­sion had final­ly over­come his fear, and he would help us on our jour­ney to Sali­na.

This chap­ter not only delves into the dynam­ics of per­son­al strug­gle but also high­lights the com­plex­i­ties of human inter­ac­tion. The bick­er­ing voic­es in the deliveryman’s mind, rep­re­sent­ed by Car­lene and Rhon­da, sym­bol­ize the inter­nal con­flict many peo­ple expe­ri­ence when faced with dif­fi­cult deci­sions. Whether it’s the fear of author­i­ty or the pull of per­son­al val­ues, the chap­ter explores how the human psy­che can be torn between dif­fer­ent forces, lead­ing to moments of pro­found hes­i­ta­tion and ulti­mate deci­sion-mak­ing. The protagonist’s per­sis­tence, paired with the deliveryman’s even­tu­al sur­ren­der, under­scores the pow­er of human con­nec­tion and com­pas­sion in over­com­ing even the most chal­leng­ing cir­cum­stances. This inter­ac­tion also reflects the larg­er theme of the chapter—how indi­vid­u­als are often caught between com­pet­ing desires and how, in moments of cri­sis, their true char­ac­ter is revealed.