“When You See Him Stand­ing in Your Kitchen”, the chap­ter begins with the nar­ra­tor and Kel­lan work­ing togeth­er to restore an old Ranchero, a task that proves far more chal­leng­ing than they had ini­tial­ly antic­i­pat­ed. In their attempt to find help, they reach out to sev­er­al local experts, includ­ing Roy Ess, a mechan­ic who insists on tak­ing Sun­days off, and Maudie Antoinette, a well-informed woman with a deep con­nec­tion to her grown chil­dren. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, nei­ther of them is able to offer the assis­tance they need, which forces the duo to return home and tack­le the repairs them­selves. As they strug­gle to locate the ball joint under lay­ers of dirt and rust, dis­as­ter strikes when Kellan’s weight caus­es the car to fall, a mishap that leads to over­whelm­ing feel­ings of guilt. The weight of their fail­ure sits heav­i­ly on both of them, leav­ing them with no choice but to step away from the project, their frus­tra­tion grow­ing with every pass­ing moment.

In an attempt to escape the grow­ing ten­sion, Kel­lan retreats to the attic, where he finds com­fort in using nitrous oxide, a sub­stance he appears to rely on when things become too over­whelm­ing. The nar­ra­tor stum­bles upon him in this vul­ner­a­ble state and is shown a series of strange and cryp­tic draw­ings. Among these draw­ings are unset­tling sketch­es of a girl, smeared beyond recog­ni­tion, and an old­er man, both of which seem to reflect parts of Kellan’s inner tur­moil. As Kel­lan speaks, his words become more reveal­ing, men­tion­ing Wer­ryck, a fig­ure that he is clear­ly ter­ri­fied of. Describ­ing Wer­ryck as a loom­ing pres­ence, Kellan’s fear is tan­gi­ble, and the idea of his arrival fills both of them with unease. This char­ac­ter, Wer­ryck, seems to hold pow­er over Kel­lan, and his men­tion rais­es more ques­tions than answers, sug­gest­ing a deeply buried past of trau­ma and unre­solved con­flict.

The more Kel­lan speaks about Wer­ryck, the more the ten­sion builds, with Kel­lan insist­ing that if Wer­ryck shows up, they must leave qui­et­ly, as the dan­ger of the sit­u­a­tion is far too great to ignore. The nar­ra­tor, attempt­ing to make sense of Kellan’s cryp­tic warn­ings, reflects on his own past, par­tic­u­lar­ly a child­hood mem­o­ry of a dev­as­tat­ing pan­dem­ic. The mem­o­ry is tied to the cre­ation of trav­el­ing hos­pi­tals, orga­nized by a wealthy ship­ping mag­nate, a con­cept that seems strange­ly linked to Kellan’s ref­er­ence to a “med­i­cine ship.” This men­tion sparks curios­i­ty in the nar­ra­tor, hint­ing that Kel­lan and the nar­ra­tor might have shared some com­mon expe­ri­ences tied to a far dark­er his­to­ry, one marked by health crises and sur­vival. The con­nec­tion between the two men goes beyond just the present moment and reach­es deep into their past, where per­son­al tragedies may have shaped their present fears and reac­tions.

Lat­er, the nar­ra­tor turns to Lark, shar­ing the events of the day and offer­ing her some insight into what has been hap­pen­ing. Lark, how­ev­er, is dis­tract­ed by the excite­ment of a recent discovery—a book cache she has stum­bled upon, which sparks a joy that con­trasts sharply with Kellan’s inter­nal strug­gles. Her enthu­si­asm for her new find con­trasts with the weight of Kellan’s bur­dens, high­light­ing the emo­tion­al divide between the two char­ac­ters. While Kel­lan wres­tles with his fears and mem­o­ries, Lark finds com­fort in the tan­gi­ble world of books, some­thing to focus on amidst the chaos of their lives. The dif­fer­ence in how they cope with their respec­tive chal­lenges under­scores the com­plex­i­ty of human nature, as each per­son seeks solace in their own way. The chap­ter also empha­sizes the idea of seek­ing peace in dif­fer­ent forms, whether through work, art, or dis­trac­tion, and how these cop­ing mech­a­nisms can either bring peo­ple togeth­er or push them fur­ther apart.