I Am the Cheese by Robert Cormier Read Free Book Online Page A

are thinking of Amy.
A
:
Yes.
T
:
It is beginning to come back to you, all of it, not only Amy?
A
:
I don’t know.
T
:
Let it come. Remember, I’m here to help you. But let it come. The medicine will help and I will help. But—
A
:
But it’s up to me, isn’t it? Whether I win or whether I lose?
T
:
Think about winning.
A
:
But if I lose?
T
:
Don’t think about that. Don’t think about that.
A
:
Would losing be that terrible?
(5-second interval.)
T
:
Let us suspend for now.
A
:
Thank you.
    END TAPE OZK005

The rain begins without warning, slashing at my face, pelting my body. Clouds have gathered as I have been pedaling along toward Carver but they haven’t concerned me because the sun and the clouds have played disappearing games since my departure this morning. Then a sudden torrent greets me as I pump along a narrow section of Route 119. Mud kicks at my legs because the front tire has no fender, nothing to prevent the mud from splashing. The rain slants toward me and the bicycle. I am driving into the storm.
    I draw up at the side of the highway and ponder the situation. Squinting, I see a house about a quarter of a mile away, but I don’t want to get mixed up with people. Trees offer the only shelter and I push the bike toward a large maple, heavy with branches. The rain showers leaves down as I approach and I realize the tree won’t offer much protection because most of the leaves have already fallen. I lean against the tree trunk in disgust. The rain is really coming down now, in wavering sheets, tossed by the wind. The cold enters my clothes, seeps into my skin and into mybones. My father’s package is soaked and the road map is ruined. I pull my father’s package off the bike and hug it to me, slipping it inside the jacket. The package is wet but I don’t mind. The rain continues. I watch the map dissolving. And I am suddenly hungry, ravenous. I am starved. I can’t ever remember being as hungry as this.
    A car passes, a station wagon with wooden panels, and the driver looks back as if he might stop. But he doesn’t. I wish he had stopped. I could have thrown the bike into the back of the car and have driven along warm and dry inside. But I’m also glad that he didn’t stop.
    “You are a nut,” I tell myself, my voice sounding strange in my ears. The rain dances on the ground, the way water jumps and leaps if you drop it on a hot stove. I shrivel into myself, hugging myself, cold and damp and miserable. I am not damp, I am drenched.
    “I’m going back,” I yell.
    “No, you’re not,” I answer.
    My voice is lost in the wind and the rain.
    “All right, all right—I am going to Rutterburg, Vermont,” I sing out, lifting my voice above the sound of the rain. A rumble of thunder answers me—the gods are listening—and I press my back against the tree and I feel stronger suddenly, as if I am part of it all, part of the tree and part of the storm, part of the thunder and part of the rain. I lift my face and the rain pours down. And I begin to sing:
    The farmer in the dell
,
    The farmer in the dell …

TAPE OZK006
1830
date deleted T-A
T
:
So. We have arrived at the point where your suspicions were aroused.
A
:
I don’t remember arriving at that point.
T
:
Are you playing games?
A
:
No. Why should I play games? I’m on the edge of panic half the time. Why should I play games?
(5-second interval.)
T
:
Forgive me. If I seem—abrupt, critical—it is only for your sake.
A
:
I know.
(7-second interval.)
T
:
Let me refresh your memory. At the last meeting, you mentioned the telephone call from Amy, from her father’s office. The visiting editor from Rawlings. Did that arouse your suspicions?
A
:
It made me feel—funny.
T
:
How do you mean, “funny”?
A
:
Well, what Amy said about there being no Farmers, no Farmer family, in Rawlings. Andeven the way I had tried to cover up. As if I had to cover up, instinctively. As if I knew something was wrong.
T
:
And what did you think was wrong?
A
:
I