Everybody's Fool

Raymer has a vivid dream of Becka running her fingers through his hair and whispering that she has to tell him something. He wakes up on the couch on Charice’s back porch. They had a lovely evening, but he is embarrassed to have eaten and drunk so much and fallen asleep. When he finds he is locked out, he calls repeatedly to Charice to no avail until he remembers that she had left him to take a telephone call, telling the caller, “[Y]ou’re getting all worked up over nothing” (219).

An electric storm is beginning, so Raymer resolves to go home. There is quite a drop from the top-floor porch. Raymer tries to climb down one of the supporting columns, but the wood is rotten and it comes away from the house. As Raymer hangs suspended from the column, the porch is struck by lightning. He manages to lower himself to safety and looks back up at the burning porch, marveling at his luck, until a grill rolls to the edge of the railing and empties its contents onto his upturned face.

As he walks away, he is intercepted by Officer Miller who, it turns out, often watches outside Charice’s house because he is attracted to her. He is worried about asking her out and about entering into a relationship with someone of a different race. Raymer tries to reassure him.

Charice’s car is gone, so Raymer is relieved to realize that she cannot have heard his pleadings from the porch.

Carl arrives at the White Horse Tavern with an inebriated young woman who initially dotes on Rub the dog, then recoils when she sees that his penis is bloody due to a skin infection that leads him to chew on it. The human Rub finds the conversation embarrassing. Carl is depressed because he is at risk of financial ruin due to the multiple legal actions pending from the incident at Old Mill. Sully is unsympathetic. They play poker and Sully wins the first hand.

Recalling Becka’s ghostly presence in his dream on Charice’s balcony, Raymer returns to the cemetery and wades through the mud in the dark, as another electrical storm begins. He recalls the opening chapter of Charles Dickens’s 19th-century novel Great Expectations, which he began reading on Miss Beryl’s recommendation, but abandoned immediately because he was frightened the convict who terrifies Dickens’s main character would return. Becka was disappointed when he told her that he never finished the book, scolding him for “cheating himself” (240). He reaches Becka’s grave and takes the florist’s card from a bunch of roses. As he does so, there is a flash of lightning and he feels a searing pain in his hand—he’s been struck. He senses his identity splitting into two parts: Douglas and “Dougie,” a meaner, younger alter-ego.

After the poker game, staring at the beautiful, star-filled sky, Sully and Carl discuss reincarnation. On the way home, Sully gives a tearful Rub back the money he won from him at poker. When Sully asks Rub what is wrong, Rub wishes Sully was kinder and the dog had a different name. Sully replies that he and the dog both wish the same.

Raymer regains consciousness and is relieved that “Dougie” no longer appears to be around. His right hand is paralyzed into a claw-like fist and he is unable to see the card clamped inside. As he tries to drive away, his path is blocked by a dead tree. The edge of a coffin protrudes from the earth. He realizes that the storm has loosened the ground and brought down a part of the hill.

The voice of Dougie cuts in and imitates Miss Beryl’s voice, asking, “Who is Douglas Raymer?” (255). Goaded by Dougie, Raymer manages to open his fingers and read the card, which bears the word “Always” (257) without any name.

As Sully returns home, he reflects on his surprising run of good luck. He feels irrational guilt that it balances the ill fortune of those close to him (Miss Beryl’s death, Carl’s prostate trouble and financial ruin). In his trailer, he is surprised to find Raymer asleep on the toilet. Raymer asks Sully to exhume Judge Flatt’s grave to recover the remote control. Sully agrees and enlists Carl’s help. They dig up the grave and stand up the casket so that Raymer can look, but he finds nothing and is mortified.

After they leave Raymer, Sully asks if Carl was having an affair with Becka. Carl wasn’t, but he knows who was.

Gus is kept up late at night by calls from angry residents protesting the various emergencies. Spinmatics Joe’s mother has called complaining that her son went missing on the way home from the White Horse Tavern. As the sun rises, Gus dresses and checks on his wife Alice, who is having another mental health crisis. She is missing.

When Gus first met Alice, she was in a relationship with Kurt, a recently appointed fellow academic who had received glowing references from his former employers. Shortly before Kurt’s arrival, Gus received an anonymous phone call, warning that Kurt was evil, but he shrugged it off. Kurt proved to be a highly toxic element in the department: unnervingly good at impressions, spreading rumors, and stirring up tensions. He was also clearly psychologically abusing Alice.

One day, Gus visited Alice when Kurt was out, offering help. A few days later, Kurt came to Gus’s house and perfectly mimicked their conversation, which he had recorded. Guessing Gus’s political ambitions, Kurt suggested that the electorate would stop thinking he was homosexual if he had a wife. Kurt then quit his job, gave Gus a glowing letter of recommendation to sign, and revealed that he had been the anonymous caller and that he had already made a similar call to his next employer.

After their marriage, Alice’s mental health temporarily improved, but moving to a new house triggered another crisis and she has had bouts of mental illness ever since.

Gus finds Alice outside Raymer and Becka’s old house. As she takes another imagined phone call from Becka, Gus reflects that she is always on the receiving end of the calls and always plays the role of trusted confidante.