Different Seasons

After hours of studying under Dussander’s eye, Todd rides his bicycle home. It seems impossible to him that he could recover his lost ground in the five weeks remaining in the school year. He spots a crippled blue jay on the sidewalk and deliberately crushes it. The smile never leaves his face.

April, 1975.

Dussander takes to killing dogs. Todd passes his first algebra test since Dussander began forcing him to study. Todd’s parents have a conversation: Monica is concerned that Todd is pale and has lost weight, and he has nightmares. She mentions something that her grandmother told her about driving a person insane if you wake them in the middle of the bad dream. Dick Bowden refers to Monica’s grandmother as “the Polack.” Monica reminds him that her grandmother was also Jewish. Later in the conversation, he describes one of his business partners as having an affair with his secretary and uses a racial slur to describe her.

Monica wonders aloud if Mr. Dussander has something to do with Todd’s nightmares, but Dick says that, actually, he thinks that Todd’s friendship with Mr. Dussander is a good sign. When Dick was growing up, he had been annoyed with his father, a grocer, who often extended credit to his customers.