- Back at Progress, Reese tells Play what happened. Reese is feeling extremely uninformed.
- Mr. Cintron pulls Reese aside to say he still has faith in him. Reese doesn't believe it, though; he's getting depressed again.
- A few days later, at Evergreen, Reese goes to see Mr. Hooft, who's soiled his bed and blames it on Reese. Welcome back.
- Reese cleans up. When he returns to Mr. Hooft's room, a guy walks in. It's John, Mr. Hooft's grandson.
- John seems to be in a hurry, and he asks Mr. Hooft if he received the check Clara sent for twenty-five bucks. Mr. Hooft seems cowed.
- John's sort of a jerk. Almost as quickly as he arrived, he's gone.
- Mr. Hooft seems agitated after John leaves. He says it's hard to get old because no one wants to visit, and then he starts to cry and it's really sad. Reese feels bad for him.
- He cleans Mr. Hooft's room and helps the old man into bed. He tells Mr. Hooft he doesn't get many visits in jail—Mr. Hooft jokes that it's because Reese is ugly.
- Reese asks Mr. Hooft if he ever thought about starting a fight back at the children's camp. Mr. Hooft says he was too cowardly and instead he took solace in a special plant that gave him hope.
- Reese stays until Mr. Hooft falls asleep. On his way back to Progress, he feels sad for Mr. Hooft. He realizes that after the war, Mr. Hooft's life wasn't as good as he had made it out to be.