Horn’s father is yelling again; they both knew it would happen, part of the pattern they help each other reinforce. This time’s different, though. Horn’s not afraid, not angry, not even bored. There has been a shift, and somehow he’s in charge.

No one watching would see it, but they both feel it there. His father’s drive has changed: it’s become a concentration on form rather than content. Horn feels like an auditioning director–that’s appropriate, anyway. His father’s theatre diction. Horn still plays the teenager, slumped and inscrutable, while consonants boom and crack like ice floes in his father’s mouth.