The narrator begins this chapter by telling his grandmother that he loves her and wishes she would live long enough to see him die. He tells her that he will be dead either way, but that she should not worry because he will die anyway. He says that he has tattooed his work into reality, and that the gods carry him onwards. He asks her if she would go on, or if she was young, and she replies that she would be young, too. He then asks her whether she would like to live or not, and he says that she will live to regret it, for he will not be criticized for his work. He adds that his love and his talent to live kill children, and forever makes liars out of them. The narrator says that if everyone agrees that he deserves a way out of hell, then it is easier for him to be in it. He wonders what happened to the body of his dead father, and wonders if his grandmother was right to say that he was still crying when he died. He imagines that his grandmother's death was caused by his mother's constant crying, over her and over her dumb sucks. He also wonders if he would have been killed if his father had not worked with him as blake to lead him off track. He thinks that he is more grown up now than he was when he was younger. He remembers that he left his goggles on his desk when he went to see his grandmother, and says that swinging makes it hard to see things.