So, I let Betty-John say whatever she had to say knowing inside that it didn't have a thing to do with me. It was her upset, not mine. I listened. I empathized with her anger. But I didn't have to accept it as a personal attack, because-I could even hear Jason explaining it to me-her anger wasn't about what I did, her anger was really about her fear. What I did only triggered it. So, now my job was to let her have her anger so she could get past it.

If I were to argue with her, she would stay angry. If I were to try to justify what I did, she would have to do something to prove herself right and me wrong. She would have to punish. So I should do nothing except listen. When she was through being angry, her anger would disappear and she would have nothing left to say or do.

It took a while, but she finally ran down.

"Okay," she said. "What? I'm waiting. What was the point of that little exercise in hysteria?"

"The children are fine," I replied as calmly as I could. I wanted to project certainty. It was very important that she be reassured. I would have to explain this very carefully. "What you're seeing right now is a release of energy. It's very normal. It's very natural. It's healthy. It's a good sign. I know it looks like upset; it is, but it's upset pointed in the right direction, not the wrong. Trust me."

B-Jay gave me her most skeptical look. "I've heard that same kind of bullshit before, Jim, from confirmed child-molesters: 'But the child enjoyed it too.' "

I didn't want to argue with that one. That brought up too many memories of Loolie and-there was just too damn much knotted up in that conversation. I needed to bring the discussion back to the issue at hand.

"B-Jay," I said carefully. "These children are little walking timebombs. The day I arrived here, you told me some of what they've been through, and you've been reminding me ever since that these kids are desperately trying to do whatever they have to do to survive. Do you think I haven't been looking at them? I see that everything you've said is right on the money. Most of these little monsters have walled themselves up so tight that nobody's going to get at them. God, B-Jay, it's terrifying how right you are. There's very little chance that any of them will ever be fully human, let alone sane. But we have to try anyway, because if we don't civilize the next generation while we still have the chance, then there isn't any point in fighting the other war either. That's what this is about. I wanted to do something that would make a difference for them."

B-Jay's expression relaxed only a little. It was hard for her to argue with her own words.

"The only thing that's really going to help these kids," I said, "is if they Iearn how to . . . how to reach out to us from their own side. They've got to learn that pain and fear and grief are normal, and they've got to learn how to let it out. That's what all that screaming was. A safety valve. They needed it. Otherwise, they're just going to keep on building up intolerable pressure until they explode and do something dangerous and stupid and selfdestructive."

B-Jay was frustrated and angry and disbelieving. "Who made up this shit, Jim? Where did you get this idea?"

I wanted to respond angrily, I wanted to reach her so badly. "B-Jay. I made it up. I've done this all my life; whenever I get so frustrated and crazy with other people's inability to hear what I'm trying to say; whenever I get so crazy that I want to put my hands around their throats. I go and lock myself in a dark closet, or I get in the shower and turn the water up full, and then I scream and scream and scream as hard as I can and as long as I can until I'm too weak to even stand up any more. I mean it. It works. It's like blowing off all the rage and fear and grief in one great painful orgasm. If I can't let it out, then I have to carry it around inside of me-and if I do that, then I'll die. Or worse, I'll do something terrible and other people will die."

B-Jay's eyes were still hard. "Maybe it works for you, but these kids . . ." She shook her head.

"Okay, yes. What I did was extreme; but it looked to me that something extreme was called for. Most of these kids are still robots. They're only going through the motions. Yes, you're making progress here; but oh, so slowly. It's so frustrating, because I know what's possible for children. So do you. These kids are still doing whatever you want them to, like machines, because they don't know there's anything more. It's just another set of rules for survival. Their lives are going to be about finding the right set of rules and nothing more. They won't be alive. No-hear me out: Do you think I don't know what these kids are feeling? I've been there, dammit. And I hurt so badly for them that I had to do something."

"So you taught them to be crazier?"

"Give them a week, you'll see the difference. They're starting to play with each other in a whole new way. They're starting to relate to each other instead of at each other. Please, B-Jay, don't be so quick to judge."

"Jim, I believe that you believe what you're saying. But, you should have checked with me first. You should have waited until-"

"Goddamn it, B-Jay!" It was my turn to be angry. "I tried to check with you, but you never have the time to listen to anything, and you're always asking people to put off their plans so you can get yours done, and then you have the nerve to wonder why everybody's always pissed off at you and why people are always doing things without your permission. I don't know about everybody else, but I'm sick and tired of waiting for you to have the time to sit and listen. And please don't give me that story about how much you have to do. I've heard it already, ten times over, and I can probably give as good a performance of poor B-Jay as you can.

"These kids were hurting, and I had a tool that I thought would help them. This is only the first step. These kids need to be trained, given the tools to handle their own emotions, their own reactions, so that they can cope with the rest of the bullshit that life is going to throw at them. It all comes down on all of us before we're ready for it. The least we can do for these kids is give them some tools for fighting back. I gave them permission to scream at the universe. Now they have a way to express what they're feeling, where before all they could do was bottle it up. Now they won't be pressure cookers or timebombs. They'll scream it out, and then there'll be a little bit of space for them to try to be rational, or as close to it as they're ever going to get."

"You think this is an improvement?" Betty-John demanded. "Have you even looked at your own kids today? Alec has turned into a babble-box. We can't shut him up. He finds a word he likes and repeats it over and over and over until he gets bored with it, then he finds another word and starts all over again."

"He's playing, B-Jay, in the only way he knows. But notice that he's playing with language now, instead of resisting it. He's interacting with his mental landscape. And I'm so glad to have him babbling anything, I don't care. He's got a lot of energy to discharge."

"He's not a goddamn battery! Christ on a pancake! Where did you pick up this psychobabble?"

"Uh . . . ," I hesitated.

"What are you, Jim? An unreconstructed Modie?"

"I've never done the Mode training," I said, vaguely uncomfortable.

"Well, you sure as hell talk like it! Where have you been, Jim?"

I shook my head. "I don't want . . ."

"Uh-uh. No way. If you want to teach the kids to open up, you'd better start with yourself. Just who the hell are you anyway, mister?"

"You know who I am."

"No, I don't. For all I know, you could be a renegade spy yourself."

I felt my blood turn cold at that. I almost rose from my chair. "I'm not. Not that; I know what renegades are like, B-Jay. Better than you think. I'm not one of them. I don't ever want to be like them again-"