I am the cheese door Robert Cormier

Samenvatting

Adam Farmer is his parent’s only child. When the book begins, Adam is riding on his bike. He’s on the road to Rutterburg, Vermont. He begins his journey on Route 31 Monument, Massachusetts. It’s a very long trip, and his bike is very old. It’s October. He left without saying anybody goodbye. He has many fears. He’s afraid of narrow places: Claustrophobic, but he’s afraid of open very places too. He dislikes sporting; actually he dislikes every physical exercise. Amy Hertz is his girlfriend. He’s on a journey to his father. He has a present for his father, a package. He’s wearing his father’s old army cap and army jacket. He has enough money to take a bus if something goes wrong. He often thinks of Amy. He wanted to call her, but she’s still in school. Amy’s father is the editor of a newspaper called Monument Times. When he’s on the way he gets fears, and almost wants to turn back. He takes medicine (probably for his problems).
Then there’s a conversation in the book. It’s between a man who calls himself Britt and Adam. The conversation(s) take(s) place in some sort of a building. Adam thinks it’s a hospital. He doesn’t feel very comfortable there. The conversations are recorded on tape. Brint asks about Adam’s past. Often Adam doesn’t want to talk with Brint. It’s like Adam has been in that place for a long time. In the first conversation Brint wants to discuss Adam’s earliest remembrance. Adam remembers his mother’s perfume. He remembers he was in bed, and overheard his parents talk about him. He hears them talking about a trip. The next thing he remembers is that they’re on a bus trip. The trip is long. He felt as if they were being chased. It was winter. They never went back. Before the trip he always associated his father with the smell of tobacco. Since the trip he doesn’t, he finds it odd, because his father doesn’t smoke. The conversation ends because Adam wants to stop. The medicine is playing tricks on him again. Adam doesn’t trust the doctor fully.
Then the story goes to the bike trip again. Adam’s talking with an old man. The old man has a map. He also gets air in his tires from the old man. The old man continuous calls him ‘‘Skipper’’. The man tells him Adam has to travel through three states. Adam tells him he wants to get to a motel where he and his parents stayed once. The old man recognises the old army hat and cote. He tells Adam he had a son that had served in world war two and was killed in Iwo Jima. Then Adam leaves. Another Conversation. Brint wants to discuss Paul Delmonte. Adam doesn’t want to. Then Brint wants to discuss Amy Hertz, Adam doesn’t want that neither. Adam has a headache and the conversation stops.
Trip again. He begins to sing “A farmer in the dell”. He remembers how his father always used to sing it. His fathers name is Dave. He remembers how they always were laughing and his mother was happy. Then he goes up a hill. He’s afraid of spiders and snakes. He goes down the hill.
Conversation. Adam finds Britt strange. He looks at him and thinks of something he forgot. Brint wants to talk but Adam is quiet. Conversation stops.
He sees a dog and is afraid. He wants to avoid the dog. The dog is a German Shepherd. The dog wants to attack Adam and Adam is very, very terrified. Then a care comes and almost hits the dog. Adam takes the chance and quickly pedals past the dog and away. He is afraid and still pedals as fast as he can go. He comes to Fairfield and bicycles through it, so he leaves it as fast he can.

Another conversation. Adam is suspicious about Brint: He asks if Brint’s a doctor. He doesn’t get an answer, but a question back. He gets vague answers to his questions. Then they talk about clues. The talk about his problem with dogs: He remembers he was with his father once. He was going with his father to the rotary club. At a specific moment his dad says that they have to go through the woods. In the woods they see a dog. A wild and dangerous dog, the dog begins to attack his father. Adam Runs away, and is dad begins to fight the dog. His father wins but is injured. Since that he’s been afraid of dogs. The dog had bitten his father. Adam wants to stop. Conversation ends.
Adam wants to talk to Amy, so he goes to a phone booth and calls Amy. Nobody answers. He tries again, butt still nobody answers. He thinks of his mother, she is always concerned about him. He can’t stand places without windows.
Brint and Adam discuss Amy Hertz. He fell love with here the first time they met in the library. He loves her because she takes him serious and because she can laugh with her. She calls him ace. They often do practical jokes together, called Numbers by Amy. Adam was almost always at home. His mother was very protective. They do a Number at a local shop. They fill shopping carts with many products and then leave the carts standing. He sometimes reads her poems he made. Amy was the first girl he had ever kissed. Amy calls her one time and says that there’s a man from Rawlings, Pennsylvania who says never known a family called Farmer and he had lived there al his life. From that point on Adam got suspicious. Brint still asks some questions about that conversation, but Adam wants to stop.
Conversation about Adam’s suspicion: He sneaks into his fathers ‘’office’’ at home. He finds his Birth certificate and sees Adam Farmer. Then he sees another envelope, it’s whit. He opens it and sees Paul Delmonte, born in the same year as Adam only another date. This confuses him. The he leaves because his fathers coming.
In the next conversation neither Brint, nor Adam gets any wiser.
Then he spy’s on his mother and finds out that he has a relative. An aunt whit whom his mother always talks on Thursdays. His parents had told him he had no family other than his parents.
Then he goes in to an restaurant were he has a bite and drink. He sees some guys sitting at the other and. He calls them wise guys. One comes to him and starts to talk to him, the boy wants to see what’s In the package. He doesn’t want to let them see what’s in it. He goes away.
A conversation with Brint again: Adam feels he has many blanks of his past. He’s in panic because he doesn’t know his real name.
He calls Amy again. But he doesn’t get Hertz, but an other man who says there isn’t any hertz living there.
Then he’s on the road again. There’s a car behind him. It’s the wise guys. They almost hit him. He wants to flee, but the car returns. When Adam wakes up he’s on the ground and sees a man. The man told him he had seen him laying in the ditch with his bike. The wise guys had hit him. The Man takes Adam in the car, and they go to Hookset, near Belton Falls (the motel). Then they talk about Mr Grey. Mr Grey always comes to talk with his dad. They always talk in the Cellar. Adam tries to listen to what they say, but can’t hear anything.
Then he comes to the motel and wants to rest there, but it’s closed. He asks a man from a garage why it’s closed and the man answers that the motel has been closed for almost 3 years now. Adam doesn’t want to believe it and says that he was there with his parents just last summer. Then another woman comes out of her car and they all look at him on a strange way. He panics an runs to the motel and screams: Let me in, Let me in.
Another conversation: They talk about things he remembers. He remembers one day he went to his dad and asked: Why do I have two birth certificates? And why does mom talk to a woman who calls me her nephew, I thought all my relatives were dead. At that moment his father tells him everything. That once was a journalist and uncovered a big scandal which contained the state. He had to give his testimony and was threatened with death. Because of that they got in to a Witness protection program too protect the Delmonte’s from followers of the crime organisation who wanted revenge. And so they got other names, work and another living place. His fathers name was not Farmer but Delmonte. Adam, or actually Paul Delmonte was very small then. Mr Grey once saved Adam’s father’s live. That’s how they got contacted. Mr Grey told he was working for a witness protection program and he helped the Delmonte’s get a new life. Adam’s dad would get a new job because if he had still stayed a journalist it would be suspicious. The woman Adam’s mother always telephoned with was indeed Adam’s aunt. She was the only living relative with whom Adam’s mother could communicate. Adam was astonished. He would have never guessed something like that. Now he understood why that journalist had never heard about the Farmer’s they had never really lived there. He also saw the guarantee Mr. Grey had given them: He saw a newspaper clipping that said: Blount Reporter, Wife, Child killed in crash on highway.
Next thing on the trip Adam had gone buying some aspirins for his headache. When he came back he saw that his bike was gone, it had been stolen. He was paralyzed, but then he went searching for it. He went through a back alley and heard a voice from above. He saw a fat man and asked him if he had seen anyone steal a bike. The man didn’t want to tell him and was teasing him. And then another voice from inside tells the fat man -called Arthur- to tell were the bike is. The fat man tells that a boy called Varney Junior took it and he tells Adam where he lives. So Adam goes there and waits for the perfect moment. Just as he wants to get it the boy and his mom come out of the house. They talk to each other and then Varney junior takes the bike and wants to leave. But then Adam starts to fight with Junior and wins. He takes the bike and pedals away as fast as he can.
Back to the conversation: He remembers that Adam got home and his mother said that Mr. Grey had called that somebody could have spotted them. So they wait until Adam’s dad returns. His father acts like nothing had happened and he says that they need rest and are going on a trip. They go to the Motel in Belton Falls. When they stay there Adam’s mom is happy again for a while. When they want to leave, Adam’s dad sees that they’re being followed. They stop near the road and Adam’s dad sees it’s just Greys man. They forget about them and go stretch they’re legs. All of a sudden a car appears and Hits them. He sees his mother die and a man (MR grey) come near them. Then he hears his dad got a way, but was wounded.
In the trip story Adam is in Rutterburg and goes to a man he sees. It’s professor Dupont. He goes with him inside and sees almost all the people mentioned on the trip: the Fat man, the wise guys, Varney Junior and the old man. He goes inside the hospital and in to his room. The doctor opens the package and it contains Pockey the pig, Adam’s stuffed animal. Then he asks the doctor if Adam’s father lived, the doctor answers negatively. Adam is sad, but starts to sing ‘Farmer in the dell’ and doesn’t feel so sad anymore. Then he calls himself ‘The Cheese’ and the story ends. The most natural cause of this is that he went in to an trauma after he saw his mother got killed and made the trip up. He probably just had been on a bicycle course around the hospital.
The summary of Mr Brint, the state’s psychoanalyst tells that he couldn’t get any information from Subject A (Adam) he tells that the witness was eliminated (Adam’s dad) en his spause (Adam’s mom). He also mentions personnel #2222 (Mr. Grey) who did a good job on getting rid of the remaining of the eliminated witness and spaus. At the end he gives the advice to Eliminate subject A, or to keep him until he dies of natural causes. So Brint was an enemy of Adam’s father. And so was Mr. Grey. It’s a large conspiracy.