Freak the Mighty: Chapter 18 Summary & Analysis

As the sun rises, Max waits for something to happen. He feels fuzzy. As he looks at Kenny, he thinks of the story about a giant who falls asleep and who gets tied up by little people. Finally, Max hears quick footsteps. Kenny wakes up and almost yanks Max out of the chair, but Loretta Lee glides in with a pizza box. She offers it to Kenny, and when Kenny asks where Iggy is, she says that he’s still asleep. Loretta wearing a long winter coat that looks new. She squints and smokes for a minute and then she asks Kenny why he can’t be nice—they had good times long ago. Kenny says those days are over, says the pizza won’t cut it, and asks for Iggy. Loretta shoots glances at Max but she agrees to fetch Iggy. She leaves.

Kenny insists that they can’t eat food that Loretta touched, so they raid the old lady’s kitchen. Max eats cornflakes with water as Kenny says that this is temporary; they’ll head somewhere warm soon. He says that first, they’ll get a big RV and then paint “The Reverend Kenneth David Kane” on the side. Max will stand out front in a suit, collecting money. He says that people give money to a man of God, and people love stories about bad men who have redeemed themselves. When Max is done eating, Kenny ties him up again and he says it’ll be like this just until Max sees the light. With a grin, Kenny says that he’s the light.

Kenny flips on the TV but he just cusses at it, since there are only cartoons and Christmas specials on. He wants to see if they’re on the news, though he insists that Grim and Gram probably don’t know Max is missing since they don’t care. Just then, they see blue lights flashing outside and Kenny shoves Max to the floor. A few minutes later, Iggy sneaks in the back. He explains that the cops came to his house looking for Max. Kenny drapes an arm over Iggy, and Max notices that Iggy looks cold and frightened. Kenny asks if Iggy turned on him, but Iggy says it was the “crippled midget kid”: Loretta saw Freak in the cop car.

Kenny thinks this is a weird story, but Iggy explains that Max and Freak stole Loretta’s purse. Kenny kneels down in front of Max and he asks for Max’s version of the story. Max just says that they didn’t steal Loretta’s purse. Iggy quickly says that Freak is Gwen’s son, but Kenny shoves Iggy down into a chair and he asks what they’re going to do now. Kenny tells Iggy to procure a gun and a car and then he sends him away. Then, Kenny takes Max’s rope and he tells him, “you can’t trust a cripple.”