Dr. Robert Terwilliger Sr. was a cold man who rarely, if ever, expressed emotion or interest in anything, and he read the morning paper as if his children weren't there at the table with him, but since Bob didn't see a lot of his father, he was pleased that he had joined him and Cecil for breakfast.
It would have been nice if Bob's mother were here too, but Judith was visiting a sick aunt...or so she said. She would never name this aunt, who seemed to get sick an awful lot, and Bob found that odd...
"Look, Daddy!" said Cecil, pouring milk around his porridge. "I made an island!"
Robert Sr. put down his paper. "Cecil, that is your breakfast, not an island. Please eat it; you need to get to school."
"School doesn't start for another hour, Father," said Bob. "Besides, we've never been late before."
Robert Sr. gave his son a stern look, but was silent.
Once Cecil was finished eating, went to check that he had everything he needed for school. Now that Bob was alone with his father, he cleared his throat. "Father, may I ask you a question?"
Bob really wanted his advice, and since the elder Robert worked long hours at the hospital and went to sleep almost as soon as he came home, it was now or never.
"Make it quick, Robert," said his father in an almost bored tone, looking at his watch again. "We both need to leave soon."
"What would you do if anyone insulted or harassed you?" Bob nervously twirled a lock of his hair as he kept talking. "You see, some of my classmates have been calling me 'Palm-Tree Head", among other, unimaginative nicknames, as well as..." In a darker tone, he continued, "Pulling on my hair, 'accidentally' stepping on my feet, and blocking me from entering the classroom, among other things."
"You can't let them bother you," Robert Sr. replied without looking up from his newspaper. "Ignore them, and they will lose interest in you. If you get angry, you will lose all your dignity-"
It may be too late for that, Bob thought ruefully.
"-and they will keep antagonizing you, because they enjoy seeing you get angry. So, as I said, ignore them."
Bob barely stifled a frustrated groan and said in a rising voice, "Father, if it were that easy, I wouldn't be coming to you for advice."
"Don't take that tone with me," said Robert Sr. His voice remained calm, but the anger was obvious to his son. "Remember to keep your head in any situation, and no word or action can truly hurt you."
In the years to come, Bob would do his best to emulate his father's cool, detached manner, but he could never entirely manage it. There were simply too many things in the world that aggravated him, as if the universe wanted him to suffer and go mad.
Cecil had better luck than Bob in keeping a cool head. When Bob eventually did snap, after the failed funeral scheme, it was he who calmly reassured his father that they would get used to Bob's insane laughing and babbling, and he wasn't too angry at Snake for whacking them during their card game with Gino.
Until the Terwilligers were separated, they did their best to ignore Bob, only occasionally giving him an icy, contemptuous glance if he laughed too loudly.
Sometimes, their cold gazes would get through to Bob in his state of madness, and the family he stabbed in his demented imagination would not be the Simpsons, but his own.