Chapter Two
Several hours since, the Chocolate Room had entered the night phase of its artificial cycle, and now there was no sound but that of the waterfall. The lights overhead had steadily dimmed and were now completely off, leaving only several luminescent varieties of the floral and fungal sweets that grew here to provide vision. Without their soft glow, it would have been impossible to see the rest of the room: the gentle ebb and flow of the chocolate river, the squat, round lollipop shrubs, the twisting, serpentine candy cane trees, the lush sugarflower gardens.
Even the house that sat crooked in the center of the room, the only testament to civilization in this otherwise untamed jungle of candy, contained no light. No one was home. Willy Wonka and the Buckets were engaged elsewhere in the Factory, in the rooms that did not sleep as this one did.
But they had been hard at work. Wonka and Charlie, as well as the Oompa-Loompas, had been preparing to receive the four guests who would be arriving at the Factory tomorrow. Meanwhile, the rest of the Buckets had been busy packing and making their final arrangements before their departure the next morning. The Factory had been buzzing with activity today, and soon, its residents would need their supper.
Sure enough, the steady beat of the drum began to make itself heard from deep within the tunnel, along with the sound of one hundred Oompa-Loompas humming their somber melody. As the song grew louder, the pink seahorse ship slowly emerged from the mouth of the tunnel and came to rest along the riverbank.
Grandpa Joe was the first one to step onto land. He'd eaten little that day in the rush to pack, and his thrill at the prospect of supper gave him more energy than the rest of the company was feeling. He waited patiently as the rest of his family left the ship, resisting the temptation to pull up and eat a handful of swudge as he did so.
Anne and Josie were the first to reach the house, and turned the kitchen light on, amplifying the light throughout the room by a small amount. "Roast beef tonight!" Anne called. Roger and George were next, the former helping the latter along – George was now eighty-six and hobbled sometimes, although he stubbornly refused to buy a cane. Gina followed, occasionally stopping to admire (and nibble, more often than not) a sweet or two along her way.
But Grandpa Joe didn't move. Neither had Charlie. Neither had the ship. Willy Wonka was still sitting inside.
The Oompa-Loompas looked at him expectantly, but he neither stood up nor gave them the signal to start rowing. He simply sat in the back of the boat, gazing off at the waterfall.
"Mr. Wonka, sir?" The chocolatier had never told them to call him by any more personal name, although Grandpa Joe suspected it was not because Willy Wonka considered himself their superior, but because it had simply never occurred to him.
Wonka blinked, and his eyes turned to Grandpa Joe. "Yes?"
"Coming to dinner?" little Charlie asked. Little Charlie… Grandpa Joe should have stopped thinking of him that way years ago. It was only a habit by now: Charlie, who only a few weeks ago had celebrated his sixteenth birthday (and who had still only requested a single Fudgemallow Delight, bless his soul) was anything but little. He was nearly as tall as Roger by now, and he easily dwarfed Anne and his grandparents. Only Wonka remained unthreatened, although even that would change soon.
Not that Wonka was shriveling up. Indeed, in the five years since Charlie had become the owner of the Factory, Wonka hadn't aged a bit. He had even worn the same velvet coat and top hat every day (although this was hardly a surprise, as Grandpa Joe could not recall a time when Wonka hadn't worn them even back when he'd been young, and Grandpa Joe had been in his employ).
But that velvet coat seemed slightly less lustrous lately, that top hat slightly less glossy. Even Wonka himself seemed to be growing frayed… if not physically, then spiritually. Ever since March, Wonka had been a little less cheery and whimsical in his daily doings. It was a subtle thing – no one had even seen fit to mention it to him at supper. But now, though he felt it too late to ask, Grandpa Joe longed to know where Wonka had gone on the eighteenth of March. To know what had happened to him in those hours he had spent outside the walls of the Factory, and why he had returned a sadder man.
Willy Wonka shifted in his seat. "I guess."
"It's your last chance to talk to Mum and Dad, and Grandpa Joe and the rest," Charlie pressed.
"We're not going to be here in the morning," Grandpa Joe added. "We have to leave at five o'clock, otherwise we won't make it to the airport in time."
Wonka smiled. "Then of course I'm coming." He stood, adjusted his hat, and stepped onto the shore, mumbling a goodnight to the Oompa-Loompas as he did so.
The little men nodded solemnly and began rowing back down the tunnel to, Grandpa Joe knew, the treetop village that Wonka had constructed in one of the underground levels of the factory. Grandpa Joe and Charlie waved goodbye to them, but Wonka faced the opposite direction, gazing out upon his Chocolate Room.
"There go the loves that wither, the old loves with wearier wings; and all dead years draw thither, and all disastrous things: dead dreams of days forsaken, blind buds that snows have shaken, wild leaves that winds have taken, red strays of ruined springs."
Grandpa Joe's face fell. Wonka was known for waxing poetic, but this was a morose work to quote. Swinburne. "The Garden of Persephone", or something like that.
"Mr. Wonka," Charlie said quietly. "Were you having another flashback on the ship?"
"What? Oh. No. No." Wonka fiddled with his cane. "No, Charlie, I'm afraid I was thinking in a different direction."
With that, he wandered off toward the house.
Charlie turned to Grandpa Joe.
"What did he mean by that?"
"I suppose… it meant he was thinking about the future."
They went inside.
-----
"Oh, Charlie, I forgot to tell you! Mike Teavee's letter arrived today. He's coming after all." Anne Mazarine Bucket took the letter off the counter and gave it to her son before turning back to cooking.
She didn't add that from what she'd heard of the Teavee boy, they were better off if he didn't come. Roger, bless him, always believed in second chances, but Anne felt that one day at the Factory and five years suffering the consequences couldn't improve a person. These children – teenagers, now, those that weren't before – would be on the warpath when Willy Wonka let them back into the Factory. No good could come of it.
Charlie examined the letter, then looked up at the company – Anne and Josie attending to the roast beef, Roger and Joe setting up the table, George and Gina already in their seats, and Wonka himself, leaning against the far wall.
"It's a messy letter," Charlie said. "He edited it quite a bit. Look—"
He held out the letter for all to see. Sure enough, Mike Teavee's message seemed twice as long as it should be, for he had crossed out many words and sentences and replaced them with others along the way (presumably at the behest of his parents). He'd been so rigorous in his work that the blotted words were impossible to decipher, but Anne could deduce what they were as she accepted the letter from Charlie and read:
DearMr.Wonka (the "Mr." had been squished in between "Dear" and "Wonka" after the fact)
I guess I have no choice but to (blot) thank you very kindly for the invitation that you and (blot) Charlie have so graciously extended to me. It's true that we haven't corresponded for a great while – which, as far as I'm concerned, is cause for great (blot) sorrow. It will certainly be a pleasure to return to your (blot) (blot) gorgeous Factory. I'll see you on the first of August.
Mike
P.S. (blot)
Once again Anne gave it to Charlie, who passed it around to the others and then set it on the mantle next to the other letters. Mike's jumbled, sloppy handwriting looked especially strange when viewed along with Augustus Gloop's small, shaky scribbles, Veruca Salt's wavy, elegant calligraphy, and Violet Beauregarde's blocky, rigid script.
Yes, it was going to be a difficult week for the two Factory masterminds.
When Wonka had told the Buckets that he wanted to invite the four children back for the first week of August, Anne had initially protested: that was the week that she, Roger, and the grandparents had been planning to spend in Florida. Charlie had already been going to stay behind with Wonka, which was reasonable, but the idea that they'd also be playing host to four teenagers… Anne didn't like to think of what the Factory would look like when they returned on the eighth. But Roger and Joe had persisted and prevailed, and neither the vacation nor the "party" was moved to a different time.
"How's the roast beef?" Josie asked, gently pulling Anne's thoughts back to supper.
"Done," she replied.
"So's the salad."
"In that case—" Anne turned around. "Dinner's ready, everyone!"
The usual clamor of "Thank you"s and "Wonderful"s and "Can't wait"s answered. Roger took the roast beef to the table; Josie, the salad bowl; and Anne procured milk and orange juice – nothing fancier, though they could have afforded the finest champagne now – from the refrigerator. Within a few minutes, all were seated in their usual positions, and supper began at last.
Anne permitted the feasting to carry on in silence for a few moments before opening up the night's conversation with "So, they're coming tomorrow already."
"I know," Charlie beamed. "I can't wait."
"Me neither," added Willy Wonka, and he seemed to actually mean it, although perhaps it was just joy at the presence of roast beef on his plate.
"I only wish I could stay around long enough to see how they've all changed," Joe said – understandably, since he'd been the only one present besides Wonka or Charlie to experience the respective beastlinesses of the Golden Ticket winners firsthand.
Charlie looked at Wonka. "Will Violet still be blue? And as flexible?"
"I'd say the elasticity will have worn off by now, for the most part. All the Oompa-Loompas I had to dejuice grew more breakier than bendier again after a while. Still, they remain quite the contortion… eers."
No one pointed out his grammatical anomaly, or the existence of the word "contortionist".
"But the color," he finished darkly, "is permanent."
"I know," Gina piped up with a smile. "It's lovely, isn't it?"
Her husband frowned at her yet, as had become his custom in the past few years, did not speak. Neither did anyone else, until Joe asked whether Mike Teavee would be as tall and flat.
"Flat? Nuh-uh. He'll have grown his third dimension back for sure." Wonka took a bite of beef and chewed thoughtfully for a moment before continuing. "He'll still be really tall, though. Not quite as. But really."
With that, he looked back down at his food. It was clear that the time for questions was over.
Anne rose from the table. "Excuse me, I'll be right back." Her eyes locked with Charlie's for a moment and she knew he understood. Her son was very good at reading her; it was a trait she was quite proud of. Before she had even opened the door, she heard the scrape of a chair and Charlie's voice: "Me too."
She stepped outside and Charlie joined her. They walked around to the other side of the house in silence. Then Anne turned to Charlie and whispered:
"Charlie, I'm worried about Mr. Wonka. He seems…"
Charlie smiled slightly. "Glum?"
Anne returned the smile. "I was going to say 'pensive', but yes, let's not beat around the bush. He seems glum."
"It's true. Ever since March…."
"I… hoped you might tell me where he'd gone that day?"
"I don't know." The teenager shook his head. "He won't even mention it. Believe me, I tried."
"Hmm."
They gazed upon the Chocolate Room for a moment.
"Well, that doesn't matter. I just needed to tell you that I don't think it's wise to have four children over for a week, with Mr. Wonka in the state he's in. I mean, I trust him, but… Do you understand what I mean?"
"Everything's going to be under control."
"I know, but..." Again she trailed off. "Charlie, I'm counting on you to keep everything under control, not Wonka."
He looked into her eyes, and she wanted to cry. Sixteen years old and he was already an adult. Thousands of candy bars manufactured every day now bore his name.
But it was still her little boy's name.
"I'll do my best, Mum."
They hugged tightly before returning to the house. The others had finished their meal, but were still talking around the table. They weren't going to bed until Anne and Charlie had eaten.
But Charlie said "Oh no, I'm fine, I'll put the rest in the fridge," and Anne followed suit, leaving the rest of the family free to prepare for sleep. Within ten minutes, the grandparents were back in their bed; Anne, Roger and even Willy Wonka were stretching out on mattresses in the (one) other room. Before climbing up to bed, Charlie appeared in their doorway.
"I'll be up at four tomorrow to see you off."
Roger sat up. "Oh, you don't have to, it's much too early—"
"I'll be up, Dad," said Charlie firmly. Then he smiled. "Good night."
"Good night, sweetie."
"See you tomorrow morning."
"Night, Charlie."
Charlie vanished, and a few moments later, his light upstairs went out. Within a short time, Roger's familiar snore made itself heard. Anne rolled over, grinning, and fell asleep.
-----
Four o'clock in the morning, August first: Roger is the first one to awaken. He stirs Anne without any trouble, but despite their best efforts the two cannot rouse Willy Wonka, who only twitches and mumbles something about braces. Charlie wakes up without prompting, and the three of them prepare a light meal of eggs and toast before waking up the grandparents. Charlie insists on only setting out six dishes: he doesn't want to alienate Wonka by making him eat alone. However, Charlie does sit and whisper with his family as they quietly take their breakfast. Goodbyes are shared, hugs and kisses go around the table, and at five o'clock, the six eldest Buckets gather their few bags and suitcases and depart for the airport.
Seven twenty-one in the morning: Willy Wonka blinks awake at exactly the same hour and minute that he has blinked awake for nearly all his life. He then proceeds to spend the next three minutes and thirty-four seconds, as always, mulling over ideas in bed (he always claims that it's the most productive three minutes and thirty-four seconds of his day). In the end, however, he rises and meets Charlie outside in the Chocolate Room.
Seven forty-five: Charlie and Willy Wonka eat their own breakfast, again composed of eggs and toast. Given Wonka's attitude as of late, Charlie manages to stir up quite a reasonable amount of enthusiasm in him for the week ahead.
Eight twenty: Charlie and Willy Wonka take a quick elevator ride around the upper few levels of the Factory, to ensure that those rooms in which the four teenagers are likely to spend most of their time have been, in Wonka's words, "Gloop-proofed, Salt-proofed, Beaurewhatsit-proofed, and Teavee-proofed".
Eleven o'clock: The first guest arrives.
-----
The Inventing Room was one of Charlie's favorite places in the Factory – and given how many rooms the building contained in total, that was saying a great deal. Charlie had fallen in love with the Inventing Room from the minute he had laid eyes upon it five years ago. All those fantastic machines and devices, pumping and whirring and whizzing and clacking as they helped bring to life Wonka's latest wild idea – or Charlie's, now – lent the room an irresistible aura of… coolness. While most of the other rooms (remarkable as they were) never changed, the Oompa-Loompas were constantly assembling new machines here according to Wonka's or Charlie's blueprints, or disassembling other machines to reconstruct and duplicate them in other rooms (if they produced new candy successfully) or return the parts to the storerooms (if they failed). The result was that no matter how long you had been at the Factory, if you needed to be dazzled and impressed, you could always visit the Inventing Room.
Granted, the room had its dangers as well – Charlie had quickly learned that it wasn't just the Hair Toffee and chewing-gum meal that had nasty side effects. In fact, a great many of Wonka's less "ordinary" candies could do a lot of damage if they hadn't been prepared or taken properly. Charlie had learned about the volatile Exploding Candies, and how prone they were to blowing up even before you took them out of the wrapper and gave them to an unsuspecting enemy. He'd learned about Stickjaw for Talkative Parents, and how the poor Oompa-Loompas who had tested it had wound up with their teeth stuck together for weeks before Wonka could finally figure out how to loosen them. He'd learned about Magic Hand-Fudge, a special kind of candy that you could taste even while you were holding it in your hand, and its wide array of "glitches" – some as harmless as tasting something else besides fudge as you held it, some as horrible as getting your hand burned right off your arm (Wonka could not recall any particular time that this had happened, yet he warned that it was an ever-looming possibility). These candies and many more had been born in the Inventing Room, and they'd all been frightful during the testing stages. Charlie sometimes wondered if it wouldn't be safer just to stick to chocolate bars, but Wonka maintained that all his candies were perfectly safe by the time they were packed and shipped… and he hadn't slipped up once yet.
"The burden of invention, my boy," Wonka had told him once, in a happier time. "We have to work out every little kink ourselves, with all that might ensue. But I think it's all worth it just to hear the sounds in this place."
Charlie agreed with the chocolatier's sentiment as he sat in the Inventing Room, listening to the uneven cacophony of metallic clinks, bangs and buzzes. The song of inspiration. The Muses' melody.
He was simply sitting and taking in the music when he felt the familiar tug on his pant leg. An Oompa-Loompa wanted to talk. Charlie looked down and saw the little man – but no, it was a woman. She had long hair that curled into spirals at the ends, and a face that was rather more appealing than those of her male counterparts, though it was equally grave. Charlie had usually only seen female Oompa-Loompas in their treetop village below ground level, for they customarily took care of the children and the village while the men worked throughout the Factory. However, Willy Wonka had instructed four of the women to receive the guests in the courtyard, and by her distinctive purple clothing, Charlie could tell that this Oompa-Loompa was one of those four.
"What?" He checked his watch. "One of them can't be here already?"
The Oompa-Loompa said that it was so.
"But that's ridiculous. They're an hour early."
The Oompa-Loompa pointed out that the guest seemed to be dead-set on arriving at the Factory first. Indeed, the first thing she had asked was whether anyone else had gotten there before her.
"Thankfully not. Who is it?"
The Oompa-Loompa, who hadn't seen the guests five years ago, had to confess that she did not know. On the one hand, the guest had been chewing gum, and between that and her aggressive desire to be the first to arrive, the Oompa-Loompa ventured that it seemed like Ms. Beauregarde. On the other hand, she had been told that Ms. Beauregarde had left the Factory blue – and this girl's skin was pink, her hair yellow. So the Oompa-Loompa also thought it might be Ms. Salt.
"But Veruca's hair is brown… No, that sounds a lot more like Violet. Anyway, let's find out. Where is she?"
The Oompa-Loompa said that the guest had accompanied her here. She turned and pointed across the large Inventing Room, and Charlie saw the girl peering at several of his and Wonka's works in progress, although (Charlie noticed with surprise) taking great care not to touch anything.
"All right. Heavens, I don't even know what to do with her for the next fifty minutes. I'll keep her here, I guess. In the meantime, can you go find Mr. Wonka and tell him that she's arrived?"
The Oompa-Loompa asked if Charlie had taken a Great Glass Elevator to get here. He knew why: ever since he'd inherited the Factory a year and a half ago, a row of buttons along the middle of each Elevator had been installed that could locate any of the seven Buckets or Willy Wonka, wherever in the Factory they might be. Charlie could tell that the Oompa-Loompa intended to use an Elevator to find Wonka.
"Yeah, I did." Charlie gestured to the sliding doors in the center of the western wall, where sure enough, one of the two Great Glass Elevators sat. "And afterwards, could you pop up to the courtyard and tell the other ladies to bring the rest of the guests here to the Inventing Room as well?"
The Oompa-Loompa crossed her arms over her chest in agreement, then strode into the Elevator, pushed the "WILLY WONKA" button, and vanished.
Charlie approached the girl. It was Violet Beauregarde after all, but a Violet who had just gone through five of the most intense years of physical change in a lifetime: from ten to fifteen. She had grown much taller – although the lanky-framed Charlie dwarfed her by a long shot – although her face was still round as a child's, and she hadn't grown out her hair by very much.
As the Oompa-Loompa had said, she was indeed chewing gum. Charlie supposed it must be a difficult habit to break if swelling up into a twenty-foot ball as a direct result of a prototype piece of gum hadn't been the last straw for Violet. On the other hand, perhaps she had simply reasoned that the spearmint and cinnamon varieties you could purchase in the checkout aisle didn't pose quite that kind of hazard.
She was wearing a heavy, slate-colored trenchcoat, which surprised Charlie considering it was the first of August. More startling, however – even though the Oompa-Loompa had told him about this – was that her skin was peach-colored again. Not that the trenchcoat afforded Charlie a glimpse of much of her skin, but her face looked completely normal. Not the slightest hint of blue. Nor in her hair, which was blonde again. Hadn't Willy Wonka said that the color was permanent?
She tore her eyes away from a large tube of violently frothing, multi-colored liquid as he approached.
"Violet?"
"Bucket!"
"How are you?"
"It's been so long!"
Charlie held out his hand, but Violet seemed not to notice. Perhaps that wasn't the proper way to formally welcome a girl you hadn't seen for five years. He said "You look…", but couldn't decide whether to finish it with "different" or "the same". She looked different from how she had left the Factory but the same as how she had entered it.
"I know," said Violet. Knew what? "You too, Bucket. You grew so tall! How's your family? How's Mr. Wonka?"
"My family actually left earlier this morning for Flo—" Charlie began, but Violet cut him off. The idea of meeting Willy Wonka again seemed to have excited her. She walked a little ways across the Inventing Room, apparently hoping that Wonka himself would pop around the corner of one of the machines.
"Where is he? Did you tell him I got here? I want to see him."
"Don't worry, he's on his way," Charlie laughed. "Excited, aren't you?"
Violet wheeled around. "I just want another chance to talk to the top man around here."
"Okay."
"That's all."
"Okay."
"Good."
"Um…" Charlie thought about his words before continuing. "I don't mean to be rude, but…"
"…the big man around here is you," Violet said with a rueful smile. "Yeah. Sorry. I forgot. Pretty stupid of me, considering that it's been your name on the chocolate bars these days. I'm sorry."
"Yeah," said Charlie, not knowing whether to laugh or not. Girls were confusing.
Violet turned around to face the Inventing Room again. "So is he coming or not?"
-----
The second Oompa-Loompa arrived about a half an hour later, at twenty to noon. Charlie had had to endure thirty minutes of awkward conversation with Violet – which had, blessedly, been taken up in part by him showing her some of the latest inventions; so far, it was the only topic he'd found in which he had any idea of what to say. Otherwise, she had done all the talking, leaving his head reeling.
But it wasn't a delight, either, to see one lone Oompa-Loompa woman enter the room. First of all, she should have been escorting the second guest. Second, she shouldn't even have arrived before Wonka. Hadn't Charlie told the previous Oompa-Loompa to go tell Wonka that Violet had arrived before speaking to the others in the courtyard? How long could it take for the Elevator to track down Wonka, for the Oompa-Loompa to deliver her message, and for Wonka to ride the Elevator back to the Inventing Room?
As soon as she approached the two teenagers, Charlie asked at once, "Did your friend come back to the courtyard after dropping Violet off here?"
She had, the Oompa-Loompa replied, in order to tell them to bring all future guests to the Inventing Room.
"Then where's—" Charlie began, but he decided to address that question in a moment. "Hadn't she gone to find Mr. Wonka first?"
The Oompa-Loompa didn't know. Her friend hadn't told them anything about Mr. Wonka.
"Well, when the next guest arrives, tell her – your friend, I mean – to come down here too. I need to talk to her."
The Oompa-Loompa agreed.
"So where's your guest?"
The Oompa-Loompa stated that her charge was still in the main hall.
"Why?"
The Oompa-Loompa said that he had expressed a strong desire not to enter the Chocolate Room. He hadn't even been able to watch as she had opened the door to go in.
Charlie frowned. That didn't sound like either Augustus or Mike. Augustus had been nothing short of euphoric when he had entered the Chocolate Room, and Charlie couldn't imagine Mike caring enough about anything to be scared of it. "Who was he?"
The Oompa-Loompa was quite certain it was Augustus Gloop. Even if his weight was not a perfect criterion – anyone can gain weight – the young man was clearly German.
"Gloop?" Violet asked, also frowning. "I thought he loved chocolate."
"So did I… Well, let's go see." Charlie took one step toward the Elevator shaft, then stopped: It was empty, of course. He turned back to the Oompa-Loompa. "Is the ship still here?"
The Oompa-Loompa confirmed that it was, and they left the Inventing Room to find the pink craft and its one hundred and one Oompa-Loompas all waiting there. Violet seemed excited at the chance to ride in the boat again already, but Charlie assured her that this trip wouldn't be as much fun. The tunnel that their ship used to get from the Chocolate Room to the Inventing Room and the others in that area was short, straight, speedy, and thrilling even after five years – but it was too steep to be an option if you were going the other way. Instead, they had to rely on a much longer, slower, more twisting route that steadily rose to the ground floor, which meant that ten minutes had passed by the time they even set foot in the Chocolate Room.
Violet kept trying to stop and pick vanilla flowers, but Charlie and the Oompa-Loompa wasted no time in heading for the front door. Sure enough, when Charlie opened it, he found Augustus standing in the main hall.
Unlike Violet, Augustus' appearance had not changed much. Though he was now nineteen years old, he was relatively short – Charlie was three years his junior yet a good six inches taller. His hazel-colored hair was still rather thin, his light grayish-blue eyes were still wide, and he was still quite fat. Yet the babyish aura that Augustus had exuded five years ago was gone. Charlie could tell why at once: Augustus had radiated with happiness then, but now he looked terrified.
He wasn't taking enormous bites out of a chocolate bar. That was the strangest thing about him.
He jumped when he saw Charlie, Violet and the Oompa-Loompa, but relaxed immediately. "Charlie? Is that you?"
"It's me," Charlie said. "How are you, Augustus?"
Augustus smiled nervously. "I've been better, I think."
"Why didn't you come to the Inventing Room?" asked Violet, never one to beat around the bush. Augustus looked at her in surprise.
"You're Violet Beauregarde?"
"Course I am."
"But you're not blue."
"Answer my question, Gloop."
Augustus looked at them balefully. "I'm sorry, my friends. I could not help myself… I was so frightened."
"Frightened of what?" asked Charlie.
Augustus backed off slightly and pointed beyond them at the door to the Chocolate Room.
"That room? Why would you be frightened of—"
"It's not just that room, it's the whole Factory." Augustus' voice was trembling now. "Why do you think I tried to cancel my shipments?"
It was true: not long after his first visit to the Factory, Augustus had written them, asking not to receive any more monthly packages of assorted chocolates. Soon after, his mother had written them and asked to receive the packages again. A little while later, they'd gotten another letter from Augustus asking them to stop, and before long, another letter from his mother telling them to go on. What Charlie and Wonka had witnessed was a strange and rather fascinating war of mail – as the mail kept coming, Augustus' tone showed that he was getting more and more anxious to stop the chocolate onslaught, while his mother's revealed that she was growing more and more impatient with her "silly boy" and insistent on keeping the service. The last they'd heard from the Gloops had been about three years ago. From that fact that Mrs. Gloop had been the last one to write them, they assumed she'd won.
Charlie and Wonka had always thought that Augustus was simply trying to right himself and rid his life of sugary sweets (which of course meant that the monthly shipments had to go) and that his mother enjoyed consuming the chocolate herself and therefore wanted the shipments to keep coming.
But as Charlie put the letters together in his mind with Augustus' present terror, the real answer dawned on him.
"Listen," he said after a moment. "Not every room in the Factory has to do with chocolate. You know that. In fact, there are so many rooms here that don't include any form of chocolate, you could wander them for months and never retrace your steps." Augustus perked up, but Charlie went on: "All the same, in order for you to reach any of them at all, you're going to have to enter this one. There's no other way to get inside the Factory."
"There must – there must be other ways," Augustus protested, although his face had fallen again, and Charlie could tell he was losing hope.
"There are other ways for candy to get out, but there are no other ways for a person to get in. I'm sorry."
Augustus took another look at the door and shuffled his feet nervously.
"Wait wait wait," Violet said loudly. "You're scared of chocolate?"
"Shut up!" Augustus cried, and he looked so pained that Violet actually did. He looked down at his hands.
"I wouldn't even have come back if my mother and father had not insisted," he went on. "I don't mean to offend you, Charlie, it's just that… Well, you understand…" He looked back up at them. "Are you sure there is no other way?"
"Positive," said Charlie sadly. "I really am sorry. Mr. Wonka just thought it would cut down on burglaries if there was only…" He noticed Augustus flinching violently at the sound of Wonka's name. "What is it?"
"He is not here, is he?"
"Not at this moment, no," Violet said. "What? Don't tell me you're afraid of him, too."
Augustus stared at her helplessly. Charlie thought it was best to shift the topic of conversation away from his fears. "That reminds me, I need to go ask your friend—" (he turned to the Oompa-Loompa) "—why Mr. Wonka never came. Let's go outside."
Charlie smiled a little as he saw Augustus' face brighten up at the prospect of not immediately entering the Chocolate Room, and they began the long walk down the hallway.
-----
Almost immediately after they entered the courtyard, the bell in the church across town rang twelve times.
Across the green field, the other three Oompa-Loompas were talking to an exceptionally tall young man, and Charlie realized at once that Mike Teavee had arrived. He was wearing a red T-shirt and jeans that just barely fit him, and he had grown out his hair by several inches, sprouting an unruly crop of bangs. He wore a backpack and toted a wheeled duffel bag, neither of which he seemed willing to relinquish to the Oompa-Loompas (who had already collected Violet's and Augustus' baggage without trouble).
"—not going to just hand them over to you, you creepy little—"
"Mike!"
Mike looked down at Charlie, who was a good twelve inches shorter than him. He frowned. "You're not Willy Wonka."
"I'm Charlie Bucket."
"Oh yeah. Geez. Sorry. You're the boss here now, aren't you?"
"Yeah."
"Great. Look, can you get these little… whatever-they're-calleds away from me? I'd rather not have my stuff stolen."
"They're Oompa-Loompas, remember?" Charlie told the Oompa-Loompas that Mike preferred to keep his baggage on his own person.
"That so? Sheesh, they don't look like I remembered." Mike squinted down at the Oompa-Loompas, each about one-eighth his height. "Which area do these guys work in? The Transvestite Room?"
Violet giggled.
"They're female, Mike," Charlie pointed out.
"Whatever. So where's Wonka? Shouldn't he be here?"
"Actually no – I need a moment to straighten that out. I'll be right back."
Leaving Mike to meet Violet and Augustus again, Charlie approached the Oompa-Loompas. Unable to distinguish between them, he couldn't tell to whom he should address his question. Therefore he met all their eyes in turn as he asked, "Where's Mr. Wonka?"
To his relief, the Oompa-Loompa who had escorted Violet stepped forward at once and said that she had found Mr. Wonka in the Wine Gums, Beer Gums, Tea Gums, Coffee Gums and Soda Gums room. She had told him that the first guest had arrived, but he had expressed no desire to welcome her, only wishing to make sure that she was with Charlie. The Oompa-Loompa had tried to talk Mr. Wonka into reconsidering, but he would hear none of it. She had eventually left him and returned to the courtyard.
Charlie thanked her and rejoined the guests. He intended to seek out Wonka as soon as he could, but he felt that he ought to wait for Veruca Salt to arrive first, since he was already here to greet her.
"No, I'm serious, I thought they must reproduce through mitosis or something…" Mike was saying to the others. "Oh, hey. What's going on with Wonka?"
"I'm going to go find him after Veruca arrives," Charlie said.
They looked at each other for a few moments.
"So, Mike…" Charlie struggled for a topic, hoping Veruca would arrive at any moment. "Have you seen any good TV shows lately?"
"Of course I haven't."
"They have all been terrible?" Augustus asked, surprised. Charlie didn't think any of them had been expecting Mike, of all people, to answer that way.
"How should I know?" Mike asked, his voice suddenly snappish. "And don't go asking about video games, I don't know what's been going on in that corner either."
"Did your parents—" Violet began.
"Yeah. Banned 'em. Nothing left." Mike shrugged, evidently trying to suggest that this was no big deal. "What about you, Gus? You lose all your chocolate privileges? Doesn't look like it," he added under his breath.
"Augustus, please… and no… I didn't lose my chocolate privileges."
"And you're still chewing gum," Mike said to Violet. "Well, I guess I'm the only one who learned from their experience, huh?"
Both Violet and Augustus looked quite cross at this, so Charlie was spared the unfolding of a three-way argument by the arrival of Veruca Salt, fifteen minutes (fashionably) late.
----
The first thought that entered his mind was that she was gorgeous.
Like Violet, she had grown taller – in fact, she wasn't much shorter than Charlie. Her face was narrower, and her blue eyes seemed more vivid than before – or perhaps that was just because they were being compared with five-year-old memories. Her curly hair, which had previously been about shoulder-length, now came halfway down her back. Her posture and manner still denoted a princess, which Charlie had been expecting, but her clothing didn't. Indeed, rather than anything as fancy as the pretty pink dress and elegant fur coat she had worn on the first of February five years ago, she was wearing a rather plain white blouse and black skirt. Had her father's nut business gone under?
As soon as she saw Charlie, she gave a cry of delight and hugged him, causing his cheeks to tingle. This was also unexpected – shouldn't she be pouting and whining the way she had before?
When she pulled away, she looked him up and down with a smile. "You certainly have changed, Charlie."
Feeling that overall it had been a very peculiar greeting but deciding to go along with it, Charlie nodded. "You too."
"So, you're the owner of the Factory now, hmm? All of a sudden all the candy bars started bearing your name instead of Mr. Wonka's."
Why was she keeping the conversation focused on him instead of her?
Had Veruca actually grown better?
That seemed unlikely. After all, she had been perhaps the nastiest of the children five years ago. Augustus may have been greedy, Violet obnoxious, and Mike rude, but Veruca had been selfish, manipulative, jealous, spoiled, impatient, fastidious, and snobbish. Could five years really have changed her that much?
"Yeah, he 'officially' made it mine on my fifteenth birthday. Mum and Dad said I was still much too young… but you know Mr. Wonka, he's a child at heart himself, he thought I was responsible enough."
"Well, you've done a lovely job of it so far," she said. "Or at least, that's what the candy has told me."
"What about you? What have you been doing?" Charlie asked, uncomfortable again for about the hundredth time in the last hour and a half.
"Oh, my daddy and mum sent me to live with relatives in America for a year. I had— I got to help them tend their farm. It was actually quite fun after a while. They're the nicest people." She paused before adding: "Even if they are a bit… well, I wouldn't want to discuss their financial situation."
Charlie wondered what it must have been like for Veruca, of all people, to live with a family of (evidently) rather poor farmers for a year.
"But never mind that; where shall I move in?" She indicated the (again, surprisingly) few bags she had left on the grass behind her.
"Oh, the Oompa-Loompas will take your baggage, and we're going to let everyone pick their rooms soon. Speaking of everyone, come meet the others!" Before his hand let the rest of his body know what it was doing, it had taken Veruca's – the hand of a girl one year older than he was! – and was leading her to where the others had gathered.
He let go of her hand rather quickly, although it was all the same anyway, since her first action was to hug Augustus. "Augustus! Heavens, how old are you now? Eighteen, nineteen? You must be in college."
Augustus blushed furiously and sputtered, but managed to indicate that he was nineteen and indeed in college.
"Any subjects you've liked especially?"
"I have enjoyed music."
"Oh really?" Veruca cocked her head. "Do you play any instruments?"
"Tuba, and cello… and I sing," Augustus replied, looking away ashamedly. Veruca, however, seemed impressed.
"That's wonderful. And you? Why, you're Mike! I didn't even recognize you for a moment!"
She hugged Mike as well, which was a strange sight considering how slender Mike's elongated body was. He backed off immediately.
"It's lovely to see you again. You're so tall! I'd completely forgotten. Have things been easier for you since then?"
"Afraid not."
"Really? You must be quite the athlete now, at any rate."
Rather than respond, Mike threw his arms up in the air and turned away, exasperated. Evidently sensing that she had hit a nerve, Veruca turned to Violet, but her delighted smile at seeing the boys had faded a little.
"Violet! What a pleasure."
"The pleasure's all mine, Salt."
"Please," she said, "make it Veruca."
"Naturally. How've you been, Veruca?"
"I've been well. Yourself?"
"Not bad."
"You look…" It seemed Veruca, too, was stricken by Violet's normal appearance. "…You look good."
Violet's eyes narrowed. "Of course I do."
Now Veruca seemed hostile, as well. Her sugary-sweet tone of voice remained, however. "Why, I do hope you don't take your looks for granted, Violet. We can't all have them."
"No. We can't."
Shocked at the sudden change of mood and fearing that a catfight might erupt at any moment, Charlie thought it best to excuse himself. "Pardon me, I've got to go find Mr. Wonka. I'll be right back."
He re-entered the Factory and proceeded to the Chocolate Room, where the first Oompa-Loompa had left her Great Glass Elevator. He didn't realize that his search was futile as he stepped through the sliding doors and located the "WILLY WONKA" button; he was too wrapped up in his thoughts about the guests.
One flighty boy who's come down with a bizarre case of chocophobia, one loud-mouthed girl who's inexplicably dead-set on meeting Mr. Wonka, one antisocial boy who lashes out at any mention of the past five years, and one unabashed flirt who goes into Catty Mode whenever she sees another girl, he thought. Well, the gang's all here.
Random Passerby: Well, Pohatu, that was just insanely long! >
Pohatu: I know! Secretly, I did not intend for that chapter to turn out so tremendous! Please tell no one!
Random Passerby: I shall not!
Pohatu: Thank you! At any rate, after typing up all this work, I really cannot be bothered to talk to you for very long.
Random Passerby: That pains me.
Pohatu: However, I will just tell our reading audience that I'm going back to school in two days, so chapters will have to be written in my spare time.
Random Passerby: Aw, MAN! That means they're going to be even less frequent!
Pohatu: Not necessarily! For instance, on Thursday I have only two classes! I go to a boarding school, y'see!
Random Passerby: Huh!
Pohatu: So hopefully I'll still have plenty of time to write. I would certainly hate for this story to die after only two chapters!
Random Passerby: I know! You could do so much with these characters over one week!
Pohatu: And I will! Young persons will find romance, come to terms with their true selves, and all sorts of other great stuff!
Random Passerby: What? You mean there's no thrilling action sequences?
Pohatu: Not many, I fear. This is mostly a character study of the five teenagers -- and, of course, Wonka.
Random Passerby: Geez, where is that guy? He was totally missing from the second half or two-thirds or whatever of this chapter!
Pohatu: He'll be back, I assure you.
Random Passerby: Well, grood.
ATTENTION: THE WORD "GROOD" DOES NOT BELONG TO ME IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORMULA. IT BELONGS TO THE BROTHERS CHAPS. THANK YOU.