In Plano, Texas, nine-year-old Stefan Block contemplated ways to heal the rift with his mother, Debra, who had been giving him the silent treatment after an argument. The Block family moved from Indianapolis to Plano a year earlier. Since then, Stefan’s mother had grown angry, a marked change from her previously playful personality. She had also cut off contact with her sister, Ella, and formed eccentric theories. As well as a distrust of authority figures and modern medicine, Debra believed that ear shape dictated one’s destiny. Stefan and his brother, Aaron, could not understand the reason for their mother's change. Since their psychologist father was headhunted for a job in Plano, they had a bigger house and more money. They wondered if she missed her friends and her job as an editor for a children’s magazine. The boys also sensed that she wanted to preserve them as small children forever.

Determined to hurt himself to gain his mom’s sympathy, Stefan fell while descending a cliff but landed without visible injuries. Deliberately scraping his elbow against a tree root until it bled, he then ran home sobbing. Debra examined his arm and deduced he wanted to avoid school. Sympathetic, she said that she understood Stefan’s unhappiness.