Robby Bustamante

Chapter 4 - Eyes

Robby Bustamante — aliases: the boy

Robby Bustamante, a thirteen-year-old boy who is blind, deaf, and retarded, is lifted into a van by the East St. Louis Day School for the Blind, a routine part of his life following a history of severe neglect and institutionalization.

Chapter 29 - Eyes

Robby / Robby Bustamante

Robby, a blind and deaf thirteen-year-old boy, is violently beaten to death by his mother's live-in partner after soiling his pants. He is dragged to a rotting outhouse, thrown into the pit, and left to die alone in the dark while his mother abandons the house.

Chapter 33 - Eyes

Robby

The narrator, a blind and deaf thirteen-year-old boy, reflects on the concept of mortality and death through the lens of Gail's dying experience, noting that the idea of ceasing to be was previously alien to him.

Chapter 35 - Eyes

Robby

The thirteen-year-old boy lies dying in a hospital bed, sliding in and out of consciousness while frantically paws at the sheets and moans fitfully in a desperate search for his missing teddy bear. His movements and cries eventually cease as he drifts deeper into a coma.

Chapter 39 - Eyes

Robby Bustamante

The narrator is mere hours away from watching their carefully constructed universe collapse, unaware of Jeremy, Gail, or the shared experiences of telepathy. They know only the continued pain of existence, the difficulty of fleeing from it, and the despair of separation from past solace. The narrator is dying, yet also hours away from being born.

Chapter 40 - Sightless, Unless

Robby

Robby lies unconscious in the adjacent hospital bed, drooling and breathing with difficulty. He is the object of Bremen's psychic probe, whose mind is revealed to be shielded by a tight inward turn of consciousness rather than a natural barrier.

Chapter 41 - Eyes I

Robby

Jeremy breaches a psychic shield characterized by a 'tight inward turn of consciousness,' entering the void of Robby's isolation, though Robby remains unconscious and does not actively act in the narrative.

Chapter 46 - Eyes I Dare Not Meet in Dreams

Robby — aliases: the god, Apollo child

Robby appears as a towering, radiant figure astride his teddy bear, projecting violent psychic images and emotional surges of sorrow. He struggles to maintain his hold on Jeremy and Gail within his dying mind, eventually fading into white fog as his power diminishes.

Chapter 47 - Falls the Shadow

Robby — aliases: little fellow

Robby lies dying in a hospital bed, surrounded by monitors and life-support machines, with his head turned upward and eyes half-open and sightless. His shriveled body is curled in a fetal position, and his lips flutter as he breathes in ragged surges, unaware of Bremen's visit.

Chapter 49 - For Thine Is Life Is For Thine Is The

Robby

Robby emerges from the dunes holding hands with Jeremy and Gail, watching the sunrise alongside them with newly opened eyes.