House of the Scorpion Madness!!

Well I am really lovin' this book. The only reason I put it down is because I only read at night, and it gets too late for me to keep my eyes open. So lets see, I think I'll just make a list of what happened so far since my last post. Oh and just to clarify, Tom and Maria are not siblings. Maria is the daughter of a powerful American senator, and Tom is the son of Mr. Alacran, who is El Patron's great-great grandson.

So, I left off where Matt had just gotten out of the basement and was safe back with Celia. Here's what happened since:

• Matt "avoid[s] leaving the safe haven of Celia's apartment for as long as possible." He is unable to speak for a very long time after he leaves the basement, and it is the mission of Celia and Maria to make him talk again.
• Maria and her sister Emilia have left for school, and Tom and his brother Steven left for boarding school soon after them. Matt is the lone 'child' (clones aren't considered children) in the Big House, and El Patron arranges to have him educated. One day Matt is introduced to Teacher. Teacher is very robotic, and Matt learns that she is an eejit. An eejit is a person with a computer chip in their brain. The chip takes away all feelings and emotions, and they can only obey orders. They look like normal people, yet they are just zombies that serve as servants.
• Matt explodes at Teacher, and finds that he actually yelled at her. He enjoys his newfound speech, and talks as much as he can the next few days.
• Tam Lin - who is the only person aside from Celia who speaks to him as a real person - takes Matt for a picnic. They traveled on Safe Horses (horses that are eejits, they stop when told to stop and only drink when commanded). They ride through the desert until Tam Lin stops at a rock with a hole in the middle of it. They enter to find a land with trees and a small pool in the center. Tam Lin explains that it is called an oasis. The oasis becomes a refuge for Matt, as Tam Lin is the only other person who knows about it.
• Felicia, Mr. Alacran's wife, is a frail woman who suffered from a nervous breakdown. She plays the piano every day, and one day is late for her session. Since Matt watches and listens to her play every day, he notices that she is late and begins to experiment with the piano. He hears her approaching and hides in the closet. He discovers that in the back of the closet there is a secret passageway that winds through the house, with peepholes that look into every room. The passageway is another secret that is shared between Matt and Tam Lin, and later Maria.
• Matt wants desperately to learn the piano. He believes that he would excel, and "then everyone would love him and forget he was a clone." El Patron gets Matt a teacher, and he learns to play very quickly. Matt is soon an amazing pianist.
• Maria loses her dog Furball. Tom is in the room and helps the two look for it, but he isn't really looking. Matt notices that he is going through the actions but not actually searching. Matt knows that Tom isn't fond of the dog, and believes that he has something to do with it's disappearance. Matt finds the dog in the toilet, and Tom is visibly upset.
• El Patron's birthday party is what closes the chapter. All sorts of rich, influential people show up, and Matt loves it, because it had developed into a celebration for him as well. Celia, Tam Lin, Maria, and El Patron are the only ones who really celebrate him, but everybody else has to grit their teeth and get through the day.
• The chapter ends with a break before dinner, and you can already tell that something bad is going to happen..

So that was my super long, probably boring list of events. Its much more interesting to actually read the book, obviously. Quotes will come later.