"Peter, do you think Harry was the kind of arrogant, stubborn person who never listened to anyone else's opinions?" Schiller asked, looking at Peter as his condition gradually stabilized.
Peter turned his head blankly to look off to one side. Like anyone who had cried until they had no strength left, he spoke sluggishly. "No, of course not. Quite the opposite—Harry was pretty good at listening to other people's opinions, while I could be stubborn sometimes..."
Peter sniffed again, the ends of his brows drooping. He looked as aggrieved as a golden retriever whose owner kept putting off calling it to dinner.
"But today, he was like a completely different person. I laid out the facts, reasoned with him, proposed all kinds of solutions. I swallowed my confusion and hurt feelings and tried my best to stick to the issue and solve the problem, but he just kept refusing. It was like... like he was deliberately picking a fight..." Peter's voice grew quieter and quieter, as though he felt it was wrong to speak badly of someone behind his back.
"Then why do you think he suddenly became like this?" Schiller asked again.
Peter sat there in silence for a while, then shook his head hard. "I really can't figure it out. It had only been two days. How could he have changed so much?"
"Do you remember the question I asked when I was analyzing Steve's condition—what had changed between you and yourself that morning? That was precisely the key to the problem. Compared to two days ago, what had changed about you and Harry?"
"What changed?" Peter muttered as he thought. "I don't think I changed at all. I'm still me, and he's still him..."
Schiller noticed that Peter was a little distracted and had not immediately spotted