The patriarch in King’s 1981 novel Cujo, Vic Trenton reappears as the protagonist and narrator of the story “Rattlesnakes.” Because the story is a sequel to Cujo, Vic’s character arc builds upon the novel’s events. In Cujo, Vic’s wife, Donna, and young son, Tad, become trapped in their car at an auto mechanic’s yard during a heat wave because the mechanic is away and a rabid, increasingly vicious Saint Bernard is present. Vic is out of town during the incident. His relationship with Donna is strained because he discovered she was having an affair. Vic’s son, Tad, dies of heatstroke in the car. At the moment of Tad’s death, Vic hears Tad’s voice, which becomes the seed of his grief over the next 40 years.

Vic is a dynamic character whose journey forces him to confront lingering emotions related to his family, which thematically underscores Dealing With the Consequences of Death as an overarching theme in You Like It Darker. The story reveals that in the years between Cujo and “Rattlesnakes,” Vic refused to acknowledge his son’s death, leading to his divorce from Donna. Several years later, they remarried but never discussed Tad until the moment Donna had a vision of their son on her deathbed.