That moment was a turning point. Charlotte pulled herself together, did as she was told, and made it to the exam with time to spare. She returned to Adam’s apartment convinced that she had butchered this exam, too, and complaining about the weird, warped mentality of Mr. Gilman. She did not break into tears; she did not despair. Scorn, contempt, and hatred were her métier. She registered not woe but anger, a deadly sin perhaps but a positive sign in this case.

Adam continued to go to bed with her every night. He pressed his body upon hers every night, at her bidding. As the night wore on and Charlotte finally drifted off into two or three hours of sleep, he slept with her—ever more bitterly conscious of the irony of that little phrase. If he had ever uttered such a thing in the company of, let’s say, Greg or Roger or Camille, any of them would have assumed Charlotte was draining his testicles for him every night. “Draining his testicles” was Camille’s term for a girl’s “living with” some boy. Camille wouldn’t say, “That little idiot has been living with Jason for a month now.” She would say, “That little idiot has been draining Jason’s testicles for a month now.” If the truth be known, the kinetics of Adam’s “living with” Charlotte hadn’t changed in the slightest. He still embraced her like a mother holding a five-foot-four baby on her lap. Charlotte never lay facing him in bed. He held her from behind, not as a lover, but as that vapid soul, the loving friend who sees to it that a poor troubled girl feels protected and secure—and not alone in this trough of mortal error where all mortals must abide. Many was the time the loving friend had an erection beneath his boxer shorts. Many was the time that stiffened giblet had the urge to thrust itself forward—two or three inches would have been enough—and let her know it was there…that was all…merely acquaint her with that pertinent fact. But how could he risk it? What had chased her into his bed but…somebody else’s mindless, wandering erection, a battering ram who had knocked her door down and ravaged her.

Irony, irony, all too exquisite, the irony—and then one night something entirely unexpected happened. Charlotte fell asleep within one minute after they had climbed into bed and he had put his arms around her.

She had her first full night’s sleep in six weeks or more. She awoke refreshed and even betrayed signs of optimism. The same thing happened the next night. The next morning she wanted to get up. The end of insomnia was pretty solid evidence that she was pulling out of her depression.

After a few days, Charlotte suggested that they return to the original arrangement, with him on the futon and her on the bed, or vice versa, since she felt much better and was no longer afraid at night. Adam was of two minds. How could he give up the tantalizing, if so far frustrating, prospect of having her body next to his every night and in the fullness of time sleeping with her in the metonymical meaning of the expression? At the same time…it was damned uncomfortable, two people in that one narrow bed; and besides, playing nurse without compensation in kind or in money was impossible to enjoy much beyond ten days.

And so there came a day when the second semester began, and Charlotte decided she should return to her own room in Edgerton and rejoin her clothes and other belongings. She and Adam were by no means splitting up. In fact, Adam walked her back to Little Yard and went up the elevator in Edgerton with her right to the door of her room on the fifth floor. She opened the door—it wasn’t locked—and invited him in. So he went in.

A big blond-streaked head of hair—filled up the room. Spectacular! Such a tall, slender girl! On second thought, the word was…skinny…and her nose and her chin—Charlotte’s roommate. Adam knew immediately from Charlotte’s description.

“Hello, Beverly,” said Charlotte. It was about as cold and wary a greeting as Adam had ever heard, especially in light of the fact that this was a roommate she hadn’t seen or spoken to, so far as he knew, in ten days. Then Charlotte added in the same cold voice, “This is Adam.” Still looking at her roommate, she said in the numbest of tones, “Adam, this is my roommate, Beverly.”

Adam forced a big grin, a very big one, and said, “Hi. Nice to meet you.”

Beverly gave him as dead a smile as he had ever seen in his life. Her lips extended about ten millimeters on either side, but the rest of her physiognomy was having no part of it. In that same half second her eyes gave him the once-over, head to toe and back up to his head. Enough of him—she devoted the rest of that second to Charlotte.

“So…the roommate returns,” said Beverly. Her expression said, My, how you do amuse me. “I thought you must have turned right around and gone back to North Carolina. But then I saw you on campus a couple of times during finals. So then I figured you must be staying out on Ladding Walk or someplace.”

Charlotte’s face turned absolutely scarlet. She was speechless. Adam was afraid she might cry. The silence stretched out out out out before Charlotte responded. “I’ve been staying at Adam’s.”

“Oh,” said Beverly. Her voice struck le chant juste of fake sarcastic surprise and interest. She gave Adam another flick of the eyes, going head to toe and back to his head again with an expression that couldn’t have said A PERSON OF NO CONSEQUENCE any louder if she had shouted it. Adam felt wounded and furious before his mind could even process the particulars.

Pretty soon, in due course, at the doorway, Charlotte gave Adam a hug good-bye, but it wasn’t the hug he had come to cherish—and live for—the one in which she threw her arms around him and laid her head on his chest. In fact, it wasn’t much more than a social hug. She gave him a kiss, but he could only imagine it touched his cheek. It was definitely not more than a social kiss. Whispering, she said, “Call me? Or I’ll call you? Promise?”

As the Edgerton House elevator descended, Adam weighed the pluses and minuses and decided the result was very much in the plus column. Of course she hadn’t given him an ardent embrace as he departed…not with that snobbish bitch—the bitch had deigned to look at him exactly twice and speak to him not even once and clearly found him A PERSON OF NO CONSEQUENCE—no preppy pink button-down, no creaseless Abercrombie & Fitch khakis—was that it, you bitch?—no fratty swagger, no fratty smirk?—no inchoately flirtatious fratty twist of the lips and significantly too-long eye-lock, as if to say if the circumstances should happen to change, let’s fuck?—was that it, you bitch?—you sorostitute…you Douche in the larval stage, you cum dumpster for Saint Rays and Phi Gams only—discriminating anorexic bitch, aren’t you—you pus-boil lump of conventional thought, conventional taste, and stillborn conventional passions selected like one of those whatthehellsthename handbags from some giddily expensive purveyor—too true, isn’t it!—that’s what we have here, isn’t it!—and ten years from now, as you sit in your summer place in…in…in Martha’s Vineyard with your Saint Ray clone consort watching a 60 Minutes segment with Morley Safer—he’ll be about a hundred, it occurred to him—Morley Safer interviewing Adam Gellin, creator of the New Matrix of the Twenty-first Century—that will be the title of the segment—you’ll turn to the big cloned jut-jawed titanium head—big but very light—sitting beside you and say, “Oh, I’ve known him for a long time—he was my roommate’s boyfriend at Dupont”—not with that snobbish bitch looking on was Charlotte going to demonstrate the depths of her…her…her feelings for him. That would be too much to expect. But!—she had said frankly, openly, “I’ve been living with Adam—and I don’t care for a minute if you know…you snobbish bitch…I’m proud of it! That’s the way things are! Get used to it!” And she had whispered—he could feel that angelic whisper of hers as well as hear it—“Call me? Or I’ll call you? Promise?” Promise, oh yes…promise me, promise me.