Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe (Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe #1)

by Benjamin Alire Sáenz

It was strange to feel like the Ari I used to be. Except that wasn’t totally true. The Ari I used to be didn’t exist anymore. And the Ari I was becoming? He didn’t exist yet.

I don’t want to upset him, but I do. I always upset him. And other people too. I guess that’s what I do. And I upset you too. I know that. And I’m sorry. I’m doing the best I can, okay? So if I don’t write as many letters as you do, don’t be upset. I’m not doing it to upset you, okay? This is my problem.

There were a lot of guys in the world that would have killed to have what I had. So why wasn’t I more grateful?

It was strange to have a good time.

good girls who wanted to pretend they were bad girls but who never would be bad girls because they were too decent.

They were all over me, hugging me and saying nice things, and I wanted to cry. Because their affection was so real and somehow, I felt I didn’t deserve it

And even though I felt it was a beautiful thing, I also felt it was a weight. Not that she meant it to be a weight.

But love was always something heavy for me. Something I had to carry.

and me, the proud owner. I had something of value—even if it was just a truck that brought out a sweet nostalgia in people.

“If it matters, then it matters.”

You know what I’ve learned from you and Mom? I’ve learned not to talk. I’ve learned how to keep everything I feel buried deep inside of me. And I hate you for it.

One of the secrets of the universe was that our instincts were sometimes stronger than our minds.

“It’s just that sometimes I have things running around inside me, these feelings. I don’t always know what to do with them. That probably doesn’t make any sense.”

“It sounds normal, Ari.”

“I don’t think I’m so...

“Feeling things is...

“We don’t always make the right decisions, Ari. We do the best we can.”

Did all boys feel alone? The summer sun was not meant for boys like me. Boys like me belonged to the rain.

Maybe kissing was part of the human condition. Maybe I wasn’t human. Maybe I wasn’t part of the natural order of things.

Some guys talked about sex all the time. I heard them at school. Why were they so happy when they talked about sex? It made me feel miserable. Inadequate.

I wondered if all boys had that darkness inside them. Yes. Maybe even Dante.

Everyone was always becoming someone else. Sometimes, when you were older, you became someone younger.

And me, I felt old. How can a guy who’s about to turn seventeen feel old?

Sometimes, you do things and you do them not because you’re thinking but because you’re feeling. Because you’re feeling too much. And you can’t always control the things you do when you’re feeling too much.

I was a boy. A boy who went crazy. Crazy, crazy.

I knew I’d gone crazy but I couldn’t explain it to myself. Maybe that’s what happens when you go crazy. You just can’t explain it. Not to yourself. Not to anyone. And the worst part about going crazy is that when you’re not crazy anymore, you just don’t know what to think of yourself.

“You can’t even tell what he looks like. You should see his face. They cracked some of his ribs. They left him lying in an alley. Like he was nothing. Like he was a piece of trash. Like he was shit. Like he was nothing. And if he would have died, they wouldn’t have cared.”

“You want me to talk? I’ll talk. You want me to tell you? I’ll tell you. He was kissing another boy.”

“Ari, Ari, Ari. You’re fighting this war in the worst possible way.”

“I don’t know how to fight it, Dad.”

“You should ask for help,...

“I don’t know how to do tha...

“I’m not an angel, Mom. And I’m not a saint. I’m just Ari. I’m just screwed-up Ari.”

We don’t always say the right things. Sometimes, it seems like it just hurts too much to look at something. So you don’t. You just don’t look. But it doesn’t go away, Ari.”

“I think I understand.”

But the way she said it. It was like she understood something about me that she’d never quite understood before. I always felt that when she looked at me, she was trying to find me, trying to find out who I was. But it seemed at that moment that she saw me, that she knew me.

My mother would listen sometimes as my father and I talked about Bernardo. But she would never say a word.

I loved her for her silence. Or maybe I just understood it.

And loved my father too, for the careful way he spoke. I came to understand that my father was a careful man. To be careful with people and wi...

I knew that a part of him would never be the same. They cracked more than his ribs.

Sometimes I think I’ll never understand myself.

Scars. A sign that you had been hurt. A sign that you had healed.

Had I been hurt? Had I healed? Maybe we just lived between hurting and healing.

“I think you love him more than you can bear.” “Dad? Dad, no. No. I can’t. I can’t. Why are you saying these things?” “Because I can’t stand watching all that loneliness that lives inside you.

All of the answers had always been so close and yet I had always fought them without even knowing it.

We all fight our own private wars.

“I love the rain more than anything.”

“I know. I want to be the rain.”

“You are the rain...

And I wanted to say You’re the rain and you’re the desert and you’re the eraser that’s making the...