Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World

At another rest stop, Dante gets excited to be among nature. They are quiet for a while, until Dante asks Ari what he is thinking about. Ari tells him he is thinking that people are very complicated. The conversation turns to the accident last year, wherein Ari saved Dante from getting run over. Ari does not like it when Dante tells him that he saved his life and asks Dante if that is why he loves him. Dante assures Ari he loved him from the first moment they met.

The boys make a pit stop in Cloudcroft and go into a small art gallery, where there is only one other person. The woman greets them by referring to them as good-looking young men.

Dante finds a blue painting that catches his eye; Ari says he likes the painting, but he does not find it amazing in the way Dante does. The woman in the gallery tells them it is her son’s painting, and that all of the artwork in the gallery is her son’s. She reveals that her son died young. She invites the boys to read the accompanying poem her son wrote for the painting. Dante reads the painting out loud, and the boys discover that Emma’s late son was a gay man. Emma cries hearing her son’s words read aloud. The three of them stand in peaceful silence for a moment. Ari decides that this is a moment he will never forget. He also realizes that he is beginning to see adults as people, which he has never done before. He recognizes them as complicated beings with complex lives, just like him. Ari knows for certain that he is not a boy anymore and is slowly turning into a man.

Once at the campsite, Dante and Ari set up their tent. When they finish, they sit around the campfire sipping on bourbon Dante stole from his parents’ stash. They rotate between talking, drinking, and kissing. Ari has never felt so alive and in love. When the kissing gets serious, Ari feels his whole body trembling. A bolt of lightning forces them apart, so they run into the tent. In the tent, Ari and Dante have sex.

In the morning, Ari wakes up to hear Dante’s steady breathing. Looking at Dante asleep next to him, Ari realizes that he is changed forever. Before Dante, Ari had never noticed his own body before, and now he feels “like a baby that made a noise and suddenly knew he had a voice” (99). Ari feels joyful.

When Dante wakes up, they wash up and brush their teeth and get ready for the day. Afterward, they go for a walk and Dante comments on how he loves that no one else is around. They follow the stream and decide to jump into the pond, even though the water is cold.

Back at camp, they decide to take a nap together. Lying in the tent, Ari comments that he misses Legs. He remembers how alone he felt until she came into his life.

For dinner, they roast hot dogs over the fire. They talk about their college plans, and Ari is surprised to hear Dante say he might go to UT. Ari did not really believe Dante would go to UT, but he did not comment on it. When it starts raining, they retreat to the tent, where they have sex again.

Ari and Dante wake up in a playful mood. After they break up camp, they decide to visit Emma on the way back home.

As they are walking toward the art gallery, Dante tells Ari that it is hard for him to walk beside him keep from holding his hand. Ahead of them, the boys see a couple holding hands; Dante comments how it’s unfair how that couple can show their love in public when he and Ari cannot.

At the gallery, the boys tell Emma about their camping trip. Ari cannot help but notice something about Emma, eventually deciding that it is “her hurt about losing her son” (107). Emma gifts the boys her son’s painting that Dante pointed out the other day, telling them to share it between the two of them for the rest of their lives. When they say goodbye, she tells them to remember “that you matter more to the universe than you will ever know” (107).

On the drive home, Dante writes down more baby names for his mom to choose from. Dante wants a brother, and he wants the child to be straight so that he can give their parents grandchildren. When Dante insists that everyone wants to have kids, Ari argues that he does not want to be a father, or at least that he does not think about it much. Though he does not say it, Ari knows that Dante is judging him and thinking “there’s something wrong with someone who doesn’t wanna have kids” (109). Ari realizes then that Dante could be judgmental, which he has not noticed about him before.

Ari wants to ask Dante what he knows about AIDS and if he has been thinking about it. He wonders if he and Dante are not yet ready to talk about it, even though it is something that will affect their lives.

When they get home, Ari feels a little embarrassed when he greets his mother, knowing that she probably knows that he and Dante had sex.

At the Quintanas, Dante is grilled for stealing his parents’ liquor. When Dante realizes that his parents are only joking with him, he gets annoyed and storms to his room. He is annoyed with Ari for laughing with his parents.

Ari follows Dante upstairs and slips a note under his door that reads “Dante, you gave me the best three days of my life” (113). As he drives home, he thinks of Dante and how it felt to finally be alone with him and finally be intimate with him.

Back at home, Ari finds out from his mom that his sisters are moving to Arizona. Both of their husbands have been transferred for work, and Lilly is feeling sad.

Ari takes a shower and decides to take a nap, tired from his travels. He has a dream about his siblings; they are all sitting in the kitchen eating and being happy together. It is such a good dream that Ari wakes up smiling.

Ari goes down to the kitchen after waking up and writes a journal entry. He tells Dante that he is not sure how to have a conversation about AIDS with him, even though it is important that they do. Ari writes, “The world is not a safe place for us” (117), or gay people in general. He writes that Dante is the center of his world, which scares him because “I don’t want to lose myself in you” (117).

After writing, Ari goes for a run. He runs faster and harder than he ever has before.

Ari is watching the news with his dad when Jaime becomes upset and heated: The news interviews a veteran who is angry and displays anti-gay bias towards the AIDS activists marching in San Francisco. Jaime dismisses the man’s comments and calls the activists citizens whose people are dying in an epidemic that the government is doing little to aid. Jaime gets so upset that he starts crying. He tells Ari that war taught him that life is sacred, and “everyone’s life is sacred” (119). Unsure how to respond, Ari tells his father that he likes it when he actually talks and shares his thoughts and feelings.

Mrs. Alvidrez shows up at the Mendoza house one day. Of all of his mother’s friends, Mrs. Alvidrez is Ari’s least favorite; he finds her to be fake. Mrs. Alvidrez asks to see Lilly, so Ari leads her into the house.

Lilly and Mrs. Alvidrez sit down in the kitchen over coffee. Mrs. Alvidrez wants to have a serious discussion and asks that Ari leave the women to talk alone. Lilly says that Ari is old enough to hear whatever conversation is about to take place. Mrs. Alvidrez is critical of Lilly’s parenting, which Lilly points out by bringing up the last time Mrs. Alvidrez came by; it was when Bernardo was sent to prison, and Mrs. Alvidrez came by to condemn Lilly for the kind of mother she was.

Finally getting to the purpose of her visit, Mrs. Alvidrez reports that Lina’s son has died of AIDS. Mrs. Alvidrez does not want Diego to have his funeral in the Catholic church given that he is gay, and she is going around trying to garner support from fellow church community members. Lilly is so upset by Mrs. Alvidrez’s request that she kicks her out of the house and tells her to never come back again.

Later in the day, Ari takes out his journal, though he is unsure what to write. He decides to write about his mother. He is finally beginning to see his parents as real people with lives of their own. Ari admits that he is not like Dante, who has always understood his parents loved him. Ari believes his mom is a little like Dante in that “[s]he knows who she is and she knows what she thinks” (126). Ari writes that he and Dante are lucky to have such good people as parents.

Dante calls Ari to apologize about how he acted when Ari dropped him off after their camping trip. Ari accepts his apology and offers to come over with Legs.

At Dante’s house, Ari and Dante sit on the front porch. Dante says his mother scolded him earlier in the day about his behavior and stealing the liquor. She wanted him to know that there are consequences for his actions, and that he needs to be held accountable.

When Ari gets home, his mother is preparing to take food to the Ortegas’ house and offer her condolences to Diego’s family. As he watches his mother, Ari nots how easy it is to be around her now. He sees her as intelligent, funny, and interesting.

Though he has homework to do, Ari decides to go with his mother to visit the Ortega’s. In the car, Jaime posits his theory that funerals are more important than weddings, saying that people always remember who shows up to a funeral to offer their respects.

Jaime and Lilly have a playful back and forth, Lilly once mentioning that Jaime cusses like a teenager. Jaime tells her that cussing is the only youthful thing about him, that “Vietnam killed most of the boy I had inside” (130). Lilly gets emotional at her husband talking about the war, which he never does. She admits that he makes her fall in love with him all over again all the time. Ari feels in awe of his parents and their love.