Experiments in Convalescence
- Amory goes to a bar two days after Rosalind has broken his heart. He runs into an old acquaintance from Princeton and has a drink. In fact, he has several, while the other guy only has two. Eventually, he starts ranting and embarrasses his friend.
- The next morning, Amory wakes up with a monster hangover, which he gets rid of by drinking more booze.
- The bender continues for quite a while, as Amory always seems to be running into old friends and finding another excuse to drink. He starts making comments about committing suicide, but people assume he just has a dark sense of humor.
- A couple of days later, he marches into his boss' office and quits his job. Then he goes on a rant about how terrible it is to live in a world where artists need to work in crummy advertising offices just to get by.
- A couple days later, Amory walks into his apartment with a black eye. He also finds out from his buddy Tom that their roommate, Alec, has moved back home, meaning it'll be tough for them to go on affording their apartment. Amory responds to the crisis by hitting the town and getting drunk again.
- But then something crazy happens to Amory. The United States government enacts Prohibition, which makes the sale of alcohol illegal. Now it's going to be tough for Amory to stay an alcoholic.
- With less of a supply of alcohol, Amory sinks into an unmotivated, normal life. He feels like there's no direction to what he's doing, and he's right.
- One day, Amory puts his finger on his problem: the world is too big and too complicated for one person to make a difference, and this is what's keeping him from trying at anything. Tom suggests a few options, like writing fiction.
- But Amory says it all seems too useless to him.
- One day, Amory receives a letter from his old mentor, Monsignor Darcy. The man is worried that Amory is setting himself up for disappointment by getting involved with Rosalind, and he predicts that the relationship will end badly.
- Amory realizes that Darcy and he haven't communicated in months, so Darcy doesn't realize that Amory's relationship with Rosalind has already ended in heartbreak. The letter stings all the more because it predicts what would eventually happen, like it was fate or something.
- Eventually, Amory and Tom can't afford their apartment anymore. So Amory takes off to live for a few months in the home of an old uncle he's barely ever seen. And as the book tells us, this is where he meets a girl named Eleanor.