Why couldn't she stop talking? Did all lonely people have that problem? - Richard Yates

From the day of his talkative, overconfident arrival at Irving he had failed and failed at learning how not to behave like a jerk; and everybody knew what kind of life a jerk could expect at prep school.

"Well, she's - sweet," he told her. "She's very sweet, and I guess that's part of the trouble. She's like a little girl - is a little girl.

Yeah, well, sure, 'remarkably intelligent'. Look, baby, the world is crawling with these diamond-in-the-rough types, these salt-of-the-earth characters, and they're all remarkably intelligent. My God, I knew half-literate guys in the Army who could scare the shit out of you with their intelligence.