how the fuck you feel?

“The second question is headed ‘Pessimism’.

He has to circle the number beside one of the following statements:

0 I am not discouraged about my future

1 I feel more discouraged about my future than I used to be

2 I do not expect things to work out for me

3 I feel my future is hopeless and will only get worse

It seems to him that any of these statements could plausibly be true, or more than one of them could be true at the same time.

He puts the end of his pen between his teeth.

Reading the fourth sentence, which for some reason is labelled ‘3’, gives Connell a prickling feeling inside the soft tissue of his nose, like the sentence is calling out to him.

It’s true, he feels his future is hopeless and will only get worse.

The more he thinks about it, the more it resonates.

He doesn’t even have to think about it, because he feels it: its syntax seems to have originated inside him.

He rubs his tongue hard on the roof of his mouth, trying to settle his face into a neutral frown of concentration.

Not wanting to alarm the woman who will receive the questionnaire, he circles statement 2 instead.”

Text: Normal People (Sally Rooney, 2018)