Just another thought. In the novel, Grace and his friend Merissa go out for dinner once a week in their favorite restaurant to have steak. With Grace's meager teacher's salary, how could he afford to even eat out and have steak once a week?
I have a theory on that. Merissa seems to be working in a government science agency. That means great pay. She was Grace's college roommate's ex-girlfriend. But even after Merissa and her boyfriend broke up, she and Grace were still friends and are still connected. And I got the feeling the reason why they broke up was because Merissa had a thing for Grace. And the reason why they are still in touch is because Merissa always asks Grace to dinner. And of course she had better salary so she insisted on paying the tab. Poor Grace doesn't have a clue that Merissa is into him, thinking that they're just meeting up to get in touch with new science stuff.
