Accidental Friendship

"Don't you know when you have made a friend?" (Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin, page 37)

This question from Giovanni essentially condenses all we have learned about David up to this point into one statement: David has trust issues. 

Up until this point in his life, David did not let a single person into his mind or his heart- no one except for Joey that is. Since the night he spent with Joey, David closed himself off to the world. Even when he was in the accident that could have very well killed him, he barely showed a glimmer of emotion. 

As he previously had described so eloquently, he was a master of deception. David only said to his father the things which he thought his dad would want to hear, which resulted in being the things he also wished to believe. David fooled himself, wanting to believe that he was not gay and trying to forget that night with Joey which shaped the person he became. Being so adept at the act of deceiving, he even made himself believe that he loved Hella, and she very possibly believed him too.

No one in David’s life really knew the person David really was. And with good reason too, because David never allowed them too- he did not even allow himself to know who he truly was. He did not trust anyone to know. However, without even giving it much thought, David allowed Giovanni to begin to know him. He let him in, without even realizing what he was doing. His only regret was that Jacques had witnessed everything.