Nash is lonely in Boston, missing Alicia and John Charles. He sees a psychiatrist and is put on medication. He takes this reluctantly, fearing that it will “prevent him from thinking clearly enough to resume mathematical work” (315).

He sees Eleanor and their child, John David, regularly and enjoys having Eleanor cook for him again. There is “a gulf” (315) between Nash and his son, one that he does not help by failing to hide his “dismay over his son’s faulty grammar and indifferent performance at school” (315). None of them are especially happy with their lives and Nash begins to lose interest, still hoping to get back together with Alicia.

Nash begins working on new papers, which remarkably actually “[break] new ground” (318). His “renewed productivity produce[s] a rush of self-confidence” (318). However, in spring, his mental health declines and he becomes incredibly manic and incoherent, unable to stop talking and yet not “able to interact any more” (319).

Deteriorating rapidly, Nash becomes paranoid and delusional again, seeing messages in The New York Times, worrying about international political conspiracies, and deciding that “there [are] magic numbers, dangerous numbers’ (320).