Page 125 - A Little Life: A Novel

really, in its execution, that there are still many people at work trying to
prove it in more elegant terms, even though it’s already been proven. A
beautiful proof is succinct, like a beautiful ruling. It combines just a handful

of different concepts, albeit from across the mathematical universe, and in a
relatively brief series of steps, leads to a grand and new generalized truth in
mathematics: that is, a wholly provable, unshakable absolute in a
constructed world with very few unshakable absolutes.” He stopped to take
a breath, aware, suddenly, that he had been talking and talking, and that the
others were silent, watching him. He could feel himself flushing, could feel
the old hatred fill him like dirtied water once more. “I’m sorry,” he

apologized. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to ramble on.”
“Are you joking?” said Laurence. “Jude, I think that was the first truly
revelatory conversation I’ve had in Harold’s house in probably the last
decade or more: thank you.”
Everyone laughed again, and Harold leaned back in his chair, looking
pleased. “See?” he caught Harold mouthing across the table to Laurence,

and Laurence nodding, and he understood that this was meant about him,
and was flattered despite himself, and shy as well. Had Harold talked about
him to his friend? Had this been a test for him, a test he hadn’t known he
was to take? He was relieved he had passed it, and that he hadn’t
embarrassed Harold, and relieved too that, as uncomfortable as it
sometimes made him, he might have fully earned his place in Harold’s
house, and might be invited back again.

With each day he trusted Harold a little more, and at times he wondered
if he was making the same mistake again. Was it better to trust or better to
be wary? Could you have a real friendship if some part of you was always
expecting betrayal? He felt sometimes as if he was taking advantage of
Harold’s generosity, his jolly faith in him, and sometimes as if his
circumspection was the wise choice after all, for if it should end badly, he’d

have only himself to blame. But it was difficult to not trust Harold: Harold
made it difficult, and, just as important, he was making it difficult for
himself—he wanted to trust Harold, he wanted to give in, he wanted the
creature inside him to tuck itself into a sleep from which it would never
wake.
Late one night in his second year of law school he was at Harold’s, and
when they opened the door, the steps, the street, the trees were hushed with