Page 149 - A Little Life: A Novel

Sometimes there were reasons behind his rages, although they were
reasons known only to him. He felt so ceaselessly dirty, so soiled, as if
inside he was a rotten building, like the condemned church he had been

taken to see in one of his rare trips outside the monastery: the beams
speckled with mold, the rafters splintered and holey with nests of termites,
the triangles of white sky showing immodestly through the ruined rooftop.
He had learned in a history lesson about leeches, and how many years ago
they had been thought to siphon the unhealthy blood out of a person,
sucking the disease foolishly and greedily into their fat wormy bodies, and
he had spent his free hour—after classes but before chores—wading in the

stream on the edge of the monastery’s property, searching for leeches of his
own. And when he couldn’t find any, when he was told there weren’t any in
that creek, he screamed and screamed until his voice deserted him, and even
then he couldn’t stop, even when his throat felt like it was filling itself with
hot blood.
Once he was in his room, and both Father Gabriel and Brother Peter were

there, and he was trying not to shout, because he had learned that the
quieter he was, the sooner it would end, and he thought he saw, passing
outside the doorframe quick as a moth, Brother Luke, and had felt
humiliated, although he didn’t know the word for humiliation then. And so
the next day he had gone in his free time to Brother Luke’s garden and had
snapped off every one of the daffodils’ heads, piling them at the door of
Luke’s gardener’s shed, their fluted crowns pointing toward the sky like

open beaks.
Later, alone again and moving through his chores, he had been regretful,
and sorrow had made his arms heavy, and he had dropped the bucket of
water he was lugging from one end of the room to the other, which made
him toss himself to the ground and scream with frustration and remorse.
At dinner, he was unable to eat. He looked for Luke, wondering when

and how he would be punished, and when he would have to apologize to the
brother. But he wasn’t there. In his anxiety, he dropped the metal pitcher of
milk, the cold white liquid splattering across the floor, and Brother Pavel,
who was next to him, yanked him from the bench and pushed him onto the
ground. “Clean it up,” Brother Pavel barked at him, throwing a dishrag at
him. “But that’ll be all you’ll eat until Friday.” It was Wednesday. “Now go
to your room.” He ran, before the brother changed his mind.