Page 170 - A Little Life: A Novel

But then he had moved to the third and final wall and had seen them: two
paintings, both of him, neither of which JB had ever shown him. In the first,
he was very young and holding a cigarette, and in the second, which he

thought was from around two years ago, he was sitting bent over on the
edge of his bed, leaning his forehead against the wall, his legs and arms
crossed and his eyes closed—it was the position he always assumed when
he was coming out of an episode and was gathering his physical resources
before attempting to stand up again. He hadn’t remembered JB taking this
picture, and indeed, given its perspective—the camera peeking around the
edge of the doorframe—he knew that he wasn’t meant to remember,

because he wasn’t meant to be aware of the picture’s existence at all. For a
moment, the noise of the space blotted out around him, and he could only
look and look at the paintings: even in his distress, he had the presence of
mind to understand that he was responding less to the images themselves
than to the memories and sensations they provoked, and that his sense of
violation that other people should be seeing these documentations of two

miserable moments of his life was a personal reaction, specific only to
himself. To anyone else, they would be two contextless paintings,
meaningless unless he chose to announce their meaning. But oh, they were
difficult for him to see, and he wished, suddenly and sharply, that he was
alone.
He made it through the post-opening dinner, which was endless and at
which he missed Willem intensely—but Willem had a show that night and

hadn’t been able to come. At least he hadn’t had to speak to JB at all, who
was busy holding court, and to the people who approached him—including
JB’s gallerist—to tell him that the final two pictures, the ones of him, were
the best in the show (as if he were somehow responsible for this), he was
able to smile and agree with them that JB was an extraordinary talent.
But later, at home, after regaining control of himself, he was at last free

to articulate to Willem his sense of betrayal. And Willem had taken his side
so unhesitatingly, had been so angry on his behalf, that he had been
momentarily soothed—and had realized that JB’s duplicity had come as a
surprise to Willem as well.
This had begun the second fight, which had started with a confrontation
with JB at a café near JB’s apartment, during which JB had proven
maddeningly incapable of apologizing: instead, he talked and talked, about

how wonderful the pictures were, and how someday, once he had gotten