Page 174 - A Little Life: A Novel

to look at it. “I’m sorry, Willem,” he said at last, “I’m sorry to drag you
down here. I think I’ll leave it here until I figure out what to do.”
“It’s okay,” Willem said, and the two of them wrapped it up again and

replaced it under his desk.
After Willem left, he turned on his phone and this time, he did write JB a
message. “JB,” he began, “Thanks very much for the painting, and for your
apology, both of which mean a lot.” He paused, thinking about what to say
next. “I’ve missed you, and want to hear what’s been going on in your life,”
he continued. “Call me when you have some time to hang out.” It was all
true.

And suddenly, he knew what he should do with the painting. He looked
up the address for JB’s registrar and wrote her a note, thanking her for
sending him Jude with Cigarette and telling her that he wanted to donate it
to MoMA, and could she help facilitate the transaction?
Later, he would look back on this episode as a sort of fulcrum, the hinge
between a relationship that was one thing and then became something else:

his friendship with JB, of course, but also his friendship with Willem. There
had been periods in his twenties when he would look at his friends and feel
such a pure, deep contentment that he would wish the world around them
would simply cease, that none of them would have to move from that
moment, when everything was in equilibrium and his affection for them
was perfect. But, of course, that was never to be: a beat later, and
everything shifted, and the moment quietly vanished.

It would have been too melodramatic, too final, to say that after this JB
was forever diminished for him. But it was true that for the first time, he
was able to comprehend that the people he had grown to trust might
someday betray him anyway, and that as disappointing as it might be, it was
inevitable as well, and that life would keep propelling him steadily forward,
because for everyone who might fail him in some way, there was at least

one person who never would.

It was his opinion (shared by Julia) that Harold had a tendency to make
Thanksgiving more complicated than it needed to be. Every year since he’d
first been invited to Harold and Julia’s for the holiday, Harold promised him
—usually in early November, when he was still full of enthusiasm for the
project—that this year he was going to blow his mind by upending the