Page 206 - A Little Life: A Novel

He is back in their apartment. Willem is with him. He has brought back
with him a second statue of Saint Jude, which they keep in the kitchen, but
this Saint Jude is bigger and hollow and ceramic, with a slot chiseled into

the back of his head, and they feed their change through it at the end of the
day; when it’s full, they decide, they’ll go buy a really good bottle of wine
and drink it, and then they’ll begin again.
He doesn’t know this now, but in the years to come he will, again and
again, test Harold’s claims of devotion, will throw himself against his
promises to see how steadfast they are. He won’t even be conscious that
he’s doing this. But he will do it anyway, because part of him will never

believe Harold and Julia; as much as he wants to, as much as he thinks he
does, he won’t, and he will always be convinced that they will eventually
tire of him, that they will one day regret their involvement with him. And so
he will challenge them, because when their relationship inevitably ends, he
will be able to look back and know for certain that he caused it, and not
only that, but the specific incident that caused it, and he will never have to

wonder, or worry, about what he did wrong, or what he could have done
better. But that is in the future. For now, his happiness is flawless.
That first Saturday after he returns from Boston, he goes up to Felix’s
house as usual, where Mr. Baker has requested he come a few minutes
early. They talk, briefly, and then he goes downstairs to find Felix, who is
waiting for him in the music room, plinking at the piano keys.
“So, Felix,” he says, in the break they take after piano and Latin but

before German and math, “your father tells me you’re going away to school
next year.”
“Yeah,” says Felix, looking down at his feet. “In September. Dad went
there, too.”
“I heard,” he says. “How do you feel about it?”
Felix shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says, at last. “Dad says you’re going to

catch me up this spring and summer.”
“I will,” he promises. “You’re going to be so ready for that school that
they won’t know what hit them.” Felix’s head is still bent, but he sees the
tops of his cheeks fatten a little and knows he’s smiling, just a bit.
He doesn’t know what makes him say what he does next: Is it empathy,
as he hopes, or is it a boast, an alluding aloud to the improbable and
wondrous turns his life has taken over the past month? “You know, Felix,”

he begins, “I never had friends, either, not for a very long time, not until I