Page 608 - A Little Life: A Novel

apologies, and he had shaken his head and grinned back at him, but then
had tugged on his left ear—their old signal—and although he hadn’t
expected it, when he had looked over again, it was to see Jude marching

toward him.
“Sorry, Isaac,” he’d said, firmly, “I’ve got to borrow Willem for a while,”
and off he had pulled him. “I’m really sorry, Willem,” he whispered as they
moved away, “the social ineptitude on display is particularly bad today; are
you feeling like a panda at the zoo? On the other hand, I did tell you it was
going to be awful. We can go in ten minutes, I promise.”
“No, it’s okay,” he said. “I’m enjoying myself.” He always found it

revealing to witness Jude in this other life of his, around the people who
owned him for more hours a day than Willem himself did. Earlier, he had
watched as Jude walked toward a group of young associates who were
braying loudly over something on one of their phones. But when they saw
Jude approaching them, they had nudged one another and grown silent and
polite, greeting him with a heartiness so robust and obvious that Willem had

cringed, and only once Jude had passed them did they huddle over the
phone again, but more quietly this time.
By the time Jude was taken away from him a third time, he was feeling
confident enough to begin introducing himself to the small pack of people
who orbited him in a loose ring, smiling in his direction. He met a tall Asian
woman named Clarissa whom he remembered Jude speaking about
approvingly. “I’ve heard a lot of great things about you,” he said, and

Clarissa’s face changed into a radiant, relieved smile. “Jude’s talked about
me?” she asked. He met an associate whose name he couldn’t remember
who told him that Black Mercury 3081 had been the first R-rated movie he
had ever seen, which made him feel tremendously old. He met another
associate in Jude’s department who said that he’d taken two classes with
Harold in law school and wondered what Harold was like, really. He met

Jude’s secretaries’ children, and Sanjay’s son, and dozens of other people, a
few of whom he had heard about by name but most of whom he hadn’t.
It was a hot, breezeless, brilliant day, and although he had drunk steadily
all afternoon—limonata, water, prosecco, iced tea—it had been such a busy
gathering that by the time they left, two hours later, neither of them had
actually had the opportunity to eat anything, and they stopped at a farm
stand to buy corn so they could grill it with zucchini and tomatoes from

their garden up at the house.