Page 357 - A Little Life: A Novel

called him, too: I always tried to eavesdrop, but couldn’t hear much of their
conversations, only that he didn’t say much, which meant Julia must have
been saying a great deal. Malcolm came over several times, and the Henry

Youngs and Elijah and Rhodes visited as well. JB sent over a drawing of an
iris; I had never known him to draw flowers before. He fought me, as Andy
had predicted, on the dressings on his legs and back, which he wouldn’t, no
matter how I pleaded with and shouted at him, let me see. He let Andy, and
I heard Andy say to him, “You’re going to need to come uptown every other
day and let me change these. I mean it.”
“Fine,” he snapped.

Lucien came to see him, but he was asleep in his study. “Don’t wake
him,” he said, and then, peeking in at him, “Jesus.” We talked for a bit, and
he told me about how admired he was at the firm, which is something you
never get tired of hearing about your child, whether he is four and in
preschool and excels with clay, or is forty and in a white-shoe firm and
excels in the protection of corporate criminals. “I’d say you must be proud

of him, but I think I know your politics too well for that.” He grinned. He
liked Jude quite a bit, I could tell, and I found myself feeling slightly
jealous, and then stingy for feeling jealous at all.
“No,” I said. “I am proud of him.” I felt bad then, for my years of
scolding him about Rosen Pritchard, the one place where he felt safe, the
one place he felt truly weightless, the one place where his fears and
insecurities banished themselves.

By the following Monday, the day before I left, he looked better: his
cheeks were the color of mustard, but the swelling had subsided, and you
could see the bones of his face again. It seemed to hurt him a little less to
breathe, a little less to speak, and his voice was less breathy, more like
itself. Andy had let him halve his morning pain dosage, and he was more
alert, though not exactly livelier. We played a game of chess, which he won.

“I’ll be back on Thursday evening,” I told him over dinner. I only had
classes on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays that semester.
“No,” he said, “you don’t have to. Thank you, Harold, but really—I’ll be
fine.”
“I already bought the ticket,” I said. “And anyway, Jude—you don’t
always have to say no, you know. Remember? Acceptance?” He didn’t say
anything else.