THENEWYORKER,NOVEMBER29, 2021 79
The scope of something inexpressible,
a mammoth, ungraspable intimation,
had overtaken him.
J
ack called Valente to apologize. He
had heard nothing from him in a
week. To his surprise, Valente’s mother
answered the phone.
“Jonah’s in the hospital,” she said.
“He’s all right, don’t worry, but he’s not
supposed to see anyone yet.”
“What happened?”
There was a pause. “How do you
know Jonah?” she asked.
Jack told her they were old college
friends, and that he’d recently moved
to the area.
“Maybe Jonah would like to tell you
himself, when he’s feeling better,” his
mother said.
Jack pondered this briefly but soon
turned his attention to other things. A
week later, quite unexpectedly, he re-
ceived a letter from Valente in the mail.
It was written on brown card stock in
a large, handsome hand:
Hey Jack,
First off, don’t feel bad when you hear what
happened or like you owe me an apology or
whatever. We argued, so what? I don’t take it
personally. But don’t add this to your list of
reasons I’m crazy. I’m not that crazy. Just a lit-
tle crazier than you. Or maybe not—ha-ha!
I never told you this but sometimes I get
pretty low. Van Gogh’s last words were “la trist-
esse durera toujours,” which in French means “the
sadness shall last forever.” But he died with a
smile on his face, they say, and sometimes I
think about that and think life isn’t so bad.
You’re right, I talk about van Gogh and Pi-
casso a lot. What can I say? They’re my heroes
and it gives me comfort to keep them close.
It isn’t cool, but I guess I’m not cool. When I
try to be, I feel like I’m suffocating, you know?
I told myself, I’ll just say what’s on my mind
and people can think what they want. Dumb,
huh? I don’t think I’ll ever learn to play the
game you were talking about, but maybe that’s
O.K., too, do you think?
The doctors say my main issue is a lack of
proportion. Well, I can’t argue with that. I get
strange notions and it’s like I can’t resist. After
our argument I was thinking about Rope Man,
and I got it in my head I was going to climb
the water tower and paint it, like Rope Man
and I always talked about. I guess I was pretty
drunk. Everyone says I’m lucky I didn’t hurt
myself worse. Rugby’s out for a while, but the
doctors are coming around to the idea that I’m
not a danger to myself.
One more van Gogh story, if you won’t
chop my head off for telling it—ha-ha! I don’t
have my books here so it’s from memory. In a
letter to Theo, van Gogh says he knows he’s a
nonentity, a bum, basically, in the eyes of the
world. And despite that, he says, he’d like to
show in his work what’s in the heart of such a
nobody. I think that’s pretty cool.
The rugby girls came to see me the other
day, six or seven of them. They’re crazy, those
girls! They brought me brownies they baked.
I wish I’d known they were pot brownies be-
fore I ate so many.... I think the girls felt
bad they couldn’t fight me, ’cause two of them
started wrestling right there in the hospital
until Nurse Ratched kicked them out. (Actu-
ally, her name’s Sally and she’s all right.) But
it cheered me up to see the girls. Hey, don’t
worry about me! In no time at all I’ll be back
out there painting with birthday candles burn-
ing in my hat.
Your bro,
JonahI
t was two years before Jack saw Valente
again. On the day in question, he and
Sophie were across the river, poking
around in antique shops and cafés while
their infant daughter napped in her pa-
poose. In Chandor, a town just north of
Rock Basin, Jack found Valente at a craft
fair, working one of the stalls. All around
him were small garish canvases, show-
ing still-lifes and cottages and bright
flowering bushes.
“Jack Francis!” Valente bellowed when
Jack approached.
“Hi, Jonah.” Sophie was in a differ-
ent part of the fair, looking at jewelry, or
retailored vintage dresses.
“What’s crackin’?” Valente appeared
genuinely pleased to see him. Jack, at
least, read no trace of their last encoun-
ter or the intervening years in his look,
just that restive quality, as if every instant
teetered on an uneasy precipice.
“Nothing,” Jack said. “Driving around.
I’m here with Sophie. And a little human
that popped out of her.”
Valente grinned. “Sophie finally made
her choice.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Jack had forgotten his
old joke. “These yours?” he said and
pointed to the paintings.
“These?” Valente’s face went blank
and a sudden humorless fire appeared
on it. The shift was so precipitate that
Jack wondered for a second whether he
had, in fact, said something different and
unforgivable.
“What?” Jack said.
Valente threw his head back and
laughed. “Man, you must really think I
suck at painting. This shit?” He cast a
hand about. “I’m just doing my friend
Raj a favor. I wouldn’t be caught dead
painting this bullshit.”“I see,” Jack said, not entirely sure that
he did. “How’s your stuff going?”
Valente shrugged. “I’m not in the Lou-
vre yet.”
“No.” Jack picked up and put down
a canvas that seemed to show a strangely
colored child or doll, or possibly a clown.
Valente was asking him a question. It
took Jack a moment to realize that he
was asking about the hollow. What had
happened with it. “Hollow?” Jack repeated.
The word triggered something in him, a
sense of déjà vu, but he couldn’t quite
catch the recollection. He hadn’t thought
about the hollow in months, years. It
seemed much longer ago than it could
have been that Valente had brought it to
his attention, a memory far more deeply
buried in the past than the facts allowed.
He stared at Valente impassively, although
some slight mirth may have danced in
his eyes. “What hollow?”
Valente narrowed his eyes, trying to
assess what was taking place. He held
Jack’s gaze, then he smiled. A snort
erupted from him, a laugh, and then Jack
was laughing, too. They laughed with a
gathering force, truly cracking up. Jack
didn’t know the last time he’d laughed so
hard, or why, really, they were laughing,
but they were roaring, fighting for breath.
“What’s so funny?” Sophie was tap-
ping Jack on the shoulder. “What are
you laughing at?”
Jack turned, grinning, and was about
to shrug, when Valente cut in and in his
loud, abrupt voice answered, “Sadness.”
Their laughter petered out. Jack stud-
ied the thinning, wrinkled skin around
Valente’s eyes, waiting for something to
happen. Valente was smiling broadly, en-
tirely in earnest. It was the earnestness
of a large, clumsy person, crashing through
a world of glass doors and gossamer
screens. Jack realized that he was wait-
ing for Sophie to suggest that she had
misheard, but she said nothing. Only
pursed her lips. He breathed quietly. The
day was crystalline, blue, touched by
clouds. Cool. A light breeze. The mar-
ket hummed. A burble of chatter. Dogs’
barks. The smell of cut flowers, of burn-
ing. Colors. Crushed leaves. Exhaust. A
chime, tinkling. A yellow shawl. Time
pooling. Opening. A moment, before
anyone spoke. NEWYORKER.COM
Greg Jackson on bohemians and the bourgeoisie.