13 and Counting

by Lisa Greenwald

  I don’t even know why this is bugging me right now. It’s a great idea, and I should be happy Ari wants to include the lunch table girls. But sometimes it seems like Ari gets to have everything: parents who are still married, a camp she’s obsessed with, all the boys who love her, a little sister who adores her.

  The one thing I had was that I was closer to the lunch table girls. I bet they’ll love this plan so much, she’ll have them, too.

  It’s not fair for her to have everything.

  38

  ARI

  AT LUNCH, I BRING UP the #BeMe thing to the table.

  “Which one of you suggested it when we had our first brainstorm list-making meeting?” I ask. “So sorry I can’t remember.”

  “Um, me.” Amirah smiles, raising her hand a little. “Your running buddy!”

  Everyone cracks up and then June says, “Hey, did you get the donation I sent in?”

  “And mine?” M.W. asks.

  I look over at Kaylan, who was keeping track of all that.

  “Yup. We got ’em all,” she replies. “We reached our goal of two thousand dollars thanks to all of your generosity and family friends’ generosity. And my neighbor Mrs. Etisof’s generosity. She gave a thousand on her own.” Kaylan pauses. “Wait, was this supposed to be anonymous?”

  We all shrug at each other and I’m glad we can check the donation stuff off the list. “So, anyway, back to #BeMe . . .”

  “Yeah?” Cami asks, looking and sounding annoyed, one cheek raised slightly higher than the other. “What about it?”

  “We want to make it a movement,” Kaylan jumps in, sort of taking over. “It was cool for it to be about us individually, but we want to make it, like, a collective movement all over the school, and then maybe the town and the county and the state and on and on and on. . . .”

  I jump in, “But we need your help. We want to take photos of you guys and hang them all over the school with the hashtag #BeMe, and you can post online, too.”

  They all stare back at me, confused.

  “Um,” June interjects. “That’s sort of awk, no?”

  “Not at all,” I answer her. “It’s all about highlighting our individuality, being our truest and best selves, not conforming to fit in with others.”

  “I feel like I could get into this,” Cami says slowly, like she’s considering it. “I feel like this could be really huge, guys. Like it could get onto a morning news show. . . .”

  “Well, I don’t know about that. But it’s a good idea.” Amirah slow-nods. “Kinda like me running in a hijab. I want that to be my photo, okay?”

  “Sure!” Kaylan yelps. “Brilliant.”

  We continue discussing this for the rest of lunch, and I think we have them all on board.

  It’s kind of amazing how willing they are to get into our ideas. They show a ton of enthusiasm. I think I took that for granted up until now.

  After school, I’m upstairs in my room procrastinating on doing my homework by searching baby name websites for dog names and checking my email a zillion times waiting for Countdown to Camp Silver emails.

  I refresh again and then a new email pops up!

  You’ve won a PoshPalace towel set!

  I click on it and the email reveals that I actually won an online contest! Sure, it’s not the trip to Japan I really wanted, or the Disney cruise, or even the two-night stay at an amusement park in New Jersey.

  A deluxe set of Posh’s most posh bath towels: two bath sheets, two robes, two hand towels, two washcloths, two pairs of slippers, and two super-fast-drying hair towels.

  Click here to claim your prize and pick your color!

  I forward the email to Kaylan and wait for a response.

  Nothing.

  I go back to searching dog names but still nothing feels quite right and we need to decide soon.

  When Kaylan still doesn’t reply almost an hour later, I decide to call her.

  “Did you check your email?” I ask as soon as she answers.

  “No. Why?”

  “We won!” I sing. “An online contest!”

  “Wait! Really? What did we win?”

  “A towel set,” I admit. “But it’s still fancy. And we can share it. And whatever—we won! Who knows, maybe we’ll win more contests?”

  “Yeah,” she replies. “Fab, we are slowly but surely finishing this list!”

  “I think the only things we really have left to do are think of a name for the dog, and thank our teachers,” I tell her. “Or at least figure out how we’re going to thank them so we’re ready for the end of the year. And hula-hoop on the unicycle.”

  “Cool, sounds good.”

  Kaylan’s quiet after that and I know something’s up with her.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  “Not really,” she says quietly, and I wait for her to elaborate.

  She doesn’t, so I ask, “What is it? What’s up?”

  She sighs and then I start to hear crying on the other end of the phone. “It’s just,” she starts, and then stops again. “It’s just that I feel like you have everything, Ari! And I’ve been chill about it for so long but I just don’t feel chill anymore.”

  “Have everything? What do you mean?”

  “You have your camp crew, and your parents are happily married, and you have a little sister who adores you, and all the boys in the world fall in love with you!” she yells. “Jason barely even talks to me anymore! And the one thing I had was the lunch table girls. Like, I was closer to them than you were. But then with the whole #BeMe thing, it’s like you’re using them when you need them! And then you’ll probably end up BFFs with them, too.” She pauses, sobbing. “You can’t have every single thing! And I think I care more about you than you care about me! And friendship is supposed to be even.” She goes on and on, saying these same things again and again.

  I listen to her even though it truthfully sounds like nonsense.

  No one has everything.

  When she finally stops ranting, I say, “Kaylan, first of all, I’m really sorry you’re so sad. And I don’t even know how long you’ve been feeling this way.”

  “Since, like, winter break!” she yelps. “You get to pick and choose what stuff you come to with us, but then the girls are always there when you want to hang. You decide you don’t like Golfy and immediately Jason loves you! You can’t have everything!”

  “Stop, Kaylan.” I roll my eyes, thankful she can’t see me. “First of all, you don’t even like Jason, and you admitted that. And you’re the one who got to go on a trip with Cami!”

  “Yeah, and it kinda sucked,” she says. “And you know that.”

  “Whatever.” I stop talking, trying to think about what to say. “I can’t convince you of this stuff. If you want to be mad, be mad. I really didn’t want to get into a fight with you. We’ve gone so many months without a fight. And we have the race coming up.”

  “We can still do the race. We don’t need to be in a fight. I just had to tell you how I feel.” She pauses. “Be Me. Remember?”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay.”

  We’re quiet on the phone, I guess debating who will be the first person to hang up.

  “Congrats on the contest,” she says.

  “Congrats to you, too. We entered them together, remember?” I huff.

  “Right.”

  “Talk to you later, Kay.”

  She hangs up after that and I’m a little confused if we’re in a fight or not in a fight or if it really even matters. The older I get, the more I realize that friendships are always evolving and changing. We’re always hurting each other and then making it right again.

  But if it’s a true friendship, it’ll be able to weather all of that. Survive it. Maybe even come out stronger.

  I look over the list again, feeling pleased with our progress.

  13 Must-Dos to Keep Crushing It as 13-Year-Olds

  Hula-hoop on a unicycle. (still working on it)

  Start a moveme
nt. (getting closer)

  Figure out how we feel about God. (lots of deep talks)

  Spend more time with Bubbie and Zeyda. (quality time for sure)

  Perfect the art of persuasion, especially with Kaylan’s mom. (crushing this)

  Train for and run a race. (yes!)

  Come up with many varieties of fruit-infused water. (SO GOOD)

  Properly thank our teachers before the end of the year. (soon)

  Find a unicorn. (hmm)

  Win an online contest. (TBD)

  Be Me. (on it)

  Eat one of those super-spicy chips. (DONE!!)

  Convince Ari’s parents that they need a dog and come up with an awesome name for said dog. (soon)

  So we do still have a bunch of things to do. But not totally. Only partially.

  I feel good about our progress, even if this unexpected fight sort of got in the middle of it.

  After my conversation with Kaylan, I feel a medium sense of slumpiness.

  I’m up in my room, lying flat on my bed, staring at the ceiling. There are things I could do, but nothing seems overly appealing.

  Gemma yells from downstairs, “Ari! Jason is here!”

  I close my eyes tight, wishing he’d have texted or called or anything. I’m just not in the mood for unexpected visitors.

  He sits down on my desk chair, throwing my rubber-band ball up in the air and catching it. “I’m bored,” he tells me.

  “Okay.” I shrug. “Well, I still have homework to finish.” It’s a little bit of a white lie since all I have left to do is long-term stuff.

  He nods, and keeps throwing the rubber-band ball.

  I look at him with his mismatched socks and the chewed-up string of his hoodie and I realize I don’t think I like him anymore.

  I don’t know why I change my mind so much about boys.

  Maybe I need a complete boy break for a while until I figure it out.

  39

  KAYLAN

  IT TAKES US A FEW more weeks but we finally master the hula-hoop on a unicycle thing.

  “It’s all about the side-to-side motion!” I yell as Ari pedals around the gym and hula-hoops at the same time. “Keep going! Keep going!”

  When she hops off, she pulls her sweaty hair back into a ponytail.

  “You did it,” Mr. Kohnmi says, clapping. “Unbelievable. Maybe you two want to do this for the fall talent show next year?”

  “Hmm, maybe,” I say. “We’ll think about it, but thanks for all of your help.”

  “Will you keep unicycling?” he asks us.

  Ari’s quiet.

  “Maybe,” I tell him, laughing at myself. It seems I’m not really sure of anything he’s asking me at the moment.

  “Are you girls all right? You’ve hardly said three words to each other.”

  “We’re fine,” Ari says. “Thanks for everything. See you later for gym.”

  “Um, okay. Well, this has been fun. . . .” It seems like he has more to say but we don’t stick around. We leave the gym and head to our lockers, silently. I don’t think we’re really in a fight—we’re just in a kind of quiet period.

  Mrs. Etisof is finishing the mural after school today and she says that I can watch her since it’s the last day and she’s just doing finishing touches.

  I talk to her as she paints.

  “Thanks so much for doing this,” I say. “I love it so much.”

  “I’m glad, Kaylan.” She turns around and brushes some hair away from her face. “I’m pleased with how it turned out.”

  “Me too. I love how you put in some of our doodles, especially that hot dog one.” I smile. “Did I tell you my dad’s getting married?” I’m not sure why I bring this up to her, or why right now, but every time I’m down here I think about Ryan and me cleaning out and the Hess trucks and Dad’s old treadmill in the corner, and I don’t want to be alone with these feelings. I have to share them.

  “No, you didn’t,” she says softly. “That’s news.”

  I nod, wondering what she means by that.

  “How are you doing with it?” she asks, finishing the last details of the unicorn.

  “Not great,” I tell her. “It feels so final. Like a death in a way. A death of our family. I mean, I know a lot of people get divorced and remarried. But, like, it’s still sad for me. Ya know? And Ryan too. And my mom even though she tries to be positive about it, and most things.”

  “You have a great mother,” Mrs. Etisof adds. “And you and Ryan make her so happy.”

  “Yeah,” is all I can think to say.

  “This is hard,” Mrs. Etisof says, her back to me, and I think she may be talking about the mural but then I realize she’s talking about the my-dad situation. “Hard things are hard. That may sound obvious, but we need reminders of it sometimes.”

  “It is hard,” I admit. “Really, really hard. I don’t want him to get married to someone else and live in some other house forever and do trips with this person and come home after work to this person and make French toast on the weekends for someone else. He was supposed to be doing that with us.”

  “That’s true,” she says. “Life doesn’t always go the way of supposed to. And that’s really one of the main hard things. I’m not sure we ever get used to that.”

  She turns around and adjusts her painting apron, setting down the brush for a moment. I reach over and hug her tight.

  “Thank you for getting me, Mrs. Etisof,” I say.

  I start to think that maybe Mrs. Etisof really is my unicorn and even though she was right there all along, it’s still a magical feeling to discover it. But I still have that nagging feeling like maybe it’s too easy, too obvious.

  Maybe the key to finding a unicorn is the challenge of the discovery.

  That night, our lunch table crew emails each other with the pictures and the #BeMe hashtags they’ve all added in.

  Ari responds right away.

  Ari: Awesome photos, guys. We’ll take them to the administration first thing Monday.

  Ari texts me separately: We’re doing this together, you know that, right?

  Ari: Also my bubbie’s in the hospital again. We’re on our way to get our dog now and we still don’t have a name.

  Ari: I’m sorry if you think I have everything. But I don’t. Not at all.

  Ari: Especially if I don’t have you.

  I don’t respond because what I want to say is way too much for a text and I don’t want to have a call if her whole family is around.

  I lie awake all night imagining Ari coming home with the dog, and praying that her bubbie will be okay, and talking to God about hard things being hard, the way Mrs. Etisof said it.

  I pray that one day I’ll be okay about my dad leaving and getting remarried and that one day everything will make sense and that the hard things won’t feel as hard, or that I’ll at least be better at managing them.

  40

  ARI

  I LOOK AROUND OUR CAR as we pull into the driveway of the person who’s been fostering our new dog, realizing that in a matter of minutes we’ll have that dog in here with us and that dog will be ours.

  Our life will never be exactly like it is now, ever again.

  “Ready, guys?” my dad asks.

  “Um, yes!” Gemma yelps. “Even though we still don’t have a name.”

  “Give it time,” Mom says. “Sometimes you need to meet the dog first.”

  She stares at her phone, distracted, and then whispers something to my dad. I bet it’s about Bubbie. I know it is because that’s what they always whisper about these days. I don’t even want to ask because I don’t want anything to spoil this moment.

  We get inside the little house where the foster dog mom lives and it smells terrible—like wet dogs and wet dogs and wet dogs forever. It takes all my effort not to gag.

  “Hi, guys,” she says, all cheerful. “I’m Barbara. Ready to meet your new puppy?”

  “Yes, yes!” I smile.

  She leads us over to the
corner where there are a few dogs sleeping. She shows us which one is ours—an orangey-red-haired small poodle—and Gemma and I play with him on the floor while Mom and Dad get all the instructions.

  He cuddles up to us and licks our cheeks and it’s sort of hard to believe but he looks even cuter than he did in the pictures online.

  My phone buzzes in my pocket and I almost don’t check it because I’m so consumed with this little bundle of love.

  But then it buzzes again.

  Kaylan: Lion! That’s the name for your dog!

  Kaylan: In honor of your bubbie!

  Kaylan: And based on the photos with his reddish hair, he sort of looks like a lion!

  Kaylan: I know we’re sort of in a fight and haven’t been talking a ton but I had to tell you because you’re getting your dog today! And that’s big!

  Kaylan: ok bye

  “Hey, Gem,” I say.

  She looks up.

  “What do you think about Lion as a name for the dog? Because, like, Bubbie loves lions and lions are fierce and loyal and strong and passionate and he has red hair and . . .” My voice trails off and then I add, “Isn’t it the most perfect name in the world?”

  She thinks about it for a minute. I feel like she’s going to say no because she always likes to disagree with me.

  “Hiiii, little Lion,” she sings, right into the dog’s ear. “Hi, little Lion baby.”

  He looks up right then and moves closer to me and licks the top of my cheek.

  “Oh, Lion, I love you.” I smoosh into him. “You’re ours forever.”

  In the car, Gemma and I go on and on about how Lion is the perfect name for the dog.

  I’m not sure if Mom and Dad really agree but they seem okay with it. Lion sits on the seat in between Gemma and me and we pet him the whole ride home.

  “Is Bubbie going to die today?” Gemma asks, all matter-of-fact. I don’t know why she talks like this.

  “Stop, Gem. That’s awful.”

  Hearing those words aloud make my whole body tense up. Like even knowing they’re out there, that they’ve been uttered, is too much. Obviously, dying is a fact of life, but when it comes to Bubbie and Zeyda, I can’t face it. I don’t want to face it.