Kissing Ezra Holtz (and Other Things I Did for Science)

by Brianna R. Shrum

  “Don’t,” I say.

  He puts up his hands. “I’m not doing anything.”

  The thing I appreciate the most, well, the only thing I appreciate at all from this entire interaction, is that when he continues, he does it without pity. He just says, voice all crisp and sharp and cool, “Then get your stuff and come with me to coffee. We’re working.”

  I bristle at him telling me what I’m going to do. Bossing me around like that.

  Especially feeling like this, like I’m going to come out of my skin in sad rage and this beyond irritating self-consciousness.

  But he just stands there all expectant, and probably objectively correct, twirling his keys around his long fingers. Metal shadows on the veins in his hand.

  And I . . . well. I get my stuff. And I go with him to coffee.

  CHAPTER SIX

  The Control Group (n.): A group designed to be as close to the test group as possible, but not to be experimentally tampered with.

  e.g., Two random kids going for coffee, tolerating one another, who have not been matched up by ANY DEGREE OF COMPATIBILITY AT ALL, and who are absolutely certain to prove that an exercise in both matchmaking and intentional vulnerability is MUCH more likely to result in a love connection. The control group should make this hypothetical experiment provable. Just. SUPER provable.

  Ezra’s drink order is not surprising. He sits down at the little corner back table with an Americano. Nothing but espresso and water and a distinct lack of joy. Americanos are efficient. I get a pumpkin spice latte with two extra pumps of syrup and just flat-out dare him to make fun of me for it.

  I say, “The most boring drink on the menu; that sounds about right.”

  He doesn’t respond in kind, which is good because I’m kind of in the mood to kick his ass. Maybe he can tell.

  I open my mouth to say, “Well, show me what you got,” but Ezra is already speaking.

  “Do you remember—” He furrows his brow. “Sorry, were you saying something?”

  “No,” I say, burning off all my taste buds on this coffee while his sits, lid off, venting steam. “Go for it.” Wow, I will never taste again. I refuse to choke or stop drinking, not while he’s staring at me.

  “Do you remember like, years ago, we were probably thirteen? Something like that. Our parents had seen us talking after shul a few times and my dad got this wild idea in his head—”

  “Oh god, yes.” I groan and Ezra’s mouth twitches up briefly.

  “And they invited your family over for dinner.”

  “Yessssss,” I say. My head is in my hand now, partially because I’m embarrassed and partially because it’s giving me the best excuse not to touch this coffee. I can’t have him realizing I made a mistake and should have waited like he did.

  “I was too young for your brothers to want much to do with me, and Dad and Tate were so freaking set on us hanging out that they kept pushing it, and within, what? An hour? Of us being forced together downstairs, you had smashed my tarantula’s terrarium.”

  I bark out a laugh. “Oh my god, Ezra, I didn’t mean to smash your terrarium.”

  “You hated Rosie.”

  “I didn’t hate Rosie!” I’m laughing so hard now that I’m concerned people are going to get us kicked out for disturbing them. “I threw a pen at your head and you ducked, risking your spider’s life in the process.”

  “A pen. Try again.”

  “Okay,” I say, then I open my bag and pull one out.

  He slowly raises one eyebrow. “It was a remote.”

  I choke. He’s right.

  “Sounds like a you problem,” I say.

  “It was a you problem when Rosie got out and wound up on your head.”

  I’m cackling. He’s still allowing an eighth of a smile onto his face but that’s like doubling over for Ezra. “What a nightmare.”

  “You really are,” he says.

  I wrinkle my nose and throw the pen at his head.

  He catches it smoothly out of the air and says, “You done trying to kill me?”

  “The day is young.”

  Ezra sets down the pen on his side of the table and puts the lid back on his drink. He slowly sips it.

  “Well,” I say, “are we going to get to work?”

  “You’re trying to get me on task. Black is white, up is down.” He pulls his glasses up on his nose and slides his notebook out of his bag. When he’s not looking at me, that means I’m only seeing him in profile, and holy shit.

  His jaw is just a little sharper than I’d thought, strong lines and little veins when he clenches his teeth. He’s got this surprising bump on his nose, so it isn’t perfectly aligned like the rest of him; it looks . . . not like he was born with it, like it was broken. Hair that most parents would have forced him to cut just a couple weeks ago—a little too long in front, not perfectly managed like everything else about him. It always looks like that, I guess.

  What I guess is that I’ve never noticed these things.

  And now, how dare my hormones? How dare I notice, traitorously, how solid his grip looks on that notebook, how shockingly strong and long his fingers look? How the slim muscles in his arms shift when he turns back to face me, all business now, semblance of a smile erased from his face. How dare I notice that when he says, “Well?” there is the tiniest little chip in one of his front teeth.

  Suddenly I can’t swallow, and this? Is because I’m looking at Ezra? Ezra Freaking Holtz?

  He spreads his fingers on the pages laid out in front of him and presses his hands into the table, stupid ridiculous veins rolling under his skin.

  Jesus, what a problem.

  I lean back in my chair to get a little distance. Clearly I’m still riding high on hormones from when I hung out with Asia again last night and I need to call her again or spend a little quality time with myself sometime in the extremely near future because absolutely not, I am not so hard up that I should be looking at Ezra all addled with lust.

  “Compatibility,” I squeak out. It’s not like I have a super high, uber-femme voice, but I’m not proud of this: I squeak.

  Ezra doesn’t notice, or if he does, his face doesn’t make it evident, so I take that for the gift it is.

  “Right,” he says. “So I have a few ideas about what goes into that: background, beliefs, religion, orientation . . .”

  He launches into it, and I follow up with my own theories on what makes two people a match—and the sun travels over the sky and streams through the windows.

  “Are you saying two people have to have the same religious beliefs to be compatible?”

  Ezra groans for the nine billionth time. “No, I’m saying it doesn’t hurt and I’m saying people building from the same ethical framework—”

  “Wow, okay, so if you’re saying that is any kind of guarantee just because people come from the same religion—”

  “I am going to throw this pen at your head.”

  “I will duck and you will hit that barista.”

  He rakes a hand through his hair. It comes away all mussed, like he just rolled out of bed. “Can we agree that similar religious backgrounds, or having personal beliefs that facilitate interreligious dating, AND OR having similar general ethical and moral beliefs might have something to do with compatibility? For the purposes of science?”

  I take a sip from my very cold latte and glance up at the ceiling, pondering. “Yeah, I think that’s broad enough.”

  “And obviously orientation is going to matter a lot here.”

  “Both sexual and romantic.”

  “Yep,” he says.

  I lean over the counter to see what he’s writing, because, true to form, I have been jotting down nothing. If he wants to get carpal tunnel, I will do him the favor of allowing it. “Change that,” I say.

  “Change what?”

  “People don’t need to have the same romantic or sexual orientations, they just need to have compatible ones.”

  “Oh, duh, yeah, you’re righ
t.”

  “WHOA,” I say, too loud on purpose.

  He jumps, actually drops his pen. “What?” he says, alarmed, staring at me.

  “I’m right. Write that down.”

  It takes him a second to come down from the surprise high and then he rolls his eyes, extremely Robert Downey Jr. in Iron Man, and says, “Give me a little credit. I can admit when you’re actually right.”

  “I can count on one hand the numbers of times this has ever happened.”

  He cocks his head at that, mouth ticking up, just a little, enough to tilt into maddening, then looks back down at the page.

  “Ass,” I say.

  I can see the smile even when he isn’t looking at me.

  “This is pretty well figured out, I think. Now we just need to launch into these questions.”

  I open my mouth to respond and a baritone voice behind me hits me with, “Yaabez. Queen of silverware.”

  I spin halfway around in my chair to find Brent strutting up to me, toothpick in his mouth.

  “I did kick your ass at that game.”

  “You wanted to see my ass. Oh, a lime green bra strap.” He waggles his eyebrows. “That the same one from Thursday?”

  “I’ll never tell.” I turn back to Ezra, who looks absolutely scandalized. “Please, it was Strip Spoons, you prude. He’s with Sasha.” I add, for Brent’s benefit, “And he’s not my type.”

  Brent says, hand clasped to his chest, “Right for the heart.” He glances over at Ezra and says, “Edward, right?”

  Ezra purses his lips. “Sure.”

  He turns back to me, like Ezra’s not even there. Which, okay, Ezra’s mood has darkened considerably so I’m not inclined to pay much attention to him either.

  “You coming this weekend?”

  “Whose house again?”

  “Who cares?”

  I shrug. “Good point. Figure it out and text me.”

  “If I do, you gonna come?”

  “You’ll find out.”

  He grins, big and goofy. “Bring that bra.”

  I flip him off and he leaves the coffee shop. Then I turn back to Ezra.

  “So.”

  “Uh huh.”

  I narrow my eyes. “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing.”

  Ezra exhales through his nose. “It’s nothing, Amalia.”

  I just lean back in the chair, arm flung over the back. I prop my feet up on the chair next to me, because I’ve never been able to sit properly in a chair, and wait.

  “You a little booked up?” Ezra says, finally.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “You and your . . .” He waves his hand dismissively. “Social calendar. A little booked to be starting something like this?”

  “Are you gonna rag on me for hanging out with jocks or did you want to work, Ezra?”

  He scowls.

  I hide mine.

  Typical. He can’t stand that I hang out with the party crowd, but everyone’s known I do that since the eighth grade. Let him sit on his boring, quiet high horse. I don’t care.

  Ezra says, “Anyway. Where were we? Questions?”

  I say, “Well, we could pretty much just use the stuff from Aron’s original study, right? That’s what we decided?”

  “I mean, yeah,” he says. “Or we could actually do work?”

  “We’ve been working.”

  “Yeah. And I think we’ve made some excellent progress that I’d rather not phone in the last half of the game.”

  I narrow my eyes. “I’m not suggesting we phone it in.”

  He snorts.

  And just like that, in a flash, this shockingly easy, bantery rapport we have magically created over the last few hours completely disappears.

  It’s astounding how quickly comfort turns to anger, because yeah, I haven’t proven anything to him yet, and yeah, I am coasting on almost no sleep in this study session because Asia and I hung out and fooled around just way too late last night, but that has nothing to do with us. Suggesting we use the original psychological study as framework isn’t unreasonable, it isn’t lazy. Coming from anyone else, he wouldn’t think it was.

  It’s because it’s me.

  Suddenly I remember that this is how he is. This is how he’s always been.

  I remember why his beautiful jaw and incredible veins and strong hands and work-for-it smile don’t matter. Ezra Holtz is a grade-A arrogant asshole.

  I stand.

  He frowns.

  “Guess that does it for today,” I say.

  “Excuse me?”

  “I’m done. I’m heading out. This has been fun. So. Bye.”

  I sling my bag over my shoulder and pick up my cold PSL, toss it in the recycling on the way out, and hold my breath for the impending shock of heat and humidity when I bust out the door.

  I mostly hope he just sits there and doesn’t come after me because, out of nowhere, I’m completely, utterly exhausted, and I don’t really want to deal with him.

  Of course, because it’s what I want him to do, he doesn’t.

  I can hear fancy-shoed footsteps behind me, precise and intentional and measured.

  “Amalia,” he says, catching up to my pace with minimal effort.

  “What?”

  “We weren’t done.”

  “Oh,” I say, looking at him from the corner of my eye, not slowing down. Not stopping, which I know he would prefer me to do. “Well, I was done, so I think that effectively transfers to we. Feel free to not be done on your own, though.”

  “Were we not agreeing to move on to the next half of the project?”

  I say, “I gave you my ideas for it, we disagreed, I’m leaving.”

  “Why?” he says, the first note of real exasperation creeping into his voice, rubbing it just a little hoarse.

  “Because!” I say, and then I give him exactly what he wants. I stop. I whirl around. I throw my hands into the air and pay attention to him. “You can’t go an hour without implying that I’m lazy and stupid and I am sick of it.”

  He reacts like I’ve just pushed him, recoiling. “When did I call you lazy? When did I say you were stupid?”

  “I said implying, dumbass. Use that huge SAT brain.”

  “Alright, kettle, then let’s talk.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Do you prefer being the pot? Because the first thing you did when we sat down to coffee was tell me I was boring.”

  I feel myself flush and purse my lips. “Well.”

  “Let’s not pretend I am not fully aware you think I’m some boring, uptight nerd who isn’t worth your time.”

  “Okay, well, that’s—”

  “Always how you’ve felt about me. That’s fine. I do think you’re lazy. I don’t think you’re stupid; I know you’re smart. But you’re lazy and unmotivated and I don’t trust you to hold my grade in your hands. You think I’m a cocky ass. Does that cover this?”

  I blink.

  “Come back with me to the coffee shop. Let’s hash this out. Afterward, my dads would like to know if you’re interested in coming over for dinner.”

  I breathe.

  I breathe again.

  I breathe just one more time.

  Then I take his face in my hands. His pulse rises and I feel his cheeks heat, and mine spikes just a little being so close to the bones in his jaw. “Ezra,” I say.

  “Yeah?” He’s shockingly breathless.

  “I want you to really listen and take this in. Just, really make the effort to hear me here?”

  “Y-yeah,” he says.

  “Take that pen you stole from me?”

  A little furrow between his eyebrows.

  “Go back home with it.”

  I lean in, close enough to his face to hear him swallow.

  “And go fuck yourself.”

  I leave.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Observation: Catharsis is basically a purge. Like when hippies talk about ridding their
body of toxins in a cleanse or whatever. Or like back a million years ago when they thought if you had cancer, the best choice was to drain the bad blood out of your body because that definitely didn’t kill a crap ton of people. It was Aristotle who coined the term in a psychological, emotional sense. And what THAT dude meant by catharsis, I think, is, in modern colloquial English: A) Cry it out, bitch, and B) The sense of emotional release that occurs when you tell a boy to go fuck himself with a writing utensil.

  I bypass the front door. I’m in such a crappy mood and I don’t even know whose fault it is. I’ve been this way all day, I guess, so there’s only so much I can logically blame on Ezra.

  Well, screw logic.

  I blame it all on Ezra.

  Ezra Holtz with his stupid condescending smirk and stupid probably 5.0 and his stupid future engineering degree and his exceptionally stupid hand veins.

  Lazy. That’s what he called me, just right to my face. Like it was matter-of-fact, like any observer could have picked it out.

  Amalia Yaabez: Brown hair. Five-foot-three. Olive-skinned. Crazy-haired. Lazy.

  I keep my head down, praying my hair won’t lure and trap any wasps, and make my way through the overgrowth that is my backyard. It’s kind of a tiny little forest back here, oaks and sweetgums and mimosa trees. You have to really work to get back to the treehouse.

  Dad and I built it one summer years ago, and my siblings will tell you they helped, but what they did was screw around and wreck a few two-by-fours and about knock Dad out of the tree for two months, and what I did, what I did, was work.

  It’s old. Ben is too old to care about things like tree-houses, and Kaylee isn’t really into the entire outside scene anymore, so we all just let it go sideways. It’s not shiny and even and new like it used to be. One of the handholds up the side of this big old oak rotted off, so it’s just a rusty nail, begging someone to get tetanus. I snagged my thigh on it once and I still have a scar.

  I also still haven’t moved the thing.

  Kind of a lot of work.

  I frown at that thought, LAZY LAZY LAZY flashing in my head, and climb up the old tree, pushing myself up off the nail with my toes.

  I pull myself gracelessly into the treehouse, choking on dust and who knows what the heck else is up here. I should clean it, I guess. Probably.