All Three Stooges

by Erica S. Perl

  “Maybe?” I said. “I don’t really know. I thought you might know.”

  “Why would I know?”

  “I don’t know,” I said again. “Just forget about it.”

  “How am I supposed to forget about it?” asked Noa.

  “Look, maybe it’s nothing,” I said. “His mom told my moms something bad happened but they didn’t get all the details.”

  “What does that mean?” asked Noa. “It’s not, like, serious, is it?”

  I didn’t answer. I felt like I had said too much already.

  “Noah!” She was clearly getting impatient with me. “What did his mom say? What were her words, exactly?”

  “I have to go,” I said. And then I hung up fast and put the phone in the back of my closet, behind the pile of sweaters Jenny washed in hot by mistake but can’t be given away because Grandma Beth knit them.

  That way, even Enid wouldn’t hear if Noa called back again.

  “Go back up and change your pants,” said Karen. She was standing near the door, wearing a black skirt and holding her keys. She sounded tired, even though I was the one who hadn’t been sleeping. I’d gone into my moms’ room several times the night before, and the night before that.

  “What’s wrong with my pants?” I asked.

  “They’re sweatpants.”

  “They’re black,” I pointed out.

  “Change.”

  When I returned wearing my so-called temple pants, she looked at my exposed ankles and made a face.

  “Wow. I guess maybe you have grown a bit.”

  “Really? You think?”

  “Yup,” she said. “Those are some serious high-waters. Tempted to make an ark joke.”

  “Thanks for resisting,” I replied. Ask anyone named Noah and they’ll tell you we get plenty of ark jokes.

  We went out front and joined Jenny and Enid, who were waiting in Frau Blue Car. “I think we need to run an errand on the way. What time does Mr. Maxx open?” Karen asked them.

  Enid pulled up the answer on her phone. “Ten.”

  Which is how I ended up with new temple pants. And why we ended up arriving at the funeral late and sliding in the back.

  Yeah, funeral. Dash’s dad’s funeral.

  It wasn’t a joke.

  Or a mistake.

  Gil was gone.

  I had never really imagined what my first funeral would be, but never in a million years would I have thought it’d be Dash’s dad’s. I mean, he was a dad, so he was old, but he wasn’t old-old. I mean, Grandma Beth is much older. Dash’s grandma is much older, too, obviously, which only dawned on me when I saw her at the funeral. This might sound dumb, but I had never thought about the fact that in addition to being Dash and Pete’s dad, Gil was also someone’s son.

  I didn’t really know what to expect. In movies, funerals sometimes have a dead guy lying there like he’s asleep. Jenny and Karen reassured me ahead of time that this wouldn’t be the case. They said there’d be a big, closed wooden box at the front of the sanctuary with flowers on top of it, and they were right. Rabbi Fred and Rabbi Jake and Phyllis were all there, and for the most part they ignored the box. I couldn’t understand how they could just go about their business when all I could think the whole time was, Gil is in that box, Gil is in that box, Gil is in that box.

  Rabbi Fred was in charge of the service. He likes to talk, and I’ll admit that sometimes I tune him out when he’s up there preaching on the bimah. But this time I paid close attention. The bizarre thing was, not only did Rabbi Fred ignore Gil’s coffin, he barely talked about Gil at all. At least not the Gil I knew. He mentioned how Gil graduated at the top of his class in college and went on to be a journalist before going back to school for his law degree and becoming a successful trial lawyer on the partnership track at a big downtown law firm. He spoke of Gil’s ambition and the pressure he put on himself to achieve, and he mentioned how many people admired him, which I’m sure was true. But he didn’t talk about how funny Dash’s dad was, or that he had done stand-up in college, or that he ran every morning, or that he loved seltzer and hot sauce and used his beloved G-Force grill for practically all of his cooking. If I hadn’t seen Dash’s mom and Dash’s grandma and the back of Dash’s head in between them, and a lot of the kids from Hebrew school, and even some of our elementary school teachers—including Mrs. Moseley, of all people—I might have thought I was at the wrong funeral.

  I wished I was at the wrong funeral.

  I wished I wasn’t at any funeral at all.

  I wished I could go back to when I last saw Gil. I wished I had gotten a ride home from him that Tuesday, even though Jenny would have been irritated when she came to pick me up and discovered I’d already left. It’s so weird, seeing someone for the last time and not even knowing that you are. It made me think of the time I was racing my favorite Matchbox car and it rolled down the storm drain on our corner. My moms got me a new one, but it wasn’t the same. I didn’t want a new Trans Am. I wanted a do-over. I even think I asked God for a do-over and promised that I’d never ask for anything else in my whole entire life. It’s hard to believe that I thought a dumb little toy car was worth giving up a lifetime of wishes.

  Not that anyone ever really gets a do-over, I guess.

  “Please rise for the mourners’ kaddish,” instructed Rabbi Fred. We all did, and Karen and I recited the Hebrew words to the prayer for the dead. I could hear Enid and Jenny tripping over the transliterated English version at the back of our prayer books.

  “Yitgadal v’yitkadash shmay raba…,” we all droned together as one. Usually, since the kaddish is close to the end of a service, it’s like a signal that there’s only about ten minutes to go. The way our temple does kaddish is that before we do the prayer part, the rabbis read the names of anyone who has died recently or at this time of year in previous years. Anyone who is related or was close to them stands up. Then the rabbis say that if anyone’s name should have been on that list but for some reason wasn’t called, their mourners should say the name and stand up, too. The rabbis also read a list of people who died due to violence in our city that week. And finally everybody who is able to stand is invited to join them, and when everyone is standing, we all say kaddish together. The rabbis explain that we do this because even if you’re not mourning someone, you can offer your voice for those who have no one to say kaddish for them.

  Gil’s funeral was the first time I had ever stood up and done something other than saying the words and stretching my legs. It was the first time I stood in a room full of mourners as a mourner.

  When we sat down after the kaddish, I felt inexplicably exhausted. It was like I had gone through some sort of time warp during the prayer and come out much, much older. Was this what old people went through all the time? Was saying “See you later” less of a reflex and more of a wish? No wonder some old people seem so grouchy. Grandma Beth isn’t like that, though. It’s true that when we talk on the phone, she always seems in a hurry to get off, but Karen says it’s because in her day they charged for phone calls by the minute. Still, no matter how short the phone call is, she always says the same thing: “So far, so good!” Her other favorite saying is “Can’t complain. Consider the alternative!”

  Today was the first time I realized what she means by “consider the alternative”: I could be dead. No wonder she feels like she can’t complain.

  From there, my mind started to wander, almost as if it were doing its own kind of SND riff inside my head. “Consider the alternative” made me think of “pining for the fjords,” which comes from that Monty Python sketch about a Norwegian blue parrot that’s completely and obviously dead in its cage. In the sketch, Michael Palin keeps telling John Cleese that the parrot he sold him—they’re clearly using a fake bird in the sketch—is not dead but just resting. “He’s pining for the fjords!” he insists.

  When Gil first showed us that sketch, he explained that “pining” means missing something you no longer have, and a fjord is so
rt of like a canal or a river. I pictured Gil standing on a bridge with a bright blue macaw on his shoulder like a pirate. The parrot, unlike the one in the Monty Python sketch, was a real one, very much alive. And so was Gil. He was smiling, albeit a little wistfully, almost as if he were pining for something. Like maybe to still be alive.

  “Earth to Noah.” A punch on the arm from Enid brought me back to the temple, which was close to empty at this point. “You planning on spending the day here?”

  “What? No.” I looked around, but everyone else seemed to have left the sanctuary. “Where’s Dash?”

  “Guessing he went to the cemetery,” said Enid.

  “Are we going, too?”

  Enid shook her head. “Didn’t you hear the rabbi? Immediate family only. They’re having people back at Dash’s mom’s house later for shiva.”

  “But I’m Dash’s best friend,” I protested, even though I was actually sort of relieved. At Hebrew school, we had studied Jewish funeral practices, which include having everyone scoop a shovel of dirt onto the coffin. That hadn’t struck me as problematic at the time. But then again, until Gil’s funeral, I had never seen a real coffin, much less the coffin of someone I actually knew. Over the years, Dash and I had buried his dad in the sand at Bethany Beach lots of times. He was always a good sport about that, so maybe he wouldn’t mind? But it still felt weird and disrespectful somehow.

  Also, I’ve never really told anyone this, but I still hold my breath when I ride by cemeteries. That’s because when I was little, Enid convinced me it was not polite to breathe while other people can’t. I’m old enough to know it doesn’t work that way, but for some reason I can’t stop myself.

  So when Enid said, “Sorry, Noah,” I didn’t argue about not going to the cemetery. Instead, we went home and made brownies while Karen made her famous triple-secret veggie lasagna from scratch (she adds tofu for extra protein and minced garlic for extra flavor…shhhh!). According to Karen, that’s what we Jews do in times of trouble: we eat. I’m not so sure she’s right, since Enid and Jenny are the same way and they’re not Jewish, but I wasn’t in the mood to argue with her. It was a sad day, sadder than even a brownie-batter-covered bowl and mixing spoon plus a cat in your lap could fix.

  When three o’clock rolled around, the food was done cooking and my moms finally said we could go over to Dash’s mom’s place. Enid stayed home, but she gave me an envelope to deliver. It was black and had a white dove painted on the outside. We let ourselves in when we got there, as directed by a little sign taped to the door, and I put Enid’s card on top of a pile of other cards near the door. There were a lot of people there, some of whom I recognized from the service. My moms and I went over and hugged Stacey. Dash wasn’t in the kitchen or living room, so I headed to his room.

  “Hey,” I said to Dash when I found him there. I was surprised to see that someone was with him already, and that it was Noa. She still had her coat on, so she must have just arrived, too. It was strange to see her at Dash’s house. I almost forgot that we were both there for the same reason—because of what had happened to Gil.

  “Hey,” said Dash. He hadn’t been at Hebrew school on Tuesday, or the Tuesday before, so I hadn’t seen him in more than two weeks. The three of us stood there awkwardly.

  “Cool tie,” I finally said. “Wait, you’ve got something on it.”

  “Huh?” said Dash distractedly. He looked down, which was weird because usually he blocks me, then we Stooge it up with some fake eye gouges and stuff. But this time he didn’t, so I had no choice but to finish the gag by knocking him in the nose with the finger I was using to point to the “stain.” I winced a little, wishing I hadn’t gone down this particular road, especially when Dash pulled back in surprise, then said, “Oh. Yeah, it was my dad’s.” He took the tie off and tossed it on a chair.

  Noa gave Dash what seemed like a look of apology for my being an idiot. “I’m sorry about your dad,” she said. As soon as Noa said it, I realized I had screwed up. Not just by pulling the dumb stain gag, but also by not offering my own “sorry” right away. I tried to fix things by piggybacking off hers.

  “Yeah, I’m sorry, too,” I said.

  “Thanks,” said Dash.

  “It totally sucks,” I added.

  “Uh-huh,” said Dash.

  I stood there, not sure what to say next. I realized that since Dash and I hadn’t really talked yet, he might not know that I didn’t know how his dad died.

  “So what happened?” I asked.

  “Noah!” yelled Noa.

  “What?” I said to her. “You were wondering, too.” I turned back to Dash. “Was he in, like, a car accident?”

  “Something like that,” mumbled Dash.

  That was a weird answer. I wanted to say, Wait, was he or wasn’t he? But before I could open my mouth, Noa said to Dash, “People are going to ask you all sorts of stupid things. You don’t have to answer them. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, actually.” Then she glared at me.

  “Thanks,” said Dash. He sounded relieved.

  I felt my insides go flop. I had no idea there were so many rules about what you should or shouldn’t do or say in situations like this. I really wanted to say the right thing—something to make Dash feel better, not worse.

  “Karen made lasagna,” was what I came up with. Dash loves my mom’s famous veggie lasagna.

  “Oh,” he said. “I haven’t really been hungry.”

  “That’s normal,” said Noa, nodding sagely. “Still, you should try to eat something.”

  “I guess,” said Dash.

  “Maybe I could bring you some food?” I offered.

  “I don’t know. Sure.” Dash seemed surprised by this idea, then pleased by it. “That’d be great.”

  “You got it,” I said, jetting off to the dining room. I grabbed a plate and dug into my mom’s lasagna, carving out a thick, meaty-yet-meatless rectangle (the third secret ingredient is portobello mushrooms), then another. I added four brownies to the plate. And three…okay, four rugelach. There, that ought to do it. I grabbed two forks, plus a cup of Dr Pepper for him and one for me, which I carried by biting the rim of the plastic cup. Jenny, who was standing in the arched doorway to the kitchen, glanced at me, took in my haul, and gave me one of those Seriously? looks. “For Dash,” I informed her importantly through clenched teeth.

  Dash’s door was closed when I came back, and I had no free hand, so I kicked it to signal my return.

  Noa opened the door.

  “Thanks, Noah,” she said. “That was really sweet of you.”

  She took the plate and the cup in my hand from me, continuing to stand in the doorway. Behind her, I could see Dash sitting on his bed with his laptop open. I shifted the cup in my mouth to my now-free hand and turned to slide by Noa, but she held up her palm and stopped me.

  “Hey,” she said quietly, in a just-between-us-friends voice. “Dash kind of wants to be by himself right now. Is that okay?”

  “Uh, sure,” I said. “I guess.”

  “Thanks,” said Noa. “You’re the best.”

  And then she closed the door. With her on the other side of it, in the room with Dash.

  I knocked on the door. Noa opened it again.

  “I thought you said Dash wanted to be by himself.”

  “Oh, yeah, he does,” said Noa. “He just wanted to show me something first.”

  “Show you what?” I asked, wondering what Dash could possibly want to show her and not me.

  “Noah, listen. Do you care about Dash?”

  “Of course!”

  “Great. The way to show him that is by respecting what he needs right now.”

  I opened my mouth, but before I could say anything, she shut the door in my face again.

  I stood there, speechless. Of course I wanted to respect what he needed, absolutely. But why did he need for me not to be there? Was he mad at me for the stupid tie gag or something else I had done? I hoped that the plate of lasagna
and desserts would show him that even my dumbest moves came from a good place.

  Reluctantly, I shuffled back to the dining room, which is connected to the living room. I really wanted to get myself a plate of lasagna and desserts, but I also felt like throwing up. Dash’s little brother and his friends were lying on the living room rug, watching some cartoon with gargoyles that transformed into robots, or vice versa. I sat down on the couch behind them and stared at the screen. The show was mindless in a good way, but since it was a show for six-year-olds, I started playing on my phone so no one could tell I was actually paying any attention to it. Pete seemed exactly the same as he had the last time I was over. Only a few days before, his dad was alive, and now his dad was gone and here he was, totally unaffected.

  It must be nice being six. When I was six, I hadn’t had anything truly bad happen to me, unless you counted dumb stuff like losing a toy car or getting my cubby stolen by Noa. I hadn’t even met Dash yet. I couldn’t remember who my best friend was before I met Dash.

  The more I thought about it, the less I actually remembered about being six. Did this mean Pete wouldn’t have any memories of this day? What if when he grew up, he didn’t remember Gil at all? I looked at Pete, who was now sitting on top of one of his friends. I heard a fart noise, then Pete fell off his friend, laughing, and all the other six-year-olds tried to duplicate the effect by smashing their mouths on their forearms and blowing or sticking their hands in their armpits and pumping their arms.

  “Gross,” I said loudly, to make sure no one thought I was in on any of that. I got up and went to the kitchen to give my moms a pitiful look that said, Can we go home now? Noa’s mom was patting Dash’s mom’s back and saying, “Don’t beat yourself up, Stacey.” The other moms all stood around, nodding sympathetically.

  “I’m sorry,” said Dash’s mom. Just then, she noticed me standing there. She wiped her eyes quickly and wrapped me in a big hug. “Oh, Noah. Thank you for coming,” she whispered. “It means a lot to Dashie. And all of us.”

  “Yeah, sure,” I said. “I’m really sorry,” I added.