Ben-o looked down. Once again, he’d tucked his shirt neatly into his pants, but on his feet was a cheap pair of rubber flip-flops. He grinned sheepishly. “Nothing else fits me,” he said.
It was true. I’d heard Mrs. O telling Mum that he’d already outgrown the new basketball shoes he got for back-to-school, and how it was too late to bring them back because he’d scuffed them up.
“Don’t worry, Mrs. D,” he reassured her. “My mom is taking me shopping after school today.”
Mrs. D grumbled something about the “crazy stuff” that “kids today” wear, which would never have been tolerated “in my day,” and something about “respect for the institution,” the “destructive influence of video games,” and a “rampant irreverence toward all that is holy.” Behind her back, Sal mimicked her fluttery hand gestures and the shocked expression on her face. It was all we could do to keep a straight face.
When we got outside, I saw Sheila Rosenberg up ahead with Missy Abrams—which was odd, because Missy didn’t live nearby. But no one wanted to walk into school alone on the first day.
I pretended not to see them. Missy Abrams is all right, but Sheila Rosenberg is a major know-it-all. Last year she told me that my dad could never be buried in a Jewish cemetery because of the pi tattoo on his left arm—which he got the year all his seniors passed the AP calculus exam. I told her it didn’t matter, because A, he’s not dying, and B, both my parents are going to be cremated. I didn’t know if that was true, but Nanaji had been cremated, so it popped into my head. Sheila had seemed troubled by this information, but she didn’t say anything until Hebrew school, when she actually asked Mrs. Moskowitz if Jews were allowed to be cremated! As if it was any of her business.
“Hey, Sheila!” Rebecca yelled now. “Hey, Missy!” They both stopped, smiled, and waved in unison. They waited for us to catch up. Great.
“What are you doing?” I hissed.
“What?” said Rebecca. “I’m just being friendly. God. Sheila’s in my homeroom.”
I didn’t get time to ask her how she knew that.
“Hi, Rebecca,” said Sheila. “Hello, Tara. Hello, Ben.”
Missy then greeted each of us by name, too.
“Hey, everyone,” I said, impatient to move it along.
Ben-o jerked his chin at them and said, “’Sup.”
We all compared homerooms. Missy was in Ben-o’s, and she said Jenna Alberts was, too. The only person I knew for sure was in my homeroom was Aisha Khan, because Mum and I had bumped into her at the dentist the week before. We’d planned to meet up in front of school at 8:40.
I caught sight of her as we came around the last corner, near the basketball courts. I waved for her to join us.
“Guess who’s in our class?” she asked, not even waiting for me to answer. “Ryan Berger.”
“Ugh,” I said. Ryan Berger is a major goon.
Aisha shrugged. “He’s cute,” she said.
“He only dates Jewish girls,” Sheila observed.
I stared at her with my mouth open. What a rude thing to say.
“She only said he’s cute,” I said. “Not that I agree. No offense, Aisha.”
“None taken.” Aisha shrugged. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I’m not allowed to date anyone, ever.”
“You mean, like, until high school?” Rebecca asked innocently.
“I mean, like, until I get married,” Aisha replied. Rebecca laughed, but I’m pretty sure Aisha wasn’t kidding. Her parents are really old-school.
I quickly steered the subject back to Ryan Berger. “Since when does he date?” I asked Sheila.
“Well, not literally, but he’s only allowed to date Jewish people when he does start dating.”
“Then there’s hope for you yet, Sheila,” I said. Rebecca poked me in the ribs. Ben-o smirked.
Ryan Berger was all over me in homeroom. He kept asking me questions, like—“Who’d you get for English?” And I was like, “Galvez—honors class.” And then he was like, “Is your friend Rebecca in that class?” And I was like, “Yeah, and P.E. and Social Studies, too.” And he was like, “What about Hebrew school?” And I was like, “I don’t know yet. We’ll find out tomorrow. Why are you asking me so many questions about Rebecca?” And he was like, “No reason. I’m just used to seeing you together.” And I was like, “What about Ben-o?” And he was like, “What about him?” And then—“Hey, are you doing any sports this year?” And I was like, “No, but I’m doing Robotics.”
After that, thankfully, he turned to Aisha and asked her a couple hundred questions. It turned out they had four classes together. Aisha sighed happily.
Ms. Ross was trying to get everyone to sit down, her high, nasal voice barely audible over the noise of everyone talking and laughing and moving chairs around. Ryan sat down at the desk next to me.
“You can’t sit there, Ryan. Aisha and I want to sit together,” I said. He got up and moved forward one seat but turned sideways to face me. “Where’s your sidekick?” I added.
“Why are you obsessing about Adam?” he teased, his hard little eyes glinting.
“I’m not—I’m just not used to seeing you apart.”
“He’s in Mr. H’s homeroom.”
“So’s Ben-o,” I said. “They’re lucky.”
Ryan shrugged. I turned my head, trying to get a sideways glimpse of him without staring directly. I’d always been fascinated by those eyes—so glittery and hard, you couldn’t even tell what color they were. They just reflected back at you, like broken glass. Looking into them made my eyes tear up, but not with emotion. More like an allergy, or staring into a flashlight. You can’t trust a person like that.
Ms. Ross distributed some home-information forms she said we had to fill out before the bell rang. Ryan asked Aisha if he could borrow a pen.
“You don’t have a pen on the first day of school?” I asked.
“It’s okay,” Aisha said, fishing one out of her backpack. “You can keep it.”
“Thanks,” said Ryan, tossing it in the air a few times. Then he missed and it skidded across the room, under the radiator. Ms. Ross wouldn’t let him go get it, so he put his head down on the table while the rest of us filled out our forms. He pretended to snore, which made Aisha giggle.
There was a tap at the back door of the classroom, and I looked up to see Ben-o in the hallway, motioning for me to come out. He grinned.
I raised my hand, but Ross was so busy bleating instructions at everyone that she didn’t see.
“May I have the hall pass?” I called out. “My stomach hurts.”
Ms. Ross is maybe twenty-two years old and looks like she’s terrified of kids. Which is understandable, because she’s shorter than most of the boys in the seventh grade. She was brand-new last year and had a reputation for sending kids to the principal’s office for almost no reason. She was in way over her head.
“I’m finished,” I added, waving the form.
Ryan looked up. “Gimme your pen,” he mouthed, so I tossed it to him. This time he caught it.
Ms. Ross hesitated, eyeing me with suspicion, but I put on a good show of pretending my stomach hurt, and she relented. She motioned me to her desk and handed me the pass.
“Be back in five minutes,” she said.
I slipped out into the hall, where Ben-o was waiting.
“How’s Mr. H’s class?” I said.
“Awesome,” Ben-o said, smiling.
“So lucky. Ross has lost control already.”
Ben-o snorted. “How’s Berger?”
“Totally annoying. He might have a crush on Rebecca.”
“I don’t think so,” Ben-o said.
“Whatever,” I said. “What are you doing out here?”
“I forgot to give you this.” He reached into his back pocket and handed me a small book with a fancy teal cover, like cool wallpaper, secured with a silver elastic strap.
“Thanks!” I said. “What is it?”
“It’s a datebook—like a plan
ner. Do you like it? I got one, too, in black. Mom says I need to get organized … See, you can put your schedule here, and there’s a separate place to write down homework assignments.”
“Cool,” I said. “It’s really pretty, too—”
Ben-o blushed.
“—but I didn’t get you anything.”
“That’s okay,” Ben-o said. “It wasn’t, like, a planned thing. I just saw it and thought you would like it.”
“I have to get back now,” I said.
“Me, too,” Ben-o said. “See you later.”
“Yeah.”
Since when did Ben-o buy me presents? He was always saving up for something—a remote-controlled helicopter or some electronic gizmo. I mean, probably his mom had paid for this, but still. I went back into the classroom and put the hall pass on Ross’s desk.
“What’s that?” asked Aisha when I sat down.
“A datebook. Ben-o gave it to me.”
“Can I see?” I handed it to her and she flipped through the pages. “This is really cool,” she said. “Do you know where he got it?”
I shook my head. “You can ask him at lunch.”
“Present from your boyfriend?” Ryan asked, a mocking glint in those hard little eyes.
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I said.
“Then why’d he get you a date book?”
“It’s a calendar, stupid.”
The bell rang and it was time for a real class—Honors English. With Rebecca. I gathered my things and waved good-bye to Aisha. I didn’t wave good-bye to Berger. I didn’t even ask for my pen back.
Mr. Galvez let us choose our own seats for Honors English, so I got to sit next to Rebecca.
“What’s that?” she wanted to know as soon as we sat down.
“My new planner. Ben-o gave it to me.”
“Let me see,” she demanded, putting out her hand. I didn’t mind, because I hadn’t written anything in it yet. I handed it to her and she flipped through the pages the way Aisha had. I saw her pause on a page, and then she snapped the book shut.
“Hmm,” she said.
“Hmm?” I replied.
“Nothing,” she said. “Just, since when does he give you stuff?”
I was wondering the same thing, but I didn’t think it was a big deal.
“It’s not a big deal,” I said.
“Okay,” Rebecca said, handing it back to me. She gave me a funny look. “If you say so.”
yan wasn’t in homeroom on Tuesday. I found out later that he and Adam Greenspan had already gotten in trouble and weren’t allowed to come back without their parents.
After school, Rebecca and I grabbed a snack at her place and ate it on the way over to Hebrew school. We wanted to get there early to find out which class we were in. I guess everyone else had the same idea, because the hallway outside Rabbi’s office, where the class rosters were posted, was packed. Rebecca and I were both in Rabbi Aron’s class, which was a relief. I’d heard a rumor that only the smart kids got Rabbi Aron for their bar or bat mitzvah year. Judging from the fact that Ryan Berger and Adam Greenspan were in Ms. Jacobson’s class, it was probably true. But it also meant prissy Sheila Rosenberg was in Rabbi Aron’s with us.
In the middle of all the normal jostling, Ryan came barreling down the hall, pretending to shoot Adam, and Adam pretended to die, clutching his chest and sinking to the floor in a slow, staggering swoon. As he fell, he stepped on my foot and almost knocked Rebecca over.
“Hey, watch it!” I said, catching Adam before he knocked us all over like a bunch of dominoes. “Didn’t you two already get suspended?” I couldn’t help being a little bit impressed: getting kicked out of middle school for setting off a fart bomb—on the very first day? That was a new record. Too bad their punishment didn’t extend to Hebrew school, too.
“My mother is so proud.” Ryan sniffed, wiping away a fake tear. Only Adam cracked up. Rebecca rolled her eyes.
The hall was buzzing with first-day excitement, even though it was, um, Hebrew school, and everyone was comparing bar and bat mitzvah dates.
Ryan made the mistake of asking Sheila Rosenberg when her “bar mitzvah” was.
“It’s bat mitzvah,” Sheila said, correcting him. “Only boys have bar mitzvahs. Don’t you know anything after five years of Hebrew?”
“Here we go,” I muttered to Rebecca, who just shook her head and looked at Sheila with something like pity.
But Ryan, surprisingly, didn’t take the bait, probably because he couldn’t think of anything funny to say. Instead he turned to me and Rebecca. I wondered again if he had a crush on her, considering the dumb questions he’d asked me in homeroom on Monday. In a way, I felt sorry for him, because—Rebecca? That was never going to happen. Not in a million years. “When are yours?” he asked, looking mainly at me, even though I was pretty sure he meant her.
“Hers is February,” I said, pointing to Rebecca. “Mine’s in December. Right before Hanukkah”—automatically adding, in my head: if I go through with it.
“And when’s yours, Ryan?” Rebecca asked, just to be polite. It wasn’t like we were going to be invited, or vice versa. She sounded as bored as possible.
“November,” Ryan said. “Adam’s is in March.” Not that anyone asked.
“Mine’s the first one,” said Sheila. “In October.”
“Who cares?” said Ryan.
Sheila shrugged. “You asked.”
“That’s soon,” Rebecca said, turning to her. “Are you going to be ready?”
“I already started taking lessons with Rabbi Aron over the summer,” Sheila replied, seeming really impressed with herself.
“You went to Hebrew school in the summer?” Ryan asked, incredulous. Adam’s mouth hung open.
I didn’t think that was so weird, actually. I mean, if my bat mitzvah were coming up that soon, and if I were definitely going through with it, I probably would have done the same thing. To tell you the truth, I kind of liked Hebrew school, especially the history stuff, like how the Maccabees drove the invaders out of Jerusalem and reclaimed the holy temple. It was cool to read about stuff like that because it definitely really happened. I had a harder time with the Bible stories, though. I mean, Jonah gets swallowed by a whale—and lives to tell about it? Really?
Not that Hebrew school was easy. For one thing, Hebrew is a really difficult language, because it’s a whole other alphabet and you read it the wrong way around, from right to left instead of left to right. Mostly I learned to sound out the words, but I didn’t always know their meaning, which kind of bothered me. How could you pray in a language you didn’t even understand? Ben-o told me it was like that in his old church, only with Latin, not Hebrew. Then his mom decided that was too old-fashioned, so they started attending a church where they pray in English, which made a lot more sense to me. I wondered why the Jews hadn’t thought of the same thing.
Sheila ignored Ryan’s question. “I’m surprised you’re having one, Tara,” she said to me, her eyes lingering on the gold om pendant—the one Nanaji gave me for my tenth birthday—that I wore on a fuchsia satin cord around my neck. She wrinkled her nose as if she smelled something unpleasant.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because you’re not even Jewish,” she said. “Technically.”
Not Jewish? That was a new low, even for Sheila Rosenberg. I fixed her with my blankest stare until she got nervous. “You know,” she said, twisting a strand of hair around her finger. “Your mother’s not Jewish, so you’re not Jewish.”
“Says who?” I whirled on her.
“Says everyone. You know the saying: ‘You are what your mother is.’”
Those sounded like fighting words to me. “What is my mother, exactly?”
Sheila shrugged. “Not a Jew.”
That was when I shoved her. You know how parents and teachers are always telling little kids to use their words instead of, like, their fists? Well, I go blank when I’m angry, and I don’t have any words. If I did, I
would have told Sheila Rosenberg that my mother, who was born in India, converted to Judaism way before I was even born. Not that it was any of her stupid business. So I shoved. And she shoved back, and then we were girl-fighting for real. She got this wild look in her eye, hissing and biting like a trapped cat.
“Girl fight! Girl fight!” Ryan and Adam yelled, pointing at us.
I got Sheila into a modified headlock, mostly to stop her biting.
“Not again, Tara.” Rebecca groaned.
That kind of snapped me back to the moment. When Rebecca pulled us apart, I had a hank of Sheila’s curly black hair in my fist. I didn’t even know how that happened, or when.
Rebecca stood between us, ready to spring into action if either of us made another move, but the moment had passed. Sheila started to cry, her lower lip blubbing in and out like a moist rubber fish. Still, she had been asking for it with that crack about my mother, and she was the one doing the biting. And besides, I mean—big deal. She certainly had enough hair. I straightened the hem of my shirt.
“Why’d you stop them? That was awesome,” crowed Adam.
Rebecca turned and grabbed him by the collar, lifting him up so he had to stand on his toes to keep his feet on the ground. Rebecca is pretty tough. She’s the captain of the basketball team and used to dealing with unruly players.
“You wouldn’t want me to tell Rabbi Aron you were involved in a fight, would you?” Rebecca asked him in her most quietly threatening voice, the one she learned from her dad, who’s both a union negotiator and a judo master. He never raises his voice, or his hand, but everyone listens to him. “I mean, considering how much trouble you’re already in.” Adam blinked helplessly. She let him go with a scowl and he slumped against the wall.
Rebecca turned back to me and Sheila. “I don’t suppose you’re going to apologize to each other?”
Apologize? I opened my mouth to protest, not a hundred percent sure if I could form words yet, but Rebecca shot me a warning look. Sheila looked down and shook her head. Trying not to cry again, I thought.
Rebecca looked at her watch: four thirty. “Time for class. Sheila—you may wanna clean up this situation first,” she said, indicating the area around her eyes.
My Basmati Bat Mitzvah Page 2
