How to Find What You're Not Looking For

by Veera Hiranandani

  “First of all, you’ve got a while before twelve,” Leah says. “And second, I’m seven years older than you. Don’t be in a rush, Ari. Nothing’s wrong with being a kid.” Her eyes travel away from you and back to the park. Her mouth falls out of its smile, and she suddenly looks sad. Then why are you rushing, you want to ask her.

  “I like it here,” Raj says, slicing through whatever Leah is feeling. “It reminds me of a park near my flat in Bombay. My cousins and I would play cricket there.”

  Leah takes Raj’s arm, her eyes sparkling. “Tell me more about your family. I want to know everything about you.”

  You roll your eyes, walk a little bit ahead of them, and plop down on a bench. You lick your melting cone and wonder what kind of game cricket is. Does it involve actual crickets? You want to ask, but it seems like a question a little kid would ask.

  “We’re going to take a walk, okay?” Leah calls out. This is also part of the routine. They usually leave you on a bench for a little while to eat your fudge ripple while they wander behind a cluster of oak trees. A few days ago, you saw them feed ice cream to each other and kiss. You turned away, your cheeks on fire. Now you know why they go behind the oak trees. A part of you wants to spy on them, and a part of you wants to run far, far away.

  After a little while, the three of you stroll back to the store, but they don’t hold hands in case they run into anyone they know. You like listening to their conversations. They discuss all sorts of things. They talk about music a lot: the Beatles, the Doors, Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones, Aretha Franklin. They argue about which band is their favorite. Raj likes the Doors the most. Leah thinks the Beatles are groovier.

  They talk about serious things, too, like the war in Vietnam, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s speech in New York City that spring against the war, and the protest marches for civil rights and peace that they want to be part of. Today they talk about the uprisings happening around the country, and you wonder what they mean. Leah says she understands why Black people are so upset. Raj says riots aren’t the way to change things, that nonviolent protests are more powerful, like what Gandhi did in India, like what Dr. King is doing now.

  “But don’t you think that the Black community has no choice but to fight back and defend themselves against hundreds of years of racism and violence? What if peaceful protests aren’t enough to change things? Have you read Malcolm X’s autobiography? And look at what the Black Panthers are trying to do,” Leah says. “It must take so much courage.” Leah crosses her arms. You’ve never seen her speak this way to anyone. Other than Dr. King, you don’t know who she’s talking about.

  “But how can we really understand, Leah?” Raj says.

  “We have to do more. We’re both not part of the majority. How can we not understand?” she replies.

  You watch Leah’s face, then Raj’s. Are they mad at each other? You can’t tell.

  “I think I have a different perspective rather than a better understanding,” Raj says. “When I came here, I felt like the best thing to do as an immigrant was try as hard as I could to blend in so no one would notice the color of my skin. Does that make me a coward?”

  Leah gets quiet. She shakes her head and reaches out to squeeze Raj’s hand quickly before letting go. You feel more confused than ever. You think about protests and riots and what they are for. You wonder what Raj means by blending in. You didn’t know Leah paid so much attention to the news.

  You also learn more about Raj. You find out that he grew up in Bombay, a big city in India. That he has two much-older brothers, one still in India and one who lives here. You find out that his favorite flavor of ice cream is pistachio and that he loves pizza.

  Another thing you find out is that Leah and Raj go out every Tuesday night to a pizza parlor two towns over so no one sees them. Ma thinks Leah is in her pointe class. You know lots of secrets now, which started off feeling special, but the feeling is getting heavier and heavier as each secret stacks upon the other. What Leah and Raj don’t talk about in front of you is their future.

  After this trip to the park, back at Rocky’s, Raj gives Leah a present, the new Beatles’ album. She jumps up and down and throws her arms around him. Everyone in the store looks at them. You don’t like the way people stop and stare. You want to pull Leah away, but she doesn’t seem to notice.

  Then Raj goes back to work, and Leah and you walk home.

  “I know I promised to keep your secret,” you say after you get far enough away from the store. She faces you, clutching the Beatles’ album against her chest.

  “Yes, you did,” she says, waggling her finger at you, a panicked expression on her face.

  “I still promise,” you say. “But when are you going to tell Ma and Daddy?”

  You read the title on the album: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. You wonder what it means. Were the Beatles changing their name? Your hands feel sticky with ice cream. You press your thumb and forefinger together, and they stay stuck that way.

  “I’m just so happy. I don’t want anything to ruin it. I feel guilty about being so happy.”

  “Why would you feel guilty about being happy?” you ask.

  “Because there’s so much wrong with the world,” she says and starts walking again.

  There is, according to the newspapers. But you look around your town. You see someone driving by in a blue Chevy convertible. You see people walking down the block in sunglasses, sipping soda pop, riding their bikes, happy to be out on such a nice Saturday. This world seems okay.

  “Do you know what happened at Rocky’s last week? A guy came in and heard Raj talking. Then he asked John, the manager, why he had foreigners working there and not Americans. He asked Raj if he was here legally. Raj said he was a US citizen, and the fellow demanded to see proof and wouldn’t leave! John had to threaten to call the cops until he finally left.”

  “Gosh, that’s terrible,” you say. Now she’s walking so quickly, you can barely keep up.

  “But our love is stronger than the racist establishment.”

  “ ‘The racist establishment,’ ” you say, trying out her words. Lately, Leah says things that feel so grown-up and strange, like they belong in someone else’s mouth. Leah stops walking, so you stop. You can see her cheeks becoming red, her chest going up and down like she’s out of breath. The air is sticky and still.

  “I’m not naïve, Ari. I see the looks people give us when we walk down the street. It’s not going to be easy for me and Raj.”

  “So maybe you shouldn’t get married?” You’re starting to feel like you’re walking into a pool that’s getting too deep for your feet to touch the bottom. A worry for Raj and Leah, in a new way, a way you hadn’t even thought about before, is nagging at you. Other people won’t like them together, not just your parents. You shake your head. You’re ready for Leah’s secret love-story movie to end and to go back to just Ariel and Leah—the way it used to be.

  “But then they would win,” she says.

  “Who would win?” you ask, but Leah doesn’t seem to hear you.

  “It’s not just what Raj faces. We know about prejudice,” Leah says.

  “We do?” you ask, and again that feeling of the pool getting deeper takes hold of you. Now Leah is a few feet ahead. “Hey, slow down,” you call, because it’s too hot to walk this fast.

  She stops and faces you again. “Of course. I once heard Ma and Daddy tell their friends how the bank wouldn’t give them a loan because they didn’t think a Jewish bakery would do well here. Daddy had to convince them that his baked goods were for everyone. He even brought them a box of cookies to prove it.”

  “I didn’t know that,” you say, and it makes you wonder what else Leah knows that you don’t.

  “And Ma and Daddy’s friends from synagogue, you know the Feldmans? They tried to sign up for that golf club in Milton, and they were told that m
embership was full, but then the Cunninghams joined a week after.”

  “But that’s not fair,” you say, and it feels like Leah has ripped the cover off something ugly and confusing, something you don’t want to see.

  “And remember what that awful boy did to you last year?”

  “I don’t like to think about that,” you say and bite your lip. But you do think about it, a lot. You and Chris Heaton had both wanted the last empty swing. You got there first by a second, but Chris insisted he was first and told you to get up. You refused. Then he leaned in and touched your head.

  “Where are your horns?” he asked.

  “What?” you said, brushing his hand away.

  “My dad told me Jews have horns,” he said and touched your head again. “Like the devil.”

  “Get away,” you said and then touched your own head, wondering if there was something you had never noticed before.

  He kept asking where your horns were, getting louder and louder. He wouldn’t stop. So you picked up a small rock and threw it at him, but it hit him in the face.

  You had just wanted to stop him, not hit his face. He stared at you, frozen, holding his cheek. Then he ran off and told the playground monitor, acting like you had shot a cannonball at him. You got in more trouble than he did, detention for a week, and all he had to do was talk to the principal.

  At home, Ma and Daddy had explained what the horn statement meant—how it had to do with a wrong translation in the Bible saying that Moses had horns instead of light around his head when he came down from Mount Sinai. Ma said it was still used as a slur today and that some people actually believed it was true. It felt like someone had slapped you when she told you this. How could anyone believe such a ridiculous thing, as if you were a different kind of person or maybe not even a person at all?

  Ma had been furious and wanted to talk to the principal. “That boy should be suspended! We can’t let this go,” she had said. But you begged her not to; you were afraid it would only make Chris worse. Daddy agreed. “Let’s not make a fuss, Sylvia,” he had said. “We don’t need that kind of attention. Think of the bakery.”

  Back then, you had wondered what kind of attention Daddy meant. Now you wonder what really changes people. You had tried stopping Chris with the rock, and it did stop him, but you don’t think it changed him. Should you just have let him take the swing? Should you have sat there silently, refusing to leave? You don’t know if that would have changed him, either. When you play it over in your mind, you never come up with a good answer.

  Suddenly you hear someone calling you. You look up to see your friend Jane coming down the street with her mother. The two of them live on the floor below you. You ride the bus together to school.

  “Why, hello, girls,” Jane’s mother, Peggy, says, taking off her big round sunglasses. “Where are you coming from?”

  You and Leah glance at each other.

  “The Sweet Scoop,” Leah says.

  “That’s where we’re off to. If June is starting off like this, we’re probably in for a long, hot summer,” she says, fanning herself.

  You both nod.

  “Oh, oh, oh!” Jane shrieks, jumping up and down. Everyone looks startled.

  “What on earth?” Peggy says, putting her hand to her chest.

  Jane points at the Beatles’ album. “How did you get that? I thought Rocky’s was sold out. They said they weren’t getting more until next week.”

  Leah looks down at her hands like she forgot what she was holding.

  “Oh, this, well, I—”

  “She put it on hold the day it came out,” you say. “But you can come over and listen if you want.”

  You see Leah’s shoulders drop in relief.

  “That would be far-out! Thanks! See you in school tomorrow, Ari,” Jane calls as she and Peggy head to the Sweet Scoop.

  “That was clever of you,” Leah says after they walk off. “Imagine if we saw them with Raj . . . ”

  “Yeah, Peggy would have definitely said something to Ma.” Peggy and Ma are sort of friends; at least they like to chat in the laundry room on Sundays, but Ma doesn’t seem to have time for many friends.

  Leah’s face changes, and she gets that hard look with her eyebrows knitted together. “Eventually, someone is going to see us and tell Ma and Daddy. I want them hearing the truth from me first,” she says. “I’m just going to do it. I’m going to invite Raj over.”

  “Oh good,” you say and give Leah a little hug. You aren’t sure how Ma and Daddy are going to react to Raj, but at least you won’t be the only one to know anymore. You both walk home, and your whole body feels lighter, like Leah just took something out of your hands and decided to hold it herself.

  How to Eat Dinner

  When you get back home, Ma’s whirling around the apartment with a rag and a bottle of Mr. Clean. Sunday is Do-everything-else-instead-of-working-at-the-bakery day for Ma. Daddy opens the bakery from noon to five and always comes home for an early dinner. You and Leah are supposed to clean the hall bathroom, your room, and bring the laundry downstairs to the basement washers. Leah makes you do it all with her right after breakfast so she can have the afternoon to relax. Sunday’s the only day she doesn’t dance, so you understand.

  Sunday is also the best time to ask Ma for something since she’s usually distracted and impatient to get her work done. Leah doesn’t waste any time.

  “Ma, do you need any more help?” she asks.

  Ma doesn’t look up as she wipes down a cabinet. “Too late for that. Almost done.”

  Leah walks over to the stove, which is empty. No pot of boiling soup on a hot day like this. She goes over to the fridge, opens it, and closes it. “What are we having for dinner?” she asks.

  You perk up from the couch, where you’d collapsed as you looked for the comics in the Sunday paper.

  “Just making some egg salad. Too hot for anything else,” Ma says and stops cleaning. She wipes her forehead with the back of her hand.

  You slump back down. Ugh, egg salad.

  “Could I have a guest over next Sunday evening?” Leah asks, not looking at Ma. She busies herself with rearranging the fruit bowl.

  “A guest?” Ma says, pushing back a bit of hair that’s fallen out of her bun. “Who?”

  “A boy I like.”

  As you flip through the newspaper, pretending not to watch them, you notice that Leah calls Raj a boy, not a man.

  Ma waves the green towel she’s holding. “Ah, so there is a boyfriend. I thought so, the way you’ve been going around lately, all gussied up,” she says. Then she grabs the orange fly swatter hanging on the doorknob and starts going after a fly buzzing around the fruit.

  “There’s nothing wrong with trying to look nice,” Leah says. “So, can I?”

  Ma’s eyes narrow on the fly that has now landed on top of the refrigerator. She takes a big swipe at it. “These flies. They’re all over as soon as the weather gets humid. So can you what?”

  “Have him over to meet you.” Leah’s voice shakes a little. She’s had a few boyfriends come over—one Jewish boy she met at Temple Beth Torah, and one boy from school who was not Jewish. That was last year. Ma and Daddy didn’t like the boy who wasn’t Jewish, and told her that.

  Ma said they didn’t like him because he didn’t thank them after the meal. But you don’t remember the Jewish boy thanking your parents, either. Honestly, your parents didn’t like either of them that much.

  “Who is this boy? Another gentile?” Ma was now suddenly wiping down the kitchen counter furiously.

  “Ma, nobody uses that word,” Leah says and looks at you with a big question in her eyes. You shrug. What can you do? Now the fly lands on the bowl of fruit.

  “Oh, you’re a goner now.” Ma lines up the swatter.

  “He’s not a gentile,” Leah tells her.

 
Ma brings the swatter down hard on an apple. “Gotcha!” Then she turns her attention back to Leah.

  “Oh? Well, I guess so.”

  “That’s swell. Thanks, Ma!” Leah says and hurries out of earshot before Ma can ask any more questions.

  Later, back in your room, you sit on your bed while Leah brushes her hair at the vanity over and over. If you brushed your curly hair after it dried, you’d look like you’d stuck your fingers in an electric socket. That’s why you keep it short. But Leah has smooth waves, not tight curls like you.

  “If they just meet him . . .” Leah starts to say. She begins brushing faster and faster. “Maybe they’ll let go of their ingrained prejudice. And who uses the word gentile anymore? I guess it’s better than goy. Maybe Hindus are gentiles? Does it mean anyone who isn’t Jewish?”

  “I have no idea,” you say and place Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band on the turntable. You lower the needle carefully. You hear a scratchy sound, and then it sounds like a band warming up. You and Leah look at each other, puzzled, but then the song bursts from the little speaker, and you both smile. The new sounds carry you away as you listen to song after song. It’s like every track opens a door and shows you a whole new world.

  As the music plays, you think about what Leah just said. Gentile. Goy. You know those words. Sometimes your parents use them to describe someone who’s Christian, but only to each other or you and Leah, never in front of anyone else.

  When the first side of the record ends, you get up to flip it over. “What’s ‘ingrained prejudice’?” you ask.

  “You’ll see,” Leah says. “I want to hear the other side.”

  You sigh and put the needle down but lower the volume. You plop down on your bed again and stare at the bumpy white ceiling. “So if you won’t answer that, then tell me why you think we moved here.”

  She stops brushing. “What do you mean?”

  “We don’t go to synagogue that much, just on holidays and sometimes on Friday nights. Ma and Daddy didn’t send us to Hebrew school. We only see Aunt Esther and Uncle Isaac’s families in Brooklyn every few months, and they hardly ever come here. But Ma and Daddy want you to meet Jewish boys. And I guess the same goes for me if I ever date anyone.”