by David Hopen
“By the way,” my father said, still chewing, “I booked reservations today.”
“Reservations for what?” I asked.
“For Meir’s bar mitzvah. Norman’s been pressuring me to book through some travel agent he knows.”
“Probably because he gets a percentage of the transaction,” my mother muttered. “That ganef.”
“Probably,” my father agreed.
I chewed the inside of my cheek. “But—what if I have something I can’t miss in school?”
My father frowned. “In school?”
“Yes.”
“We have time,” my mother said. “You can always cancel if you really need to.”
My father nearly choked on his seltzer. “Cancel on his first cousin’s bar mitzvah?”
“Let’s just play it by ear, that’s all.” My mother passed me a plate of mashed potatoes, ignoring the look on my father’s face. “Ari, fill us in on your day.”
“It was fine. Uneventful. I’m going out tonight, actually.”
“Oh?” My mother looked pleasantly surprised. “With whom?”
I took a swig of water. “The kid across the street.”
“Noah, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“He seemed really nice, didn’t he, Yaakov?”
My father ruminated over his plate. A smudge of meat sauce colored his chin. “He did,” he conceded. “But these are different sorts of people.”
My mother frowned. “And that means?”
My father shrugged innocently.
“Really,” my mother continued, raising her brows, “I’m curious what you’re implying.”
“I mean,” my father said in his monotone, “that Noah Harris is a long way from Shimon Levy.”
“Well, that’s silly. He seems perfectly mensch-like.”
“Different places encourage different values. You said it yourself—the kids here are light-years ahead.”
“I was referring, clearly, to their academic abilities.” My mother returned her silverware to her plate. “So I disagree.”
“And the davening stunts?”
My mother continued cleaning without looking up.
“Tell me, Aryeh,” my father said, resting his gaze on me, “where are you off to?”
I shrugged. “Not sure,” I said, which wasn’t altogether a lie, though it was the first time I’d ever offered my parents so much as a mistruth. “Noah wants to introduce me to classmates.”
“How downright devious,” my mother said under her breath.
“And the girls,” my father asked, “from the barbecue?”
“What about them?”
“Will they be there?”
“I don’t know,” I said, reddening.
“Of course they will,” my mother said. “And Ari should meet them. He’s going to be spending the year with them, isn’t he?”
My father revisited his spaghetti with unbroken concentration.
“Cynthia was telling us about Noah’s girlfriend,” my mother said, “a lovely girl he’s been dating for years.”
“Her name is Rebecca,” I said.
“Strange to think they can love so young.” She looked away from the table, fingered her ring. “Who knows? Perhaps they can.”
* * *
ALMOST EIGHT. I WAS SITTING anxiously in my room, door closed, flipping through Noah’s paper. Finally, my cellphone rang.
I sprang from bed, peeked in the mirror. My thick brown hair was matted and unruly, my sneakers worn and sexless, my button-down replaced with a creased white polo, making my standard black-and-white ensemble slightly more palatable. Why, after many years of neurotically maintaining a clean-shaven appearance, had I picked today to experiment with sporting scruff? Why did the corners of my eyebrows insist on undergoing a slight vertical ascent? Would it be biologically impossible to gain even one-tenth of Noah’s muscle mass? Did others suspect they, too, owned a fundamentally unrecognizable face, one people consistently failed to remember? Unsatisfied with what I saw, I took a deep breath, hid my tzitzit in my pants and emerged from my room.
“Imma?”
She was sprawled on the living room couch, reading another selection from the New York Times Best Seller list. The usual: self-help and educating children. “Abba’s at mincha.” She said this without looking up.
“Noah’s outside. I’m heading out.”
She hesitated. “Ari?”
I opened the front door. “Yes?”
I waited for a reminder to behave, to be home early, to daven ma’ariv. Instead, she gave a knowing look. “Make sure you have a good time,” she said quietly. “It’s more important than you think.”
Noah’s black Audi hummed softly in my driveway. Rebecca was in the passenger seat. I considered briefly whether this sight was a mirage. Timidly, I approached.
He rolled down his window, flooding my driveway with electronic music. Rebecca leaned over him to greet me, lowering the radio volume. “Ari!”
“Hop in, bud,” Noah said. “They’ll make room.”
In the back sat two boys. The one on the far side was skinny and pale with slicked light brown hair, a thin nose and large, black-rimmed glasses that seemed especially expensive. He wore a crisp Oxford shirt and fitted, pale-gray jeans. “Greetings,” he said, nodding haughtily. “Oliver Bellow.”
The other boy—“Amir Samson, nice to meet you,” he said, actually offering his hand—was fair-skinned with a thick beard, thinning brown hair, coal-like eyes that became black slits when he smiled and thick eyebrows that gave him the permanent impression of a faint frown. I couldn’t tell if he was Latin or Mediterranean: he had large, white teeth, a square-shaped face, high-arching cheekbones and a Romanesque, slightly crooked nose. He and I were the only ones wearing yarmulkes.
“Yo, shove over,” Noah barked. “Make space.”
“Oliver, move to the middle,” Amir said. “You’re smallest.”
“Not where it counts, Amir,” Oliver said. “That dishonor falls on your lap, so to speak.”
Rebecca turned in her seat to face me. “I’d say they’re not typically this annoying, but they absolutely are.”
“Maybe I’ll just take the middle,” I said, cringing at this glare of attention.
“How generous of our guest,” Oliver said, as I awkwardly sidled my way between them. “Wait, aren’t we getting Evan?” That name again.
“Nah,” Noah said, “he’s not home yet.”
Rebecca changed the radio station to 99 Jamz. “When’s he coming back?”
“This week, isn’t he?” Amir said. “Thursday or Friday?”
Oliver yawned, putting his legs against the back of Noah’s seat. “Where’s he now?”
Amir played with his beard. “You don’t know where your overlord is?”
“I don’t recall.”
“All that weed affecting your memory?”
“He’s in Spain,” Noah said. “One of those travel programs.”
Oliver gnawed at his cuticles. “People in Spain are supposed to be breathtaking, did you know?”
After too long of a pause I realized I was being addressed. “No, can’t say I did.”
“Knock it off, Oliver,” Rebecca said.
Oliver didn’t look away from me. “Have you been to Spain?”
Amir snorted. “Suddenly Oliver is worldly.”
“Nope, never,” I said.
“Where do you vacation, then? The Maldives, maybe? Sukkot in Israel? Passover in Greece?”
“You’re an ass, Oliver,” Amir said.
“And you’re balding, Amir,” Oliver said.
Amir took out his phone and scrolled mindlessly through Instagram, double tapping a post by some college advising firm. “Rebs, now you see what I mean when I say there’s something wrong with him?”
“I’m pretty sure she saw it a long time ago,” Noah said. “Like, in second grade.”
“What? I’m just trying to become acquainted,” Oliver said. “Anyway, y
es. Evan. Spain. He must be on some rampage.”
Rebecca glared through the rearview mirror. “Don’t be a pig.”
“Oh, lighten up. You’re just defending Sophia,” Oliver said. This caught my attention. I looked around uneasily. “For the record, may I note no one’s forbidding Sophia from doing the same. I’m definitely not. Far be it from me to overstep my boundaries.”
“Stop fantasizing,” Rebecca snapped. “It’s repulsive.”
Oliver winked at me. In response I pursed my lips.
“Where was she this summer?” Amir asked, changing the subject. “I haven’t seen her in months.”
“Abroad,” Rebecca said. “But she just got back.”
“Abroad where?”
“Kenya.”
Amir frowned. “Wasn’t she doing, like, interventional cardiology research or something at U Miami? Her dad’s friend has a lab?”
“Yeah, but that was late June,” Rebecca said. “Then she went to Kenya.”
Amir cracked his knuckles absentmindedly, painstakingly. “What’s in Kenya?”
“Volunteering at some institute that teaches music to orphans. Something like that.”
“Orphans and music, huh?” Amir shook his head. “Great, that’ll dance right off the résumé.”
“Here they come, ladies and gents,” Noah announced, “the rat race! Look, against all odds, there’s Amir Samson leading the pack!”
“Fuck off,” Amir said.
“Chill, I’m only kidding,” Noah said, pulling into a driveway. “Anyway, pipe down. We’re here.”
Oliver glanced at the house. “Am I the only one down to punt this and hit Three Amigos?”
“Cut it out,” Rebecca said. “Be well adjusted for once.”
Four cars were parked outside the house, which was average-sized, at least in comparison to the other homes I’d seen, all still decisively larger than anything on my block in Brooklyn. The house was quiet, much to my relief. In fear, I’d envisioned deafening music, pools of vomit, half-naked bodies.
Oliver knocked. He carried a small backpack, adorned with the Miami Heat logo. “Drugs and booze,” he said, returning my stare.
The door opened halfway, revealing a short, freckled girl with fiery red hair that was, sure enough, slashed with streaks of blue. “Hello!” she said, fawning over the sight of my companions at her door. After a moment, her gaze rested confusedly on me. “Do I know you?”
“This is Ari Eden,” Noah said, stepping to my side, slinging his arm around my shoulder. “He’s with us.”
Her blank stare evolved into a smile. She offered her hand. “Lisa Niman. Nice to meet you, Ari.”
“You too.”
“Very touching,” Oliver said. “Inviting us in or what?”
She opened the door wide, stepping out of the way. “Everyone’s out back.”
There were about a dozen people in the backyard. They sat on folding chairs, circling a tiny pool and smoking from a translucent hookah. Oliver surveyed the crowd, mumbled his dislike for the clientele and proceeded to probe his bag for a pre-rolled joint, which he then stored behind his left ear. “You blaze?”
I gave a puzzled look, which he returned.
“Do you smoke marijuana?” he repeated, slower and more enunciated, as if I spoke a foreign language, which I suppose I did.
“Ah, right. No, thanks.”
He handed me his backpack. I could feel a bottle inside. “Then make yourself useful by holding this for me.” He turned to Noah and Amir. “Quick session?”
Amir retreated several feet, anxious to avoid being seen with the joint. “Funny.”
“Yeah, sorry, bud,” Noah said, waving his large hands. “Basketball season.”
“It hasn’t started yet.”
“For me it has. Started training last month.”
“God, I can’t wait for Evan to come back,” Oliver said, shaking his head in disgust. He took the joint from his ear and faced the group. “Any takers?”
Two boys stood. “Baruch Hashem,” Oliver said. “Was nervous everyone spent their summers getting neutered.” The two of them—one blond and Hispanic, the other bespectacled and flat-nosed—trailed Oliver to the side of the house. Following Noah’s lead, I found an open seat, keenly aware of everyone’s stares. Sophia, I noticed, wasn’t present. The anticipatory whirling in my chest subsided.
“Everyone,” Noah said authoritatively, clearing his throat. “Meet Ari Eden. He’s just moved from New York.”
I nodded politely, gave a regrettable wave. There were brief, disinterested smiles, then nothing. The girl to my right, however, extended her hand. She was blond and had a long, thin nose and eager eyes. “Gemma.”
“Ari.”
“Nice to meet you. You just moved here?”
“Yes.”
She eyed me skeptically. “Wow. But you’re not, like, in a semicha program or something, are you?”
“I’m not.”
“Isn’t there one in Coral Gables?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“It’s just, you know, the way you dress.” She gestured at my clothing—baggy khakis, my ill-fitting polo. Others, it seemed, followed some sort of unspoken uniform: slim-fit jeans, white sneakers, V-necks or T-shirts bearing some defiant graphic.
“You mean I’m unfashionable?”
“Sorry if that’s rude.”
“Fair enough, I’m only kidding. You should’ve seen me before I changed into this outfit.”
She smiled charitably. “So how do you know Noah and the boys?”
“I don’t.”
“You don’t?”
“I mean, I’ve only just met them.”
“Oh. And what about Evan? Where is he anyway?”
“I hear that name a lot.”
“Yeah, but who doesn’t, right? Like, he’s Evan Stark. Where’d you say you were from—Upper West Side?”
“No. Brooklyn, actually.”
“Hm.” She surveyed her phone for texts. “Well, people from New York definitely know him.”
“I don’t.”
“How’s that possible? He’s the smartest kid in school. They say he has an IQ of, like, I don’t know, one hundred and ninety.”
“That’s—impressive.”
“Yeah, teachers are always in awe of him. Apparently he’s best friends with the principal. Not to mention the fact that he used to date—”
“—we’ve never met,” I interrupted.
Her face fell. “Oh.”
“But I am neighbors with Noah,” I said, trying to combat her disappointment.
Boredom receded slightly from her eyes. “Well, Noah’s the best. Everyone loves Noah.”
“Seems that way.”
“No, I mean it. Literally everyone.”
“I can see why.”
“You know he’s captain of the basketball team? He’s, like, historically good.”
“Figures.”
“Runs in the family, I guess. His sister plays college volleyball. But anyway.” She inched closer. “Are any of the rumors true?”
“What rumors?”
“I don’t know, there are a bunch. Like, that they once threw Rolexes into the ocean. Or that their dads—well, not Amir’s, obviously—have trade wars. Okay, yeah, they’re probably made up, people say crazy things, but who knows, right?”
“Really,” I said politely, “I couldn’t tell you about any of that.”
“It’s just they’re . . . well, exclusive, you know? Normal people don’t just show up to a party with them, is what I mean, especially if”—she sized me up—“if you’ve just moved to town, let’s say.”
I took no offense at this insinuation. She was right: a half minute of conversation was sufficient to uncover the extent to which I was categorically unexceptional. During those first days in particular, I often imagined how I must have looked to others, those for whom social capital was a direct function of wealth, wit, beauty and romantic achievement. Picturing myself as an ext
ernal onlooker, I watched as I sat there with Gemma, fumbling for words, dabbing at sweat stains. From the comfort of this secondary self, I enjoyed two novelties: my proximity to normalcy and my association with exclusivity.
I looked over at Noah. He was gesticulating madly, telling some story with Amir’s help. Rebecca was perched on his lap. Those around him were laughing wildly. The hookah arrived at Gemma. She took a long, exaggerated puff before passing it my way. I declined. “I don’t smoke.”
“Neither do I,” she said. “This isn’t smoking, so.”
“It’s not?”
“You don’t get high.” She puffed again and thrust it toward me. I waved her off once more. “Suit yourself,” she said crossly. “It’s not carcinogenic.”
Oliver reappeared suddenly, standing over us with painfully red eyes. “Eden?”
“Yeah?”
“My bag?”
I picked it up from the ground and handed it to him, feeling the weight of the bottle inside.
“Care to join me for an ill-advised number of drinks?”
Gemma launched herself to her feet. “Of course.”
Oliver blinked impatiently. “I meant you, my new friend,” he said, fixing his attention on me.
Gemma gave me a jealous glare.
“No,” I said, nearly stuttering at this alien proposition, “I don’t really—”
He rolled his eyes, turned to the others. His interest in me had dissipated. “Anyone trying to get plastered?” His words were well received: the people around me took last drags of the hookah, and then we all shuffled into the kitchen, where Oliver passed around the Jose Cuervo from his backpack. He nudged a red cup into my chest. “Drink up.” He smiled stupidly, eyes glossed. “If Amir indulges, so can you.”
“Ignore him.” Amir grimaced from a shot. “He can be an asshole.”
Oliver took a long gulp. “Between you and me,” he whispered when Amir’s head was turned the other way to greet someone, “I’d be on crack by now if I were Amir. It’s no wonder he drinks.”
“Pardon?”
“His family situation. His mom, his grandpa. You’ll see.” Oliver raised his cup and left me.
Two girls sauntered over. The first, short with straight brown hair, wrapped an arm around Amir, completely ignoring me. The other was taller, fairer, her hair a blondish-red. She regarded me with momentary interest. “What’re we drinking?”
