Tell It to Naomi

by Daniel Ehrenhaft

  For a terrible instant I was worried I’d offended her. (I knew where I stood with him.) But then she burst out laughing. She slipped into old-drunk mode again, slamming her list on the table. Her bracelets jangled. A tear fell from her cheek.

  Zeke just smiled. His eyes were like two blocks of ice.

  I took the opportunity to turn and bolt, brave soul that I was. My plate nearly slid off my tray.

  “I’ll see you guys later!” I yelled over my shoulder.

  Celeste kept cackling away.

  “Yeah, later, bro,” Zeke called after me.

  I’m pretty sure he meant we should see each other much later—if at all. Either that or he meant to kick my ass. Realistically I’d have to say the latter. So on the plus side, I didn’t need one of his palm readings to glimpse the future. No, it was all taking shape before me, as clear as a crystal ball: Ezekiel Beck—prophet, singer/songwriter, surrealist, Seuss lover … the New Age guru with the washboard abs—was going to pulverize me. And somewhere down the line he would start dating the one girl at school I actually cared about.

  But hey, at least the future couldn’t get any worse, right?

  Ha, ha.

  I should have known not to ask myself stupid questions like that.

  All during last period the sky began to darken. The clouds came together in that certain evil grayish black swirl—like the cafeteria’s mashed potatoes—when you know it’s not just going to rain, it’s going to pour. Sure enough, five minutes before the final bell the floodgates opened. I hadn’t brought a raincoat, of course. So I did what I always did in those circumstances: I loitered on the steps with all the other unprepared chumps, praying for a miracle—and then I gave up and ran the ten blocks home, splashing and cursing.

  That’s when I saw Cheese for the first time since our fight.

  It had been one full week.

  He was scurrying downstairs to the lobby. Some kid was with him. I wondered if it was that “sick” guitarist. Not that it mattered. No, whoever it was, I got the picture: our pact about school was now officially kaput. Cheese was no longer simply befriending his coworkers; he was taking his job home with him.

  I wiped my dripping nose with a wet sleeve. Neither Cheese nor his friend was wearing a raincoat. They weren’t carrying umbrellas, either. Odder still, they looked like they were playing dress-up. Both had on identical black suit jackets, thick black belts, Doc Martens… Even their brown bangs were the same length. Maybe this kid was an only child, too. Maybe he and Cheese were trying to make up for their lack of siblings by pretending to be twins.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “What’s the dilly, son?” Cheese asked.

  I couldn’t tell if he was talking to me or the other guy. He’d never called me “son” before—but I suppose it was an improvement over “dude.” And “dilly”? … I decided to start from scratch.

  “What’s up?” I said.

  “Crime,” the other guy answered.

  Both he and Cheese laughed. I watched as they strolled right past me.

  “You know, it’s pouring outside,” I said.

  Cheese shrugged. “It’s real, son.”

  The other guy pushed through the door and marched out into the rain. Cheese trailed behind him. I felt the same nausea I’d felt when Naomi had suggested there were a hundred wiseasses just like Cheese at Roosevelt. Maybe she was right. Maybe there were. Clearly, I had no idea what kind of a wiseass he was anymore. I supposed I should be happy for him, though: new friends, new look, new language—a language that wasn’t even linguistically related to MTV Award Show Speak. I’d barely understood a word he’d said.

  Later, son! I yelled silently.

  At the last moment Cheese hesitated in the doorway. He turned to me. I couldn’t see his eyes. His hair hung practically to his nose.

  “Yeah?” I said, giving him one more chance.

  He shook his head. “Nothing,” he mumbled.

  “Where are you going, anyway?” I asked.

  “I’m going to look for a place that sells waterproof microphones,” he said.”I want to stage-dive into a big vat of gravy. You know, when the time comes to perform live. But I can only pay by homemade personal check. Or the barter system.”

  In spite of the heinousness of it all, I laughed. I hated myself for it.

  “Come on, Greg,” the other guy called.

  My jaw dropped. “Greg?” I cried. “Whoa … wait. Greg?”

  Cheese chewed his lip. “It’s my name, Dave,” he said.

  I had no idea how to respond to that.

  As it turned out, I didn’t have to. Cheese looked up at me as if to add something—then turned and slunk out the door, disappearing with his twin into the storm.

  * * *

  Upstairs, I found Naomi frantically pacing the front hall and muttering to herself. She’d probably lost her wallet. She’d been doing that a lot lately. It looked as if she were playing dress-up, too. She had on a formal, professional-type black pantsuit, and her hair was actually brushed. And she was wearing eyeliner. She hardly ever wore makeup. She hadn’t even worn any for her date with Joel Newbury.

  “Have you seen my wallet?” she asked.

  “I’d say check your room, but I wouldn’t go in there without a survival kit. What’s going on?”

  “I’m supposed to meet Joel’s friend from the Village Voice right now,” she grumbled. She started rooting through the basket full of keys we keep by the door. “I’m seriously late.”

  “You can borrow a couple of bucks from me if you want,” I offered.

  “Really?” She flashed me an eager smile. “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah, it’s no big deal.”

  She sighed. “Thanks, Dave.”

  I shrugged and dug through my pocket, pulling out a few crumpled bills. It wasn’t a big deal at all, in fact. Nope. It wasn’t like I needed the cash this afternoon. I sure as hell didn’t have anyone to meet, or rain to get caught in, or bands to start with clones.

  “You’re a lifesaver,” Naomi said. She grabbed the money from me and strode toward the door, her heels clattering. “Hey, is it still raining?”

  “It’s real, son.”

  She glanced over her shoulder. “Huh?”

  “Yeah, it’s still raining,” I said as I dripped.

  Her nose wrinkled. “Are you okay?” she asked.

  “Never better.”

  “Really?” She reached into the closet for an umbrella. “You seem sort of bummed.”

  “Life is peachy,” I said.

  “You are bummed. And who says peachy? Oh, I almost forgot! I have some news that will cheer you up. Joel just called. He told me that the response to the first column blew his mind. He said maybe two dozen kids have come up to him in the past two days asking who Naomi is.” She laughed. “He said that the column single-handedly got the student body to start reading the school paper again. They ran out of copies of yesterday’s edition! Isn’t that awesome?”

  Awesome?

  I could think of another word. Call me sour, but I couldn’t find it “awesome” that so many kids were so psyched about something I’d done and Joel Newbury was somehow taking credit for. Or at least partial credit.

  “Dave?” Naomi prompted.

  Faked a big smile.”Yeah!” I exclaimed. “Awesome!”

  She smirked. “You have to get over this problem you have with Joel,” she said. “He’s not a bad guy. You just have to get to know him. Give him a chance.”

  “I didn’t say anything,” I protested

  “Yeah, you did,” she said gently. She glanced at her watch. “Damn. All right, I gotta go. But look, Joel told me that he wants the column to run daily instead of weekly. He’s really excited. He says he can use it to transform the whole school paper. I told him I had to think about it. But you know … it could be really cool. I mean, I never imagined this whole thing would take off so last. So let’s you and me talk later. I’ll be back in, like, two hours. My computer is on if you
want to go through the e-mails we got today. And thanks again for the money. Cheer up, all right?”

  She slammed the door behind her.

  I blinked.

  A small puddle of rainwater had begun to form at my feet.

  Well.

  At a time like this—after school on a typical Wednesday, the “hump” day, if you will—a young man sometimes takes stock of how his week is going thus far. He might think of ways to improve it.

  I could think of several. I could order fifty pounds of lima beans and wolf them all down until my stomach exploded in a slimy green bloodbath. That would be an improvement. I could impale myself on a ground-up collection of smooth jazz CDs. Yes, that was another option. Then there were rats… Hmm. For some reason I couldn’t seem to come up with any improvements that didn’t involve my own gruesome death.

  But, hey, what did I have to be so depressed about? Joel wanted to run the column daily! Great! I could entertain Celeste and Zeke five times a week instead of just once! And if all it took was that first short response to FONY to bring the two lovebirds together—to help Zeke overcome his shyness and to compel Celeste to wear those pale green pants … well, gee! Think of how fast their torrid romance would blossom if they could soak up my “genius” (yes, Prophet Beck’s actual word, if you remember) every single day of the goddamn year!

  I had nothing to be depressed about.

  Nope. Life wasn’t just peachy Life was wonderful. Life was sublime.

  Once again, I could see the future without the aid of a palm reading: Naomi would soon return home from her triumphant meeting at the Village Voice, having landed the perfect gig there, something in the six-figure range. Plus, she’d have already secured a film deal and book contract about her so-called cutting-edge teen advice column—which meant, of course, that “Tell It to Naomi!” would definitely have to run daily. Which also meant my own work was cut out for me. I’d have to answer roughly 43,281 e-mails a day with subject headings like “yo yo yo whaddup bee-atch!!!” On the plus side, our family would move to that fabulous new apartment in a doorman/elevator building we’d been fantasizing about. On the minus side, Joel Newbury would move in with us, since he and Naomi would have eloped—

  My ears perked up.

  There was faint laughter outside in the stairwell, gravelly and all too familiar … But, no, it couldn’t be. Not this early in the day.

  “Who wears heels in the pouring rain?” a voice asked.

  It was.

  The lock clicked. The door flew open.

  Mom and Aunt Ruth shambled into the apartment: a dripping, unwieldy mass of matching yellow rain gear.

  “Dave!” Aunt Ruth cried.”Guess what? We got a raise!”

  My eyes widened. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt as if I’d been socked in the stomach.

  Mom swept me into her arms and kissed me on the cheek. “Isn’t it wonderful? We weren’t even expecting—” She broke off and pulled away from me. “Dave, you’re soaking. Didn’t you listen to the weather report this morning?”

  “I … I guess—”

  “Mr. Schwartz buzzed us in right after lunch,” Aunt Ruth interrupted, out of breath. “At first your mother and I thought we were going to be fired! But he was all smiles, so we just knew the news was good. He asked about you, too, Dave.” She squirmed out of her coat and boots and left them in a heap by the door. “You remember Mr. Schwartz, don’t you? Our boss? The fellow with the mole on his chin?”

  “You’re going to catch pneumonia,” Mom scolded me. She tossed her wet raincoat on top of Aunt Ruth’s. “You should dry yourself off, no?”

  I shrugged. “I’m okay.”

  “I vote we all go out to dinner tonight to celebrate,” Aunt Ruth said. She padded into the kitchen in her stocking feet. “Where do you want to go, Dave? That Chinese place on Second Avenue? Or Don Vito’s? Anywhere you want. The sky’s the limit. Where’s Naomi running off to, by the way? We just passed her outside. The hurry she’s in! We didn’t even have a chance to tell her.”

  “She, uh … she’s going to meet a friend of that guy who teaches at my school…”

  “Guess how much Mr. Schwartz gave us,” Mom whispered. As if by magic, she produced a towel. She handed it to me, smiling joyously. “A fifteen percent pay increase! Both of us!”

  “That’s … um, fantastic.”

  “Where did you say Naomi was going?” Aunt Ruth called.

  I opened my mouth, but the staccato opening riff of “Purple Haze” suddenly blared from the kitchen stereo: baow!-BAOW!-baow!-BAOW!-baow!-BAOW! … (If you’re not a Jimi Hendrix fan—and at that moment I wasn’t sure if I was—take it from me: that opening is by far the weirdest, most dissonant guitar line he ever recorded. Even at a reasonable volume it makes you feel like you’re being trampled by a circus parade. So there wasn’t much point in trying to answer her.)

  “Dry off and come celebrate with us, okay?” Mom yelled over the music. She gave me another quick peek on the cheek and hurried to join Aunt Ruth.

  I wanted to go celebrate with them. I honestly did. This was good news. Great news. But if I went in there, I’d just spoil the party. And they deserved to party.

  We all deserved to party.

  No—on second thought, that wasn’t quite true. Mom and Aunt Ruth deserved to party because they’d earned something. They’d worked their butts off, and they’d successfully accomplished their mission: to bring home more money so that all of our lives would be better.

  Mazel tov to them.

  And if Naomi landed a gig at the Village Voice, then she deserved to party, too.

  Mazel tov to her.

  Even Cheese deserved to party. He’d accomplished his mission. He’d met the right new people to start an actual, nonjoke band. (True, the mission forsook everything he’d once stood for, and those right new people were idiots, but I had to give him credit.)

  I was the only one who didn’t deserve to party.

  I hadn’t accomplished any mission. I didn’t even have a mission—which was the problem. Sure, moping around and fantasizing about humorous forms of suicide occupied my time … but in the end it got me as far as practicing guitar. I needed a concrete, realistic goal. I needed a reason to get up every morning, to smile at myself in the mirror after I brushed my teeth and say, “You’re one step closer.” I needed—

  That’s when it hit me.

  Yes.

  It was the same kind of epiphany I’d had a week earlier, when I’d come up with the whole advice column idea in the first place. And it was as clear to me as the lines on Celeste Fanucci’s palm must have been to Zeke Beck.

  It would solve all my problems. It would take my mind off Cheese (sorry—“Greg”) and his new clones. It would clue me in to insights I could never have even imagined. But most importantly, it would allow me to focus on what truly mattered: namely Celeste herself.

  I’d wanted to write an advice column, right? I’d gotten myself into this mess, hadn’t I?

  So I would make the most of it.

  I would harness the columns power. People wouldn’t tell it to Naomi. I would tell it to them. I would use the column—subtly, delicately, but also very obviously—to show everyone at Roosevelt High what a fool Zeke Beck was. But I wouldn’t mention his name, of course. Oh, no. I would be very very clever. Because if all it took was Dr. Seuss to get two strangers talking, to get this ridiculous buzz started around the halls … well, imagine what I could do if I actually put some careful thought into my responses?

  Yes. It was awesome that Joel wanted to run the column daily It was a blessing. Because FONY, Hospital Girl—all of them would be transformed. They would become the tools I would wield to dig an unbridgeable chasm—a truly unbridgeable chasm—between Zeke and Celeste. Whatever a kid’s problem or question, my advice would always include the same subliminal message: palm-reading morons were not right for beautiful brand-new seniors. No. Witty, sensitive, Hendrix-loving sophomores who didn’t talk like other guys were. And everyon
e who read the column (yes, you, Celeste!) would soon come to see this as the Truth.

  And they wouldn’t even know it.

  It was brilliant.

  Or like all good epiphanies, it was completely twisted.

  Or it was both. But I had my mission.

  “Am I happy or in misery?” Jimi sang from the kitchen. “Whatever it is, that girl put a spell on me…”

  * * *

  You have 71 new messages

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  My mission ended up being a little more complicated than I’d expected.

  The first inkling of a possible snag came the following night. We’d just returned from our big celebratory feast at Don Vito’s. Mom and Aunt Ruth had decided to postpone the Mr.-Schwartz’s-raise blowout from Wednesday to Thursday because the rain wouldn’t stop. Also, Naomi didn’t get back from her meeting at the Village Voice until nine.

  Coincidentally, Joel’s friend turned out to be a guy Naomi had known from journalism school … Brian Something. We’d never heard of him. He didn’t offer her a gig, either. She didn’t even know it was going to be the same Brian until she saw him face to face. But she did say that they “got into an amazing conversation about recycling on the Upper West Side”—which was why she came home so late.