Intentions (13 page)

I go to the cupboard, take out a glass, and hand it to Dr. Schmidt. He pours himself some water, finishes it in one gulp, and pours another. “I’m taking this up to your mom,” he says to Jake.

Then to me: “Do you need a ride home?”

“No, my dad can get me.”

“She was just about to call,” Jake says.

I was?

CHAPTER 17

BLAH, BLAH, BLAH

We stand outside waiting for my dad. We don’t talk, and it’s awkward. But after a few minutes, Jake kisses me. A real kiss. A long, luscious kiss. Now I’m really confused. This guy is mercurial. I love that word. I love kissing him.

“I’m really sorry,” he says. “I shouldn’t have taken it out on you. I’m sorry.”

“It’s OK,” I say, and I think it is. He’s not perfect, but that’s a good thing, right?

When my dad pulls up, Jake opens the car door for me and nods at my father.

“Good night, Jake,” I say.

“Hi,” says Dad as I get in.

“Hi.”

We ride in silence, the radio on the jazz station Dad loves. Finally (it’s been a whole two minutes), I can’t stand it anymore. I text Jake.

Thank you
.

He texts me right back.

You’re welcome
.

I text him again.

It was delicious
.

He texts me.

So were you
.

I sigh. Loudly.

Dad looks over at me. “What?” He has a hopeful look on his face, but his forehead is wrinkled.

“Nothing.” I hold my phone to my heart.

Dad stops at a stop sign but does not go again, even though there is no one else at the intersection. He puts the car in park, turns off the ignition.

“You OK, Rachel?”

I look at him. “Yes. No. Yes. I don’t know,” I say, because it is the truth. Jake has me very confused.

“I love you, Rachel. And I know this is hard for you.”

What is he talking about?

“But we’ll work it out, I hope. Your mother and I. I mean, I know we will.”

Oh.

“OK,” I say. “Good.”

Dad starts up the car and drives us home.

When I wake up in the morning, my first thought is not about Jake. It’s about my father. In those few minutes between sleep and wake, when fragments of my dreams are still dusting my consciousness, the loud words in my head are: I blew it. I should have talked to Dad. I should have asked him about what was going on with him and Mom. Would he have told me the truth?

I get out of bed and keep thinking as I try on outfit after
outfit. I finally settle on tight jeans and a black top, kind of low-cut. I will definitely put a jacket on so Mom doesn’t bother me.

I have never
dressed
for Sunday school before. I’m lucky if I even wash my face. Today I definitely wash it (still have some makeup on from last night), and I put on some eye liner and lip gloss. I want to make Jake wish he had not let me out of his arms last night.

I smile at myself in the mirror. The hair around my face is curling a little, but I kind of like that. I think I look pretty, beautiful maybe. Two days in a row! “Beauty comes from inside, Rachelleh,” I hear Grandma’s voice telling me.

I am ready to leave early enough to be able to walk. So I tell Mom and Dad I don’t need a ride. They are sitting next to each other at the kitchen table, drinking coffee, looking OK, normal even.

“You look really pretty, Rachel,” Mom says.

I can tell there is a question in her voice, but I ignore it. “Thanks.” As a little gift, I am careful not to slam the door behind me as I leave.

What a beautiful morning! The sky is so blue, the air so crisp. It is one of those days that makes autumn my favorite season. I can’t wait to see Jake.

Sunday classes aren’t really mandatory, like the Wednesday night ones are—they are only every other week, and usually it’s not the rabbi teaching, it’s someone else. It used to be that I didn’t want to go because it wouldn’t be the rabbi teaching. Now, of course, I’m praying it’s someone else, anyone else, so I don’t have to sit in the same room as His Hypocrisy.

But today I don’t really care, as long as I can see Jake. (I feel like this is a good sign—I am focusing on my own life, I am not obsessing about the stupid rabbi.) Maybe Jake and I will sit in the back and hold hands. Maybe we will walk home together, maybe we will …

But why should I be so lucky?

As I’m walking into the classroom, I get a text from Jake.

My coach called. I have to lift weights for

swimming. Sorry I won’t be in class
.

And then the rabbi walks in. Damn.

He smiles when he sees me, and I pointedly do not smile at him.

I go sit in the back, next to Adam. Who is next to Alexis. The rabbi starts to talk.

This is what I hear of what the rabbi says:

Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah God blah blah blah blah blah
kavanah
blah blah blah blah blah
Torah
blah blah blah
tikkun olam
blah blah blah blah blah morality blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
kavanah
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
tikkun olam
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah do unto others blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah Rachel? Rachel? blah blah intention and intentions, Rachel, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
keva
and
kavanah
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah intention blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
tikkun olam
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.

Shalom
.

When he’s done saying whatever he was saying, the rabbi takes off his glasses. “Thanks, everyone. See you on Wednesday.”

Then, “Rachel, come talk to me, please.” I stop for a second,
reflexively I guess, look at His Hypocrisy, feel sick to my stomach, turn around, and quickly leave before he calls me back.

I catch up to Alexis and Adam, who have bolted ahead, walking toward the Wawa.

“Alexis,” I ask hopefully, “do you want to come over, or go shopping?”

She looks at her phone and says, “Can’t. See ya,” and starts to walk away.

“Hey, wait,” says Adam. “I thought we were going to hang?”

“I have to go, sweetie,” she says, turning around and looking at him. “But I’ll talk to you later,” she says definitely just to him, and saunters away.

The two of us watch Alexis go.

“Hey, Rachel,” Adam says, putting his hand on my butt. “Wanna get high?”

“No thanks,” I say. Why does it feel good to have
his
hand on my butt? I leave. Fast.

CHAPTER 18

KISSING ELEPHANTS II

“And then, on the runway, with everyone looking—like, billions of people—she tripped on that stupid dress!” says Kendra.

“Fell on her face!” Marissa laughs.

“I bet she was high on something!”

“Her ego,” snarks Alexis.

Vintage Alexis. We all laugh, even me, which is weird because I don’t watch this show, never will. So not into it. I am a stranger in a strange land.

At that moment Jake appears beside me, as if God is reassuring me,
You are not alone
.

“I’m on a bathroom pass from French,” he says.

He bends down, moves my hair away, and whispers into my ear, his lips lightly touching my skin. “So will you walk home with me today? I mean partway—I have to go to swim practice.”

I have to swallow before I can speak. “Sure,” I tell him as nonchalantly as possible. I was going to stay after school and work on Yearbook, that’s what I told Mom, but Jake trumps Yearbook any day.

“Great,” he says, and turns to leave. But then he moves
closer, puts his hand on my shoulder, and whispers into my ear again, making me crazy. “See you later.”

I turn my head. I want to pull him to me, give him a long, deep kiss. Right there.

But of course I don’t.

I just nod, and savor the feeling of his hand on my shoulder and his lips on my ear and his fingers in my hair. I put my own hand on my shoulder, where his was, as I watch him walk away.

“What was
that
?” Alexis asks me. The look on her face is—what? Disapproval? Disdain? Envy? I can’t read her anymore.

I smile slightly but say nothing. I don’t want her to ruin this.

Before she can ask more, I stand up, dump my tray, and leave.

I have no idea what happens in any of my classes for the rest of the day. All I can think is: Jake.

At final bell I go to the nurse. I ask her for a toothbrush and toothpaste, and she gives me them, no questions asked. I put her near the top of my list of Decent Human Beings.

Jake is waiting for me in front of the building, near where we sat the day he told me about his brother. As soon as we get a block away, he pulls me behind a tree and kisses me.

Our first kiss is bumpy—literally. We bang noses and don’t quite get our mouths together. I am about to say something funny, but he takes my face in his hands and puts his mouth on mine, and it’s amazing how good this feels. It’s even better than Saturday night.

I love his lips, the scratchiness of his cheeks and chin, his hands in my hair.… I run my hands up and down his back, which makes me think of our dinner, which makes me think, for some reason, of our first time kissing on that other walk home,
and I think of how we talked about elephants and we are elephants kissing, and I pull back and look at him. “What?” he says. He looks wary even though I’m smiling.

“Nothing,” I say, and start to kiss him again.

“No, what?” he says, pulling away. “What is it?” Boy is he insistent.

“Elephants,” I say, “kissing elephants.” He grins a big grin, and I know he gets it.

“Oh, Rachel,” he whispers, “you are so beautiful and smart and funny and so …” and he kisses me on my neck and on my ear, the same ear that he whispered into before, and

I really do think I am in love with him.

After a while, I hear a shout and then more shouts and I realize that even though I feel like we are alone in the world, Jake and I actually are standing in a tiny grove of trees right next to a playground. There are little kids on the swings, in the sandbox, on the sliding board. I’m sure they can see us. I don’t think they
should
see us, especially since Jake now has his hand up my shirt, and I seem to have my hand in his back pocket, and we are both breathing hard.

I stop kissing him, and I pull out my hand.

“Can we walk a little?”

He nods. We start walking, holding hands, and are quiet for about a block. I assume we’re both trying to cool down a little when he says, “I still feel bad about the other night. I’m sorry I was such an ass about my potential little sister.”

“No,
I’m
sorry,” I say. “I should have been more sensitive.”

“No, no, it was
me
. You were perfect that night. You
are
perfect,” he says, and then he stops and he kisses me again, first gently, and then hard, urgent, until he pulls away, leaving me wanting more.

This is how the rest of the walk goes: we walk a block, talk a little, then one of us stops, grabs the other one, we kiss passionately, and then we walk on. (He does most of the grabbing, but I try to keep up.)

I wish I could get home like this every day: Walk, talk, stop, kiss. Walk, talk, stop, kiss. If I were a songwriter, I’d write a love song with that title: “Walk, Talk, Stop, Kiss.” Any doubts I have about Jake, like the kind of weird way he sometimes says things—“potential little sister”—or the way he can get moody, would not be in the song.

Or maybe those things should be in a love song, because nobody is perfect, even if he thinks I am.

I am going to stop overthinking this and let myself be happy.

Because I
am
happy. So happy.

Because of Jake. Because of who I am with Jake. Because of the world with Jake in it.

The more we kiss, the happier I am. Screw the rabbi. Screw my parents. Screw Alexis. Life is good. Better than good.

Even after we finally say good-bye and go our separate ways, I feel like I am flying, I feel like I could really fly … but I don’t want to get home too quickly, I don’t want to break the spell. And because it’s late in the afternoon now, one or both of them could be there, and they could be fighting—or worse, not talking to each other.

Mom’s not expecting me for at least another half an hour anyway. So I put on my love-song playlist and walk really slowly,
eating a granola bar, thinking about Jake and those kisses, wondering if I will be going to Planned Parenthood soon. The thought makes me happy and scared. Excited. Alive.