Intentions (18 page)

All of a sudden a deep male voice booms right next to us.

“Hey, you two.” It’s McKelvy, who is lucky enough to have cafeteria duty at this historic moment. “Stop right now, or you’ll have detention for the rest of your lives.”

They don’t stop.

“Separate detention. You will never see each other again.” He’s bellowing now, so everyone all over the cafeteria can hear him. Ohmygod. They still don’t stop.

Finally, McKelvy whacks Chase on the side of the head, risking arrest, or at least being fired, but nobody, nobody, would turn him in. He is practicing an old-fashioned form of birth control.

Goo-goo and Gaga finally stop kissing. They pull apart, and the whole cafeteria starts clapping and whooping. Autumn looks around the room, gets it, and runs out, crying. Chase, on the other hand, pumps his fist into the air, and the crowd cheers. McKelvy grabs him by the shirt collar, pulls him to his feet, and says, “Detention for a week! Meet me in the principal’s office after you’ve, uh, calmed down.” I look at Chase’s pants, and yeah, he’d better calm down.

Zoë and I laugh hysterically as soon as McKelvy leaves our table. So does everyone else in the cafeteria. Even Chase. For a few seconds I feel normal, and grateful to Chase and Autumn for being more screwed than I am.

The bell rings, and everyone starts to leave. I neaten up my tray and turn to say something to Zoë. But she’s not at the table. She’s vanished into the crowd.

CHAPTER 25

TIKKUN OLAM

I’ve almost made it through the week. Very few Jake sightings. He seems to have taken an invisibility pill himself. In a way I’m relieved. It hurts so much to think about him.

It’s Friday, and McKelvy is supposed to go to Union with me today. He’s never been to the reading lab. I’m glad he’s coming. But maybe Randy won’t even be there. No, Mrs. Glick would have called me if he wasn’t going to be there. He’ll be there. But what kind of shape will he be in? I’m nervous. I haven’t been nervous since that first day.

Maybe McKelvy’ll give me the inside scoop on what’s happening with Chase and Autumn. My carrot as I trudge through the rest of the day.

Math class is fun. If
fun
is a synonym for
torture
.

I sit in the back, as usual. I know this is a bad idea. I should sit in the front row and pay close attention. Instead I let myself space out.

All of a sudden I hear, as if coming from a muted bullhorn, “Rachel, Rachel Greenberg, did you not hear me or are you ignoring me?”

Oh crap. I look up at the front of the room. He’s got another one of those sequences on the board.

“I don’t know,” I say.

Mean Scary Math Teacher whips his face to the right and says, “Kenny?” to the math genius who sits next to me.

Kenny clears his throat, says, “I am trying to determine if there is a pattern to the integers, and what I see is that each one following is half the previous one plus two, but—oh, I get it!” He laughs delightedly. “Fantastic! It’s thirty-seven, of course.”

Of course.

Once again I think of Randy. I have
got
to help him.

When I get to McKelvy’s room, he says he can’t go. He has to deal with the Chase and Autumn situation, mostly a few “little repercussions” from whacking Chase on the head.

“I’m not going to get fired or anything,” he reassures me when tears start to puddle in my eyes. “I have to explain why I hit him. I have to give them my justification, to prove it was legitimate. So, what was my justification?”

I laugh even though I want to cry. I guess I didn’t know how much I was looking forward to his coming to Union with me. “The whole cafeteria will back up your justification. It’s called birth control.”

“Tell me about it,” he says.

I want to give him a hug, but the last thing I want to do is get him in trouble for hugging a girl. I’m pretty sure he’s gay, but just in case the Powers That Be don’t know that, I’m not going to touch him.

“You’ll go with me another time,” I tell him, and I smile at him even as the tears spill out of my eyes.

“Are you OK?” he asks, but before I can say anything, his class phone rings.

“Uh-oh,” he says as he picks it up. After he listens for a minute, he mouths, “Principal.”

“I’m fine,” I say. “Good luck.” I give him a pat on the arm as I leave the room.

The minute I walk in, Randy runs to me with a huge pile of books and an even huger grin. My little boy.

“You’re late!” he says.

“I am?” I look at Mrs. Glick. She shakes her head. I have made a point of not being late since that first day.

“Randy has been really eager for you to get here, so his teacher let him come down early.”

“Wassup, dude?” I say to him.

He giggles. He always giggles when I call him dude. “I have a prize for you!”

“A prize?” I say. “Why do
I
get a prize?”

“I mean a surprise. Sit down!” he yells while he’s jumping up and down.

Mrs. Glick says, “Randy, inside voice, please. I know you’re excited, but …” at the same time I say, “Randy, dude, you’re going to drop those books!”

“OK!” Randy whispers. The loudest whisper I have ever heard, and I erupt into giggles, too. We fall onto the car pillow, and he puts his head on my shoulder briefly. Maybe I’ll never leave the reading lab.

“Which book do you want to start with?” I ask him. Randy pulls out a book. “This is a new one Mrs. Glick got for me,” he says.

“
Go, Dog. Go!
by P. D. Eastman,” I announce. I know this book very well. It has a dog in a car on the cover, but it’s not about cars. “Randy, you sure you want me to read you this one?”

“No,” he says.

“OK, so which one?”

“No—I mean, are you ready for my surprise?”

I nod.

Randy takes the book from me, opens it, and starts to read. “ ‘Dog. Big dog. Little dog.’ ” He is not faltering at all. “ ‘Big dogs and little dogs.’ ”

He looks up at me and smiles. I stare at him.

“Oh my gosh!” I say, tears filling my eyes. He’s reading.

I should be totally and unselfishly happy, but I am not. I’m happy. But I also feel robbed.

“ ‘Do you like my hat? I do not like it,’ ” Randy reads. With
expression
.

He finishes the book without making a mistake, not a single mistake. How did that happen?

“Randy, that was amazing! I am so proud of you!” I say, because I am, even though I feel let down. I wasn’t there when
it
happened. I wasn’t the one who taught him to read.

“When did you learn to read?” I ask him, willing myself not to cry.

“I don’t know,” he says, shrugging. “All of the sudden I saw the words—”

“His teacher called me—it was a few days ago.” Mrs. Glick
is standing next to us. “She said Randy picked up a book and just started reading it. Sometimes, like I told you when you first started, it just clicks.”

“It didn’t just click,” yells Randy. “I worked hard at it!” For the first time ever I see him angry.

“Of course you did, Randy. I know that!” I say.

“You sure did,” Mrs. Glick says.

“I’m so very proud of you!” I say. Thunderstruck is more like it. But I am happy for him. I AM. He got it. Himself. This is the best thing that could have happened. “SO PROUD!” I yell in a Randy voice.

“Thank you, Rachel,” he says, and gives me a big hug. “I love you.”

I want to tell him, No, you don’t love me, you love yourself. But instead I say, “I love you, too, Randy.” And we spend the rest of the period in a reading-and-love-fest.

I stay after class, and Mrs. Glick and I beam at each other for a few minutes. I am totally over feeling cheated. I am beside myself with happiness for Randy. It’s so great he did it himself.

“It’s huge for him,” Mrs. Glick says.

“But the rest of his life is in the toilet,” Mrs. Washington says. “His grandma’s got end-stage cancer.”

“How bad?” I ask, stupidly.

“She might only have weeks left,” Mrs. Glick says.

“I heard days,” says Mrs. Washington.

“What does this mean for Randy? Where will he go?”

Mrs. Glick shakes her head. “We don’t know.”

I walk the whole way home. It gives me a lot of time to think.

There are no cars in the driveway. I’m disappointed. I wanted to tell Mom about Randy. But at least nobody’s kissing someone she’s not supposed to kiss in the driveway. I push that thought away fast.

I see Mom’s taken chicken out of the freezer to defrost. I open the fridge and can tell what she’s planning to make for Shabbat dinner: roast chicken with potatoes and carrots, a salad on the side. It’s one of her usual dinners. I’ve helped many times.

I turn on the radio. It’s set to NPR. I don’t change it. I want someone else’s thoughts in my head for a change.

I wash the chicken and pat it dry. It’s almost defrosted. I brush the roasting pan with oil, very lightly, though I’m not sure if I have to. I can’t remember if Mom does that or not.

I put the chicken in and season it with salt, pepper, garlic powder. What else? I shake on some oregano and basil. I have no idea if that’s what Mom does, but …

OK. Next. Should I scrub or peel the potatoes? I bet Jake could tell me. They’re those nice red ones, so I scrub them. I toss them in a little olive oil and garlic salt and then grind some black pepper on them, put them around the chicken. I peel the carrots, cut them up a bit, and throw them into the pan, too. Oops, I forgot to preheat the oven. I set it to 425° F, and while it’s heating up I wash the lettuce and spin it dry. It’s my least favorite job, so I change the station to music. A mostly oldies station. I wash and spin to the Beatles. I like them. Even if Alexis doesn’t. “Alexis who?” I say out loud.

In some ways it’s a relief to be done with her. Or at least to know where I stand.

When the oven beeps, I put in the roasting pan and go back to the salad.

Rufus Wainwright is singing “Hallelujah.” I
love
him.

What about dessert? Do I have time to make something? If we have apples, I could make apple crisp. Or is that being too ambitious? I think of Randy’s face beaming with pride. I think of his grandmother. Apple crisp it is.

I find apples, flour, brown sugar, butter, and get to work. I’ll put it in the oven when the chicken is finished. It’ll be ready by the time we’re done eating dinner.

“Yesterday, all my troubles …” No way. I switch the station to indie rock.

I lose myself in the cooking and the music. As I’m finishing assembling the crisp, Mom comes in, muttering to herself about how late it is.

“Oh my God! What smells so good? Did I clone myself?”

“Hi,” I say, turning down the music.

She looks at the apple crisp, peeks in the oven, and throws her arms around me.

“Rachel, you are a lifesaver!” she says into my back. I turn around so we’re in a real hug.

“I got stuck at the Laudenslagers’ house, and I didn’t know what I was going to do about dinner. Grandma’s coming, and I’m taking her to temple, so we really need to eat by six-thirty. Thank you! Oh, thank you!”

Is she crying? I hold on to her as long as possible.

Dad comes in the door with Grandma and a challah from our favorite bakery just as the timer beeps.

“Perfect timing!” I say.

“You cooked?” asks Dad, and I nod.

Dinner is delicious—everyone says so. Mom and Dad seem OK with each other, and even Grandma seems more or less normal.

When I bring in the apple crisp, they are knocked over.

And—Glory be to God!—no one pressures me into going to temple. Mom asks once, halfheartedly, if I want to go, but when I say I’m too tired, she lets it go. Dad and I do the dishes, and then he goes downstairs and I go into the den and watch TV.

When Mom comes in, she bends over and kisses me.

“Thank you so much for making dinner, Rachel. I love you.” I can’t get out the words “I love you, too” without crying.

I have been such a bad girl.

I squeeze her really tight for the second time today. And then I spend the rest of the weekend plotting.

CHAPTER 26

FLOODING

I’ve gone over and over in my mind the order in which I should do things. The
keva
of my atonement.

Should I go to Morrison’s first? Alexis’s mother? Should I talk to my own mother? Should I confront the rabbi? I mean, he started the slide into the hell that is now my life. Maybe if I confront him, chase away those demons, I will be back to where I was. Who I was. In my heart I know I will never be back to where I was, but.

But.

But I always end up at the same place. And it surprises me. Jake. I miss Jake. I miss who I am when I’m with Jake. I want him. I need to have him on my side. Then I will have the strength to do everything I need to do. Is this totally retro? I don’t care. I need my boyfriend.

On Monday I corner Jake by his locker first thing in the morning.

“Walk home with me,” I say to him.

“Why should I?” he asks with a harshness to his voice I find in no way sexy.