Sons of the 613 (20 page)

“Isaac, you should put some clothes on,” says Lisa disapprovingly.

I go to my room to get dressed. Patrick's clothes are strewn about. There is also some underwear of the very wispy, feminine variety lying on the floor, suggesting that Terri spent the night. I get dressed, averting my eyes from my bed, the scene of the crime.

I pass by the den, Terri saying, “Okay, Lisa, let's do your hair.”

 

When I get to the kitchen, Josh is there, measuring the burnt countertop with a tape measure. He straightens and jots something on a spiral notepad, then types something on his laptop, which is resting on the center island.

He doesn't say anything to me, so I finally say, “'Sup.”

He makes a grunting noise without looking at me, still typing, then starts scrolling through a web page. I wonder if he's going to bring up what happened yesterday, or if he even remembers it. He's probably just given up on me is what it is.

The room still smells of smoke. I'm sure it has worked its way into the walls and the curtains, tiny particles binding to all the surfaces, and the room is going to stink for weeks. I don't say this to Josh. Instead I say, “What's going on?”

“What do you mean?” he says, scribbling some more notes.

“I mean, I don't know. It's late.” I shrug.

“It's the Sabbath. Rest day.”

“Oh.”

“There's eggs on the table,” he says. He's dialing the cordless phone as he talks. “There's also some lox and bagels.”

I sit and eat, listening to him on the phone navigating his way through some voice-activated menu: “Kitchen. No, kitchen. Kitchen. Kitchen. Okay, operator. Operator. OPERATOR. Christ.”

He waits, then talks with someone about the types of countertops they have and whether or not he can come and buy something today. Halfway through he abruptly says, “Thanks. Gotta go,” punches a button, and puts the phone back to his head. “Hi, Mom.

Yes, everything is great. Isaac is better. Yes, he was in school yesterday. Not much is happening. Pretty standard Saturday. Yup, very boring here in ol' Minnesota, Mom.”

From the den comes more cackling and giggling and yapping. I roll my eyes and mutter.

“Here,” says Josh, and shoves the phone at me.

“Hi, Izzie!” says my mom. “Are you all better?”

All better. Everything is fine. Nothing unusual to report. No former meth dealers living here, or any strippers giving Lisa a makeover.

“Listen, Izzie, I was talking with Roni Weinberg,” my mom says. Roni, Eric's mom. “He's very lonely and upset, and you still haven't called him.”

“I will, Mom. I've been sick.”

“
Very
lonely. And I think he needs a friend.”

“I'll call him.”

“So Roni and I made a plan.”

“Oh, God, Mom, please tell me you didn't—”

“I think that you should spend some time with him.”

“Mom, I will, it's just that—”

“I mean, you're becoming a bar mitzvah, and if we're talking about mitzvahs, good deeds, what better thing than helping a friend?”

“I
will
help him.”

“Yes, I
know
you will.”

“I will. Wait a second—what do you mean?”

“What time is it there?”

“What? It's . . . eleven.”

“It is? Oh, well, he should be there about—”

The doorbell rings.

“Mom, I'm going to kill you.”

“I love you too, sweetie.”

M
ERIT
B
ADGE
: K
INDNESS TO A
F
RIEND IN
N
EED

Eric and I say hey to each other when I open the door, neither of us with particular enthusiasm. Then we stand there in silence, the two losers, until he says, “You know what? I don't want to be here either. My mom made me come.”

We're at that impasse when my brother looms behind me and starts pushing me out the door, forcing Eric to step back down the steps.

“C'mon. We're going,” says Josh, now marching past me and jumping off the front porch.

“What? What are you talking about?”

He turns and walks backwards on his way toward the garage. “We're buying a new countertop.” He points a finger at Eric. “You, too, Weinberg. Let's go.”

It's the confident tone of command, I think as we pull out of the driveway. That's how he does it. Like the Voice in
Dune,
or Obi-Wan convincing the stormtroopers they've got the wrong robots.

“These are not the droids you're looking for,” I mumble from the back seat.

“What?” says Josh, driving.

“Nothing.”

Eric is riding shotgun. Josh told him to. “You,” he said, aiming with a finger, “in here. You”—to me—“in back.” We obeyed instantly. Of course, Eric's unquestioning compliance could be due to the fact that he saw my brother nearly bat Tim Phillips's head off his shoulders yesterday.

Barely out of the driveway, Josh says to Eric, “You're not going to puke on my car, are you?” Eric sighs. “I'm kidding, dude.”

That's it for the talking as we drive. Josh snaps on the radio, loud, and yowls along, loud, grinning and nodding and singing to us, inviting us to join in. We decline. I'm thankful for the noise and distraction. I haven't spoken with Eric since the whole bar mitzvahpocalypse, and I feel guilty and excuseless, my craven behavior completely transparent. As we drive I try to think of how, exactly, we're supposed to start over again, what I'm supposed to say.

When we pull into the parking lot of the Home Depot and park, Eric hops out of the car and walks ahead of me without a word or a backwards glance. Maybe he's pissed at me, or maybe, I think, maybe
he's
ashamed to be seen with
me.
Maybe
I'm
the loser here. My disgrace might be fresher, but I don't think getting beat up and humiliated in front of the whole school ranks higher on the loser index than what happened to Eric, which is a lot more exotic and noteworthy, the sort of thing people will talk about for years. I almost want to remind him of that.

We enter the store in stretched-out single file: Josh in front, then Eric, then me. Inside, Josh finds an employee and stops to ask directions. Eric gravitates to a spot a few yards off to the right of Josh, I end up equidistant to the left, the both of us sort of shuffling around, shifting our weight, not looking at each other. Magnets both attracted to and repelling each other, not moving too far away but unable to get close. Floating in a cloud of awkward.

Josh gets his directions and strides off toward the depths of the store, and we trail behind, dragged along by the main magnet. He quickly starts to outpace us. About halfway down the endless wallpaper aisle I look up and realize that Eric has stopped. He's not exactly waiting for me, but he's not moving, either—just standing there in profile to me, arms crossed. I slow, unsure of what to do, then resume my normal walking speed, thinking to just pass him and catch up with Josh.

Instead, as I get near him, Eric says, “Hey.”

I stop.

He looks at me, then looks away, then does it a few more times, squirming a bit, clearly working on getting something out. I do my own squirming, both internal and external. Neither of us wants this confrontation right now, standing in an aisle at the Home Depot under the fluorescents.

“You know something?” he says, and then points an accusatory finger at me. “I thought you were my friend. But I guess I was wrong.”

It looks and sounds rehearsed. I can picture him standing in front of the mirror saying that to me, saying it all different ways, some worse than others. I wonder how many versions there were, and where this one lies on the scale from good to bad.

“Eric . . .” I say.

“I guess I was wrong,” he repeats, shaking his head.

I start to protest, excuses tumbling out, piling on top of each other:
I didn't do anything, What are you talking about, I was busy, I haven't been in school
—and then something unexpected happens. Something extraordinary. Profound, even. Right there in aisle seven. Something like the scene in
How
the Grinch Stole Christmas!
when he hears the
Whos
of
Who
-ville singing and a light goes on in his brain and his heart suddenly swells and he understands how wrong he's been.

I. Was. Wrong.

I say, “I'm sorry.”

I'm sorry.

It tastes unfamiliar and exceptional and righteous. It feels like what a grownup would say. Lesley would be proud of me.

I'm sorry.

Whatever Eric had been rehearsing in the mirror, he hadn't rehearsed for this. He's out of words, almost confounded.

“I'm sorry,” I say again, because it feels so good. “I was wrong.” The repetition is almost unfair, like hitting a guy when he's down.

“Oh,” he finally stutters. “It's okay.”

He shakes his head, looking down.

“You don't know what it's been like. No one will even talk to me,” he says.

“Yeah.”

“Not one person. I had frickin' food poisoning. It's not my fault. I could have died.”

I nod. “That sucks.”

“I've been thinking of changing schools,” he says.

Probably a good idea,
I think.

“Don't do that,” I say.

“Really?”

“Yeah. Screw 'em.”

“Yeah,” he says, uncertainly. “Yeah. Screw 'em.” He smiles briefly and shakes his head again. “How are you?” he says.

“What do you mean?”

“Come on. I saw it. I saw the whole thing with Tim Phillips.”

“Oh, yeah,” I say, dismissing that nonsense with an airy wave. “Whatever. They got nothing.”

“What?”

“They got nothing.”

He nods. I nod. We're nodding, agreeing that they got nothing. Then he says, “What does that even
mean?
”

“It means, they got nothing. You can't let guys like that get to you.”

“Huh,” he says. I have to admit it sounds better coming from Patrick.

We regard each other some more.

“So . . .” he says, “we friends?”

“Of course.”

He smiles, relieved. His eyes are wet. “All right.” He sticks out his hand. I shake it.

“Friends,” I say.

“Thanks,” he says, and I can see him trying to keep it together. This is a mitzvah, I can hear my mother saying, a good deed. It makes me feel good, knowing that I'm doing the right thing. I am the water on the parched landscape of his life. The balm on the wound. I am the sun rising after the endless night. I feel ashamed, again, thinking about what a coward I've been—it doesn't matter how close Eric and I are, he's still a friend. My friend has been suffering, and I abandoned him in a time of need. No more.

That's an actual life lesson, maybe the only one I've learned this week: If there's anything that makes you a man, it's sticking up for a friend, even when that friend is unpopular, and there's nothing more important than—OhmyGodthere'sPatriciaMorrison.

Oh my God. She's just rounded the corner at the other end of the aisle with Tracey Howat. They're walking with a man who must be Patricia's dad. They're about ten yards from us, drawing closer, pointing at and discussing the wallpaper samples on the side racks, seconds from noticing the two of us.
Hey, Tracey! Come help me pick out wallpaper for my bedroom, bestie! OMG, is that Eric Weinberg, the pants pooper? And look who he's with! OMG!! Let's tell
everyone!!

Eric is still grasping my hand. He's not even shaking it anymore, he's just sort of holding it while he wipes at his tears with the back of his other wrist, having a moment. The trio have paused about five yards away, having a wallpaper conference, and they're going to notice us in about three seconds.

“Okay, well, I should . . .” I stammer, trying to disentangle myself from his grip, my face starting to burn.

“What?”

“I need to see if my brother—”

Just then Tracey turns to see me and Eric standing there exposed, caught in the spotlight, holding hands, Eric all teary eyed, and I can see the rapid process as her brain analyzes the data, recognizes us, and spits out the result:
losers.
Now she's leaning over to whisper to Patricia and alert her to our presence, and before Patricia can react and turn toward us I jerk my hand roughly free of Eric's and take off running.

“Hey!” he shouts after me. “Hey, Isaac!” but I keep running, dodging fat people and orange shopping carts and leaping over cans of house paint.

I get clear of the aisle and sprint to the left and put some distance between me and the aisle opening, finding a spot amid a floor display of refrigerators from which to do some spying. A few seconds later Eric emerges and looks left and right. I hesitate, hidden in a forest of brushed-steel refrigerators, then step out and raise a hand to get his attention. He sees me but doesn't approach. He just stands there for a moment and looks at me, and the look says it all: He knows exactly what just happened back there in the aisle.

He glares at me hard, anger and grief and betrayal, an expression I'll never forget. Then he walks away, heading toward the exit.

 

He's not there when I go outside. Maybe he called his mother and she picked him up, I think, or he started walking home, or some combination of the two. I search for him for a few minutes, then kick one of those outdoor garbage cans that's encased in a pebble-encrusted barrel. However much quantity of good I was feeling about myself during my reformed-Grinch moment, I'm feeling that much bad, plus about ten percent. I wasn't the gentle rain on his arid landscape. I was peeing on it.

 

I can't find Josh in the store, so I wait by the entranceway, finally just taking a seat against the wall. He comes out about half an hour later, pushing a cart with a big box in it. AIR PURIFIER says the box.