In the Bible, Jacob, for some reason or other, went away and found an oasis where he saw the girl of his dreams, Rachel. I think she was drawing water from a well. Whenever a female character in the Bible is introduced, she is always drawing water from a well.
Anyway, Jacob just had to marry her. “Not so fast,” said her father. “You have to work for me for seven years before you can get her.” So for seven years Jacob lifted that barge, toted that bale, and did everything his pre-union, slave driver, future father-in-law thought of.
Then came the wedding day. Jacob had a hard-on for Rachel so all the blood rushed from his head and he acted stupid. He didn’t lift his bride’s veil to check if she really was Rachel. This was before the Better Business Bureau. So he marries his bride and finds out that she isn’t Rachel, but her older sister Leah. A woman who must have been so ugly that none of her fellow Bedouins wanted to marry her. And in case you don’t know what a Bedouin is, I think Yassar Arafat is one. So yeah, the Bedouins are no prizes either.
So Jacob’s father-in-law says, “Whoops, sorry, son. Wrong bride.”
Jacob is really pissed off. He tells his father-in-law that he wanted to marry Rachel, not Leah. The old skinflint tells him that: “One, a marriage is a marriage. You married that she-cow, I mean, my daughter, so you have got to live with her and two, you want a second wife? Not on your salary, boy. No, you are going to have to work twice as hard to get the money to support a second wife. Let’s say, seven more years, with no nights or weekends off. But hey, look on the bright side, now you can call me Dad.”
What does this have to do with me? Well my name is Rachel too, and it took my parents fourteen years (they keep telling me) to give birth to me. Fourteen years, exactly, from the night they got married to the day I was conceived. And they tried everything, boxers instead of briefs (what this has to do with it, I don’t know and furthermore, I don’t want to know), oysters, heat and ice, and just about anything you can think of. And then there were the two miscarriages they told me about in graphic detail. Repeatedly. Completely grossed me out. Of course, just the thought of my parents having sex grosses me out.
I don’t know if all that sex grossed them out but I do know that on their fourteenth wedding anniversary they gave up. They were never going to have a kid. It was either adopt some Vietnamese refugee baby or nothing. Raise a kid not their own? Couldn’t do that. “Every time we looked into its eyes we would be sad,” they said. So they found the cheapest gin they could find (apparently when old hippies get depressed they start drinking gin) and got plastered.
They wanted to feel suicidal so they snuck their gin into a movie theater that was playing Love Story. Every time Ryan O’Neal or Ally McGraw whined they took a swig of the gin and whispered to each other, “We will never have a kid of our own. Face it; our baby will be named Ho Chi Minh Jr.”
That night they made angry, depressed love (hopefully at home and not in the movie theater) and, miracle of miracles, they conceived me. Naturally they named me Rachel, the desired one.
You would think it would be great being the thing that your parents wanted more than anything else in the world. Right? Wrong!
I can’t do anything! When I go roller skating I have to wear these stupid kneepads. Every time I skate I hear, “Look it’s the bionic woman. That thing cost six million? Should have gotten a refund.” If my parents could find some sort of moveable, full body cast they would put me in it. What if I got into an accident? We have to make sure that our little love veal is protected at all times.
At all times means that I can’t hang out after school with my friends. No, I have to go to after-school acting classes, art classes. . . . I like them but once in a while I just want to stay home and be a normal kid. And normal kids hang out.
“Can we help it if their parents don’t love them as much as we love you, Rachel?”
Argh! I’m twelve. I was sick of being treated like veal, fed milk and kept in a cage so it won’t get hurt. And you know what they do with veal? Or at least kosher ones? They slit their throats! Non-kosher ones, they hit over the head with a hammer. I read The Jungle for school, so I know.
Well, no more! I didn’t want to be Rachel Ann Abramowitz, their little veal of love. I wanted to be a normal kid. I wanted to hang out with my friends at the 7-11 and get kicked out for loitering. I wanted to do something grossly stupid like smoking. Basically I wanted to come and go as I pleased and not be treated like a child.
There was a boy-girl party coming up and damn it, I was going to go! Every one else was going. And you know what? Most of them told their parents about it. Oh no, I couldn’t do that. If I told my parents I would hear, “I don’t know, Rachel. I don’t think you’re old enough for an unsupervised boy-girl party or even a supervised one. Maybe later.”
Which means:“What if our little girl gets emotionally hurt? What if they make her cry? What if our little girl gets physically hurt? Our baby Rachel covered in booboos? Can’t have that!”
I was going to that party! I couldn’t stand it anymore! I had to be a normal kid or I swore I would die. But of course I couldn’t get caught. If I got caught, I would hear, “Rachel Ann Abramowitz, did you plan to go to a boy-girl party without telling us? Well, young lady, I think it’s about time you learned to act like an adult. You are grounded. From now on you will only go to school! And art class, and acting. . . .”
So, how was I going to go to the party? By being brilliant, if I did say so myself. My friend Linda, whose parents call her their little lamb, wanted to go too. Little lamb. Yeah, she’s another one like me. Her parents wouldn’t let her go either ’cause she might get hurt.
So this was what we did. We each left notes to our parents saying that we would be at each other’s houses. We had to help our friend because her parents were sick. Really sick. Flu sick. Don’t bother calling sick. I mean Linda had such a hard time lately “basically having to live on her own,” because her parents were so sick. I had to go help her out. Good love veals always help people out. That way we can go to the party and not get caught. I had one problem though; when to leave the note?
If I left it before or after school, my parents, Asher Abramowitz, Staten Island’s public defender for the defenseless, and Deborah Abramowitz, Staten Island’s museum goddess (who could tell you everything about the history of Staten Island except why you should care) might find it and say, all together now, “Rachel Ann Abramowitz, what is this? Why didn’t you tell us? How can you just go? We should call Linda’s parents to make sure they are okay.”
“But they’re sick.”
“Well then you shouldn’t be going. You might catch the flu. We’ll go.”
The only answer was that I had to sneak out at lunch like the bad kids, run to my house, put the note on my fridge, and then run back to school. If I didn’t have to run and get terrified that I would get caught, I might have actually enjoyed hanging out with the bad kids. They probably have really cool lives. I mean, they don’t have to worry about what would be appropriate for a love veal to do. Of course I don’t know if they’re cool. I never cut class. Not appropriate for a little love veal.
Lunchtime is forty-five minutes. At the start of lunch I ran to the school’s side door because it lets out on to the park. I could run through the trees without someone seeing me, get home, and get back. If I stuck my hands straight out in front of my face I could push the door open as I ran. If I went through it slowly, I knew, knew, that I would get caught.
I hit the door, I was free and . . . I tripped.
“Aw didum fall down and go boom?” someone said.
Oh great I was busted. Seven years of detention with no chance of parole. Lift that barge in silence. No talking, Rachel, because you have been bad.
Okay, who was it? It was Kate O’Donnell, one of the bad kids who hang outside the school.
“Uh, hi, Kate. Can I get a little help here?”
The guy who gave me a hand up was her boyfriend Dean Cox. The one with the torn jacket and the torn face. He has a scar going from his eye all the way down to his chin. There is a rumor that it was his father who gave it to him. Along with Dean, someone else offered his hand to me. It was Dean’s friend, Adrian Hamilton. Yeah, that kid with the huge knapsack. An outside kid carrying lots of books? No, he carries pot in it that Kate sells. My mother is a big feminist but I don’t think she would be happy about that. Or me wanting to grab his hand.
But he’s hot! Really, really, really hot. He’s got dark hair down to his shoulders and always wears rock T-shirts (even in the winter) that show off his muscles. How a kid who is twelve has muscles, I don’t know. But he has lots of them. Especially pecs. I thought I would like to kiss them. I would have loved to do something wild and stupid with him that Asher and Deborah Abramowitz would never approve of.
“Rachel Ann Abramowitz? Skipping school?” said Kate between cigarette puffs.
“Can you guys, uh, let me go?” I said to Dean and Adrian who were holding my arms.
“Why?” said Kate between puffs.
“What do you mean why? I’ve got stuff to do.”
Kate looked at her watch, a Rolex. How much money does this girl make? “Miss Abramowitz,” she said, “lunch at William McKinley Junior High is only forty-five minutes. . . .”
“President,” said Dean.
“Thank you, Dean,” said Kate. “Lunch at President William McKinley Junior High School is only forty-five minutes, and you, little missy, have math class after lunch.”
“I’ll be back by then.”
“Oh yeah, right. You are just going out for a little stroll. I don’t think so, missy. I think we should march your little butt back inside and make sure you get to math class.”
Was she kidding? Worrying about me going to class? No one in President William McKinley Junior High School is allowed to go out for lunch. These kids weren’t just going out for a stroll; they were smoking and having a wonderful time. A good time that little love veals weren’t allowed to have. I did not want to stay there with Kate. She frightened me. Twelve-year-old girls who sell drugs and had the guts to wear Rolexes are dangerous. But most of all I needed to go to that party and I had no hope of doing that unless I got the note written. So. . . .
“Uh, guys, can you let me go?”
Dean and Adrian looked at Kate.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
“Uh, home.”
“Why?”
“What?”
“Why is a nice Jewish girl like you doing such a bad thing like cutting class?” Kate’s two henchmen looked at her to see if it was okay. She nodded yes, so they laughed.
What did this crazy chick want from me? All I wanted to do was go home and leave a fake message and run back to school before math class started. Was that too much to ask?
“Yes it is,” the ever-present parental voices that live in my head said in stereo. “Good girls do not skip school. Nothing good can come of it. And you are a miracle baby. So how can you be anything but good?”
What should I have said? What would have made her let me go? She was having fun with me. If that was her idea of fun, I would hate to see what her idea of a laugh riot was, and unless that crazy chick let me go, I was probably going to find out.
So what was the right thing to do? Tell her the truth? A lie? What?
“Good girls never tell lies,” said the stereo head-voices.
Yeah, well good girls don’t wear Rolex watches on their wrists.
“Uh, I left my watch at home,” I said. Stupid, stupid, stupid! Show her that you are obviously thinking about the ultimate symbol of her bad girlness.
Kate looked at me, puffed on her cigarette, and exhaled. As the smoke poured out of her mouth so did the word, “Liar!”
She snapped her fingers and Dean and Adrian pulled my arms behind my back.
“Ow! Quit it.”
Kate puffed on her cigarette slowly, agonizingly slowly, and exhaled.
Oh great, here it came.
“Why are you ditching school, Rachel?”
“Ow, ow, uh, my lunch. I left my lunch at home.”
“Liar!” The boys pulled harder and Kate puffed slower. I felt my arms being ripped from their sockets.
“Now then, Rachel, why. . . .”
“All right. All right. I’m going home to leave a fake note so I can go to the party tonight.”
“What party?” asked Kate.
“The boy-girl party,” I said.
“What boy-girl party?”
“You know, the one at Michelle Gellar’s house. . . .” I stopped. Maybe the reason Kate didn’t know about the party was that she wasn’t invited. And God I didn’t want to be the kid responsible for leading the Philistines to the party’s gate.
“Why wasn’t I invited?” said Kate. “I’m a fun girl.”
“Very fun,” replied Dean and Adrian.
“Hey!” said Dean to Adrian.
“Quiet you two,” snapped Kate. “Why wasn’t I invited?”
“I don’t know.”
They pulled my arms further back, if you could believe it.
“Why wasn’t I invited?”
“I have really no idea. Ow!”
“You see this? This is what happens when good girls lie,” said the voices in my head.
“Ow! All right. It’s because you, well, you know. . . .”
“No. What?”
“Sell drugs.”
Kate looked at me and took two puffs from her cigarette. I was in for it now.
“Rachel,” she said. “I don’t think you realize the great educational opportunities you are blowing by skipping school. President William McKinley Junior High School is one of the best schools in the city. Dean tell her about McKinley.”
Dean and Adrian stepped on my feet so I couldn’t kick them, pulled my arms high over my head, so I couldn’t move them, and then Dean said, “President William McKinley was born on January 29, 1843 in Niles, Ohio. . . .” And for what seemed like forever scarface Dean Cox lectured me on William McKinley.
“How do you know this?” I asked.
“I watch public television,” he said.
“See, Rachel, aren’t you glad you stayed in school? Where else can you get information like that. Besides,” said Kate who showed me the face of her watch, “math is only ten minutes away.”
“Ten minutes. I can’t make it to my house in ten minutes.”
“Oh well,” said Kate, “I guess you will just have to miss your party then.”
She smiled and Dean and Adrian let me go. Kate laughed and seeing that it was okay they started to laugh as well. I looked at them. I looked back at the school, looked back at them, and took off.
I had to go. But if I couldn’t get back in time? What would happen if I was late to math? I did not want to be late. How can I get out of being late? I could lie.
“Good girls don’t lie,” said the voices.
“I know. I know.” The voices certainly weren’t late. No, they were right on time with my math lesson. One veal of love plus two parents who never do anything wrong equal eternal guilt.
How could I get out of being in trouble? Where was I for twenty minutes? I was in the assistant principal’s office. Would Mr. Schwartz, my math teacher, buy that? Without checking? I mean I was the veal of love so I would never lie, of course, but then, what was I doing in the assistant principal’s office? Good veals never go to the assistant principal’s office. We don’t stay up past nine, we don’t eat sweets between meals, and we definitely do not go to assistant principals’ offices. Maybe I should have asked Kate how she gets away with cutting. Right, and maybe my parents would actually let me kiss a boy.
I was in the bathroom. For twenty whole minutes? I was sick. Oh yeah that would be good to say on the day of the party: “Kiss you? I’m not going to kiss you. You were hurling all afternoon.”
“I was dodging class, you idiot.”
“Yeah right. You were hurling.”
“Nah, maybe. . . . Maybe she was farting. Farting for twenty minutes! And she didn’t want anyone to know.”
“Somebody had the burrito surprise for lunch.”
God, sometimes boys can be really stupid.
So I ran back home and put the note on the refrigerator art gallery; each masterpiece was created by their miracle baby.
“What is it?” they would say when they saw it. “It is not a drawing. A poem perhaps? Oh, our daughter is helping out Linda. Isn’t she such dear love veal?”
I made it back to school. The “three stooges” were gone. I opened the door, and there was the assistant principal.
“Uh hi, Mr. Gambrelli. I was just. . . .”
“Cutting your math class, Miss Abramowitz?”
“No I wasn’t cutting. I have lunch this period. Yeah. And I really can’t eat with all those people around. It’s a thing I have.”
“You have math with Mr. Schwartz and you are twenty-five minutes late. Those equations won’t solve themselves.”
“But Kate O’Donnell and Dean Cox and Adrian Hamilton. . . .”
“Miss Abramowitz, grown ups do not blame others for their problems. Let’s grow up, shall we?”
“Okay, I’ll be an adult, and take full responsibility. So that means you won’t call my parents. Right?”
“If you have to ask that, then we are calling your parents. Oh, and in case you are wondering, you are getting detention today.”
“Mr. Schwartz,” said Mr. Gambrelli after he led me through the halls, “I have one of your wayward sheep here.”
“Miss Abramowitz? A good girl like you? I’m shocked,” said Mr. Schwartz. “What would your parents say?”
I didn’t have to wait long to find out. Because on cue, and they haven’t missed one yet, the head voices spoke up.
“From a nice Jewish girl like you we would have expected better.”
Even though I am Asher and Deborah Abramowitz’s little veal of love I spent the rest of the class whispering a string of obscenities, that in a million years, little veals of love should not know.
I got detention. I had to sit in silence for two hours. Two boring hours.
“Miss Abramowitz, stop looking at the clock. You are not here to clock watch and don’t put your head down. You are here to think about what you have done. So after being bored with ”paying my penalty“ I met up with Linda and we, for lack of a better thing to do (we couldn’t go home and change like everyone else probably was), we went for pizza. The veal and little lamb special, lots of pepperoni that their parents wouldn’t let them have. It is bad for you.
Many slices of pepperoni later we made it to Michelle Gellar’s house.
”Well here we are,“ I said.
”Yeah,“ Linda said.
”Nervous?“ I asked.
She replied, ”No, I always want to play ostrich and hide my head in the sand.“
I reached for the doorbell and stopped.
Linda looked at me. ”Together.“
”One, two, three,“ we chanted and pressed the bell.
Well of course we were nervous. Linda and I were trying to crawl our way out of vealhood. Open the cage and allow us to walk outside, and build up those social muscles.
Michelle Gellar opened the door, wearing a purple dress with shoulder pads.
”Well I see someone dressed up for this,“ she said.
”Well we didn’t, uh, have a chance to go home and change,“ I said.
”I guess my party isn’t that important to you two,“ Michelle replied.
”Well it’s, uh, your party,“ said Linda as she brushed by our ”gracious hostess.“
”That bitch!“ said Linda. ”We didn’t dress for her party.“
”Well, at least we didn’t wear shoulder pads.“ I laughed. ”What was she thinking? The whole time she was talking I thought she was going to hit us and shout, ’No wooden hangers’.“
”Michelle Gellar as Joan Crawford. A perfect fit,“ giggled Linda.
Linda and I stood near the punch bowl. What do you do at a boy-girl party? Veals don’t know, that’s why we stay in front of the non-alcoholic punch bowl (As opposed to the table with all the ”drinks“ on it.).
”Hey, you guys, nice outfit,“ said Bobby Lewis who was wearing a sports jacket. A sports jacket.
I airily replied, ”Hey, at least I am not overdressed.“
”No, the jeans that you wore to class is definitely not being overdressed.“
”But a sports jacket is,“ said Linda, coming to my rescue.
”Hey, I look cool in it.“
God he did. And Linda and I looked stupid. We were the only ones, the only ones, who had not dressed up for the party. Would anyone notice?
”Oh, don’t be stupid. Of course they’re going to notice,“ Linda whispered to me. Veals can read each other’s minds. We looked around.
There were three kids talking. Jennifer Campbell, Andrew Goldberg, and Teresa Alphand. Three sharks approaching the two veals.
”So what is ’Ride Sally Ride’?“ asked Andrew.
”I think it is a song,“ said Teresa.
”Because they always say it when they talk about her,“ he said.
They were talking about the astronaut Sally Ride. She had just gone up in the space shuttle. This was safe talk. No comments about clothes.
”Well, somebody looks like they can be astronauts.“ Jennifer said as she looked us up and down.
”Jeans, very practical,“ said Teresa.
Andrew didn’t say anything. He just laughed.
I looked at Linda. She looked at me. What should we do? What should we say? We had to say something soon, or we would look stupid. We already looked stupid. The two girls who didn’t know to dress for the party. Don’t they know the rules of boy-girl parties? After all, everyone knows the rules. The ones who don’t are stupid losers anyway.
I explained, ”Uh, we went out for pizza. After class.“
”That’s very brave, eating garlic before the party. With the closet and all,“ said Andrew.
”Uh, we got some toothbrushes. At the drugstore.“
”Oh I’m sure,“ said Jennifer.
”Did you know about the closet?“ I asked Linda.
”No.“ She shook her head.
The ”Closet of Paradise.“ A boy and a girl, ten minutes in a closet, alone. And in some parties (so I’m told), they put speakers in front of the closet so those outside it can’t hear what is going on inside. Ten minutes where the boy and girl can do anything! Would we be expected to go into the closet? Of course we would! Isn’t that the way these things work? Silly little veal girls who think they could step out into the big wide world without looking stupid? Ha!
How do you pick a boy? Does a boy pick you? The only boy I would be interested in would be . . . well, Adrian. But he wasn’t coming.
Is it something like ”Spin the Bottle?“ Except you don’t kiss the person the bottle points at, or maybe you do, or maybe you have sex with them. No girl I know said that they have actually had sex. But when we saw that video tape in social studies class (The one with Walter Cronkite talking about those ”hippies“ of San Francisco and how men and women who were not married were living together.), well, the jokes they said: ”Heads will roll.“ ”Tongues will wag.“ How do they know about this stuff? Oh, Michelle Gellar knows about it from a book that her parents own called Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Sex* — *But Were Afraid to Ask. She told us this. But did she put it into practice? She never said so in school. But Linda and I aren’t part of her cool girl clique. None of the cool cows on the range ever talk to the veals.
So what should I do about it? Nice girls, well nice Jewish girls who act like veals get slaughtered. What about not nice Jewish girls? They put on veils and make gullible grooms marry them. All right, pick a not nice Jewish girl to ask. Who? Anybody. Michelle Gellar. She was already acting like a total bitch.
”So, uh, Michelle,“ I asked, trying to act cool. ”How do we pick our (Should I say lover? Shouldn’t I? What would normal girls do?) uh, partner (they wimp out) for the closet?
“The same way we always do,” said Michelle.
Oh, thank you, bitch. That really helps.
“Don’t you remember?” she asked.
Oh, she really was a bitch. I never went to any of these parties. She knows I never went. How many had she attended anyway?
“Uhm, Michelle, I never went to a boy-girl party before.”
“Yeah, you just stay home with your nice Jewish dolls,” replied Michelle.
Oh fuck you, bitch! “Well I didn’t have time. Really busy, you know.”
“Doing what?”
I should have been busy finding excuses for you. Why did you invite me anyway? To laugh at me? I’ll call myself a nice Jewish girl. And Linda will call herself a nice goyim girl. But you won’t.
“Well, I guess I missed something good. (Yeah right.) But how do we do it?”
“Well, each girl kisses an unopened condom, which we put in my grandma’s punchbowl. The boys pull out a condom and they take the girl that kissed it.”
“Are you serious?”
“Oh yeah, it’s totally cool.”
“Do we do it, uh, now?”
Michelle came over and patted me on the head. “Oh, don’t worry your nice Jewish girl head. It won’t happen for hours. We have to get good and drunk first. And don’t worry about the lipstick. I got you and Linda flavored lip gloss. It’s so innocent, just like you.”
I wanted to slug her. I went over and told Linda what had happened and what we had to do. Linda wanted to break Michelle’s legs. We must have been so angry that we didn’t hear the door open, or them step in.
“You didn’t invite us to the party? Dean is so hurt!” said Kate O’Donnell as she walked into Michelle’s house. “I said, Dean is so hurt!” she said louder. Then I heard a thump.
“Ow! Sniff. Sniff,” Dean said.
“What are you doing here?” asked Michelle.
Kate replied. “We’re coming to the party. They’re boys, and I’m a girl,”
Michelle blocked their way. “You weren’t invited.”
“I know, and it hurt so much.”
“Sniff. Sniff,” said Dean.
“How did you find out about the party?”
“She told us,” said Kate, pointing at me.
The moment Linda and I realized who had come in we hid behind the punchbowl. I told Linda about my little meeting with Kate and company when we were having pizza.
“You told them. You little weasel.” Michelle glared at me.
“I’m a weasel?”
“Yes you are. Trying to get yourself in to places where you don’t belong. I only invited you for a laugh and you had to tell them. You had to open your mouth like the scared little weasel you are!”
Linda began. “Why you, she—”
Kate walked over to Linda and me. “Now, girls,” she said as she put her arms around our shoulders, “you shouldn’t let a naughty little snob upset you.”
“Naughty little snob?” said Michelle.
“Sure. You got booze here. Lots of it. Corrupting these little ones. Do your parents know about it?”
“Uhm. . . .”
“Hello, officer, my nice little Jewish girl went to this party and I wouldn’t have let her if I had known that it was an unsupervised boy-girl party where some unthinking adult left out alcohol so minors could get drunk. I’m so sad.”
“Sniff. Sniff,” said Dean from across the room.
“What do you want?” said Michelle.
“To party. Right, girls? Right, girls?”
“Uhm, yeah,” I sighed.
“Uhm, sure.” Linda said, glancing at me.
“Now where’s the beer?” asked Kate as she walked back to Dean and Adrian.
“Why is she being nice to us?” asked Linda.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“I’m scared.”
“I’m scared too, Linda.”
“Well, well,” said Michelle as she turned on me.
“Hey you. . . .” said Linda.
“You keep out of this,” said Michelle, interrupting her. “You didn’t tell her about the party. Well, Rachel, since you are going to stay at my party, and you can’t be corrupted by alcohol, you can play bartender. The rest of the alcohol is in the kitchen. Go there. Teresa and Jennifer will go with you.
”Right,“ Teresa and Jennifer chorused.
That didn’t look good. I didn’t know what they were going to do in the kitchen with me, but I assumed it would be violent. Or humiliating. Basically anything to make me run away from the party. Just me. Not Linda. Because I told. They were going to drive me away. But I had taken the veal’s oath not to be veal anymore. The oath taken usually right before veals get their throats slit. How could I stop that? I could go to the bathroom. The great hiding place. But I would have to come out eventually. But I wanted to stay at the party. I wanted . . . that’s when I thought of the one place I would be safe at the party.
”Uh no. Why don’t I be the first to uhm, try out the ’Closet of Paradise’,“ I said, really fast, before anyone could stop me. I looked around at the boys. Who would go with me to the closet and get tainted? Risk being banished from cool girl Michelle’s party? And then having to lift that barge, tote that bale, wait seven years and generally grovel to get back in her good graces? No way, Rachel. But I needed a boy.
”Come on,“ I said, as I grabbed Adrian’s hand and pulled him to the closet.
So it was just me and Adrian in the closet. What should I do? What should I say? If I said something stupid, would he think I was a dork? Of course if I didn’t say anything he would know for sure that I was a dork. So I had to say something.
”Uhm, hi?“
”Hi.“
Now he knew I was a dork! Dork! ”So you come here often?“
”No.“
Oh, like that wasn’t the dorkiest thing I ever said. ”I mean to Michelle’s parties.“
”No.“ He wasn’t saying anything. Just ”no.“ And I didn’t know what to say. Prince Charming doesn’t come to sweep little veals off their feet. He stays at home while little veals struggle to not be stupid in a closet.
I couldn’t see Adrian. But I could ”feel“ him. He was right there. In front of me. I could hear him breathing. Why didn’t he kiss me? I wanted him to kiss me! Should I have kissed him?
”Nice Jewish girls don’t. . . .“ Yeah, yeah, I know. Asher and Deborah, if there ever was a time that I didn’t want you in my head, it was then.
I put my hands in my pockets. Maybe he would reach out to me. He didn’t. He was not moving closer. The breathing hadn’t changed. I didn’t hear movement. Not his anyway. Oh I heard stuff from outside. I heard laughter. Girls’ laughter. Michelle’s laughter. That snort she does through her nose is unmistakable. She was laughing at me and she probably pointed at the closet and said, ”Looooser. Do you guys hear any kissing? ’Cause I don’t. I hear a little baby. A little baby who is starting to cry. When they get out of the closet, Linda, you should give your friend a hug. She is so sad.“ That bitch. But the bitch gave me an idea.
”I’m sorry that you had to come into the closet with me,“ I said.
”Uhm. That’s all right. I guess,“ said Adrian.
”No it’s not,“ I said. ”Here, let me give you a hug.“
”Uh . . . okay,“ said Adrian.
I put my arms around him, pulled him close. I felt those wonderful pecs of his against my body.
”Hey, it’s all right,“ I said.
”What . . . oh . . . Rachel, I am so sad.“ Yay. He got it.
Our hug got tighter. Our bodies got closer. I could finally see his lips (it was a very dark closet). My mouth moved towards his and. . . .
”
”Mom!“ I shouted.
”That’s your mother?“ said Adrian. ”Ha. Ha.“ He laughed.
He was laughing! Oh God. My mother was using that stupid bull horn she uses when she leads tour groups at Staten Island’s historical sites.
”
”You’re (ha ha) a perfect girl (ha ha), who can’t do anything wrong,“ snorted Adrian in between laughs. ”No wonder Kate hates you.“
I threw open the closet door and ran out. All I saw were fingers pointed at me, and mouths wide open. They were all laughing at me.
”Aw, her mommy is upset,“ teased Teresa.
”Bad, bad, girl,“ Jennifer sang.
”Wow there was a perfect girl at the party!“ said Michelle. ”I should invite her more often.“
Deborah and Asher had their heads to the side. Jesus studying how to reach those bad old Pharisees. What’s a nice Jewish girl doing with Jesus? I hate to tell you but Jewish hippies are strictly New Testament. No wrath of God stuff. Love the sinner, hate the sin. Of course that didn’t mean that they were going to let the sinner out of the veal pen. Particularly because she lied.
”You lied to us,“ said Asher.
”How can we ever trust you again?“ said Deborah.
”You don’t trust me now!“ Did I say that?
”Of course we trust you.“
”No you don’t.“ I guess I did say it. ”You never let me go anywhere on my own.“
”That’s crazy.“
”No it’s not. I go to art class. I go to acting. I never get to hang out with my friends.“
”Well, if going to unsupervised boy-girl parties is what you do when you hang out, I am glad we don’t let you.“
”It was just one party.“
”And you told us just one lie, which can quickly become two, three, four, and then you are drowning in them.“
”No, I’m not.“
”No, I’m sorry, Rachel, but you lied to us. We have no way of knowing whether you will do it again.“ Asher was summing up. The defense lawyer, out to save everyone’s freedom, was denying me mine.
Once we were home, I ran upstairs to my room and locked the door.
”Rachel, don’t be like that. Come on out and we’ll talk.“
Now they wanted to talk? I had almost kissed Adrian, I was not veal. I was not a calf, golden or otherwise, and they were doing their best to try and keep me as one. I had to show them I was independent. I was a tough bad kid who hung out at the 7-11, smoked cigarettes, and wore a Rolex (well maybe not that bad), so the next day. . . .
”Hi Mom, want some breakfast? I made it myself.“
”Rachel . . . you’re . . . bald.“
”You like it? I did it last night.¢?¢?¢?¢?¢
So did I show them? Did they leave me alone? Does the God of the Old Testament forgive? No. Now their little love veal has a new activity. A shrink three times a week. Argh!