All Three Stooges

by Erica S. Perl

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Noa.

  “I dunno. What if you’re wrong?”

  Noa was silent for a moment. We watched some fifth graders getting into a duel with the paper strips that come with the fruit rolls. Rabbi Jake seemed to be having little success getting them to stop.

  “I’m not wrong,” she finally said. “Trust me, I know what it’s like to lose someone like that.”

  There she went again, acting like she was the grown-up and I was just a stupid little kid who didn’t know what was what. It made me so mad. So instead of keeping my mouth shut like I should have, I decided to give it right back to her.

  “Yeah, sure,” I said.

  “I do,” she said before turning her back on me to take the dollar from the next kid in line.

  “You do think you know everything. You do think you have some kind of special magic rainbow connection to Dash. But you know what? You don’t actually know everything about what he’s going through. Unless your dad killed himself.”

  Noa spun around, her mouth open like a fish. “What did Dash tell you about his dad?” she demanded.

  “Nothing,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant but feeling anything but. It was actually true, of course, though I hoped she wouldn’t call me out on it.

  Without warning, she bolted from the snack table, knocking the cash box over in her haste. Dollar bills went flying everywhere, attracting the attention of the sword-fighting kids, who ran to grab handfuls of money and make it rain again. Through the chaos I saw Noa heading into the girls’ room. Sarah, Deena, and some of the other girls followed her in, glaring at me over their shoulders.

  “Are you going to take my money?” asked a freckle-faced kid who had materialized in front of me. He was thrusting a handful of bills from the floor in my direction and casting a greedy gaze at the snacks. A bunch of other kids were now picking up the scattered money under the stern glare of Rabbi Jake. I kicked the would-be looter out of the snack area and was attempting to recount the money when Rabbi Fred came over.

  “Everything okay?” he asked.

  “No problem,” I told him. Because what else could I say? Noa was still in the girls’ room. But I could tell that when she came out, my problems were going to get a lot worse.

  —

  It’s never a good sign when you’d rather stay in Israeli dance class than get pulled out. When Rabbi Fred showed up and crooked a finger for me to join him, I pretended not to notice and kept right on grapevine-stepping until Solly turned off the music and told me to go. We went to the library, thankfully. Rabbi Fred’s water feature was more than I could take in my current condition.

  I figured Rabbi Fred must have spoken to Noa, so I was not surprised to be pulled out of class. I was expecting him to say something like “Can you tell me why Noa got so upset?” Or maybe “Can you explain why you were so insensitive about Noa’s father’s death?” Or perhaps “Can you help me understand why you needed to prove to Noa that she doesn’t know everything about what Dash is going through?”

  He said: “How does getting some fresh air sound to you?”

  Now that surprised me.

  “Right now? Sure. What for?” I asked. We never get to go outside during Hebrew school, unless it’s for an activity like sukkah decorating or getting on a bus for a field trip.

  “Change of scenery. Stretch of legs. Unless you’d rather get all your exercise in dance class?”

  “No! That sounds great. But can we just, like, do that?”

  Rabbi Fred shrugged. “I’m the rabbi. Who’s gonna stop me?”

  I couldn’t argue with that, so I waited while he got his coat and told the front office people he’d be stepping out with me “for a few.” I had a pang of jealousy, wondering if Rabbi Fred did this with other students on a regular basis. Of course, it also occurred to me that maybe he only took walks with kids who caused trouble.

  Andrea, the security guard who monitors the front door every Tuesday afternoon, gave us a nod like our leaving the building during Hebrew school was no big deal. Together we walked out of the synagogue and down the front steps. Rabbi Fred led the way, turning right on Wisconsin, then left, then heading straight for a while. He didn’t say much, which was unusual for him. I didn’t ask him where we were going because his stride suggested he had a destination in mind. Sure enough, after we walked down a hill, he said, “This way,” and I noticed a small brown trail marker.

  One of the coolest things about Washington, D.C., that not everybody knows is that in addition to Rock Creek Park, which is like a big forest that happens to be located in a city, there are also these cool trails that connect to stuff, like the zoo and the C&O Canal. When I was little, my moms used to take me and Enid hiking on the weekends, so I’ve been on a lot of the trails. Though I have to admit that a lot of them look the same, so I’m never a hundred percent sure if I’ve been on any of them before unless there’s a really obvious landmark, like this old mill on a trail near the zoo, or this bridge that’s on a trail behind my favorite playground.

  So when Rabbi Fred asked, “Is this trail familiar to you?” my answer was, “I think so.” But when we walked down the trail a little bit, we crossed a creek and I had a vague memory of standing in the rain holding a bag of stale bread. At first I thought maybe I was confusing this spot with another one where my moms used to take me to feed the ducks, but I asked anyway.

  “Did we do tashlich here?”

  Rabbi Fred smiled. “I wondered if you’d remember that. Yes, we did, once, a long time ago, before our congregation grew and we needed to find a more spacious, if less convenient, location.”

  “Was it raining?” I asked.

  “It was pouring, as I recall. And, if memory serves, there was a dog—”

  “Yes!” It all came rushing back to me. We had done community tashlich in this spot, all of us crowded on the banks of this tiny creek to cast our “sins”—in the form of bread—into the water, like we do every year to get ready for Yom Kippur. And then out of nowhere, a huge dog appeared and grabbed several of our bread bags and wolfed them down. “He even ate the bags!”

  “I can only imagine how sick that dog became. Eating all that plastic.”

  “Eating all those sins!” I said. We both laughed, then fell silent. I suddenly remembered why we were here.

  “I’m sorry,” I told Rabbi Fred. “I mean, about Noa. I dunno why I did that. She just kind of pushes my buttons.”

  “So I’ve observed,” said Rabbi Fred.

  It made me feel guilty that he was being so nice, so I offered, “I guess I probably push hers, too.”

  “You might say that.”

  “I mean, I know I should probably apologize. But she should, too.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah. For acting like she knows everything. Especially when it’s about my best friend.”

  “You’re talking about Dash?”

  “Uh-huh,” I said. I picked up a little stick, studied it, then threw it in the water and watched it slowly drift away.

  I was tempted to tell him the whole story, but before I could launch into it, Rabbi Fred asked, “You haven’t by any chance seen his cell phone, have you?”

  His question caught me by surprise. My heart started to pound in my chest and I felt myself starting to sweat, and not just because of our walk.

  “No. Why?” I said.

  “His mother called and said he misplaced it recently. She thought maybe he had left it at Hebrew school last week. I’m sure it’ll turn up, but if you happen to see it, can you let me know?”

  “Sure,” I said. “I’ll keep an eye out for it.” Look, I know lying is bad. And lying to a rabbi takes it to a new level of badness. I’m not sure what happened. My mouth just sort of took over for my brain. But once I said it, I couldn’t take it back. It’s okay, I told myself. You’ll give the phone back, and no one will have to know. Except for Enid. And God.

  Next tashlich, I was going to need a lot of bread.
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  Just then, another stick landed in the river. It followed the path of mine. I picked up another one, and so did Rabbi Fred.

  “Care to race?” asked Rabbi Fred.

  “Sure,” I said.

  “I should probably warn you,” said Rabbi Fred. “I was the stick-racing champion of my yeshiva.”

  Together we walked down the trail to a little bridge we’d spotted. Standing in the middle, facing upstream, we held our sticks steady and, on the count of three, dropped them into the water. The bridge was narrow enough that we only had to turn around to get to the other side and watch the outcome. But the current, if you could even call it that, was slow. Eventually, a stick emerged.

  “You see?” said Rabbi Fred.

  “Best two out of three?” I countered. He nodded, and we each gathered our additional entries. I tried to find sticks that were light but not too light, and long but not too long.

  We met on the bridge again. Held sticks. Counted off. Dropped them in the water.

  “Here’s something I learned along the way,” said Rabbi Fred as we waited and watched on the other side of the bridge. “Most people think that water currents and stick dimensions are what determine a stick’s path. And, to a degree, that’s true.”

  Splash!!

  I turned, startled by the sound, and realized that Rabbi Fred must have picked up a big rock on the banks when we were selecting our sticks. The water sloshed, then rippled in all directions. Both of our sticks, which were emerging from under the bridge, reacted, but in different ways. One went left and ended up in a tangle of leaves trapped behind two boulders. The other went right, slid into the center of the current, and plowed ahead.

  Guess whose stick got stuck?

  “Interference!” I yelled.

  Rabbi Fred held up his palms. “All right already. We can do a rematch. But you see what I mean, yes? One minute, you’re going along on a path, and then all of a sudden, boom, there’s a rock blocking your way or knocking you off course. And a rock like that can do a lot of damage.”

  I thought about it. What he was saying made sense. But what he was saying also made me want to throw rocks. So I got one off the banks, returned to the bridge, and threw.

  Ke-splooosh!!

  “You know how that makes me feel?” he asked.

  “How?”

  He grinned. “Like getting another rock.”

  So we both did, big ones.

  “One, two, three!”

  Ke-splash! Ke-sploosh!

  I was headed to get another rock to throw when I noticed Rabbi Fred down at the edge of the water. I saw him gathering something, so instead of returning to the bridge, I went over to investigate.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “This is the other part,” he said. He had a bunch of small stones in one hand, and he used the other hand to carefully place them into the water, just downstream of where my stick had gotten stuck in the leaves. I realized he was creating sort of a makeshift wall. I took my big rock and placed it at one edge, and then we put several smaller stones next to it. One of the big boulders anchored our construction on the other side, so as we made the wall higher and higher, a funny thing happened. It was like a miniature version of one of the locks on the C&O Canal. The water in the little corner we’d formed rose higher and higher and slowly the leaves began to move and the next thing I knew my stick twirled back into the moving section of the current and headed downstream.

  “Hey! We did it.”

  Rabbi Fred gave me a high five. Then he stuck his hands into the water, pulled out two flat stones, and gave one to me. “Think about this. You could say that the last stone was the one that sealed the deal, but in truth it wouldn’t have succeeded without every single one beneath it and next to it. So just like one big rock can knock you off course, a lot of little rocks can boost you back on course.”

  “Is that how you got to be the stick-racing champion?”

  “I’m actually talking about something, dare I say it, even bigger than stick racing. You know that song we sing sometimes at services? ‘If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now…’ ”

  “ ‘If not now, when?’ ” I said, finishing his refrain.

  “Exactly,” said Rabbi Fred. “That song is based on the teachings of Hillel. Who was a brilliant rabbi. And, if I had to guess, probably a pretty formidable stick racer.”

  “So, you’re saying I should try to be nicer to Noa?”

  Rabbi Fred shrugged. “It wouldn’t hurt. But it’s more like a way of being in general. A way of seeing that the things you do and say can make a difference. For example, take your friend Dash. This might be a good time to ask yourself, Am I doing all I can for him?”

  “I would, except I don’t think he wants to hear from me right now,” I admitted.

  “You never know,” he said. “Sometimes people who are grieving don’t want to talk, but they usually appreciate knowing that people are thinking of them.”

  “Actually, I’m pretty sure he wants me to leave him alone. I tried texting him a bunch of times, but he didn’t text me back. And then, the thing is…” I took a deep breath, studying the rock in my hand and trying to find the right words to explain what had happened. Why I read Dash’s texts. Why I kept Dash’s phone. Why I lied about it.

  “Right, I know, he lost his phone,” said Rabbi Fred, his voice startling me. I looked up at him. “I know this makes me a dinosaur, but I can’t help pointing out that texting isn’t the only way to reach out to a friend in need.”

  As he spoke, Rabbi Fred balanced his stone between his thumb and two fingers. He pulled back and skipped the rock across the creek. It bounced gracefully off the water’s surface—one, two, three times—leaving ripples in its wake.

  I positioned my own rock, then tried to copy his movements. One, two, three-four-five skips!

  Rabbi Fred raised both eyebrows.

  It felt good to see him impressed for the first time in a long time. Did I really want to come clean and watch his face fall? Maybe I don’t have to tell him anything, I realized. Maybe I just need to talk to Dash and make things right.

  “I think I get it,” I said slowly. “You’re saying I should just go up to Dash and, like, ask how he’s doing.”

  Rabbi Fred stooped down, picked up a small reddish stone, and examined it. He polished it with the edge of his shirt, then slipped it into his pocket.

  “That seems like a good place to start,” he said.

  At dinner that night, Karen told me she wanted to take me shopping at Mr. Maxx.

  “We can go after school tomorrow,” she suggested. “That way, we can find something for you to wear to Gil’s unveiling this weekend. Plus, you’ll probably need more clothes for all these bar and bat mitzvahs that are coming up.”

  “Gil’s unveiling?” I asked nervously.

  Enid clearly understood my tone. “His grave marker,” she explained, helping herself to some salad.

  “Right,” said Karen. “It’s a tradition—a little service at the cemetery to display the headstone after it’s installed. Stacey sent an invitation, it’s on the bulletin board. Didn’t Dash mention it?”

  “Sure,” I lied. It felt easier than explaining that Dash was no longer talking to me.

  “You know,” added Jenny, reaching for the salad dressing, “if you want to ask Dash to come over afterward, that would be fine with us. You guys could even have a sleepover, if you want.”

  “We might even consider getting soda,” added Karen.

  “Duht-DUH!” teased Enid.

  Jenny leaned over and tried to grab Enid’s nose with the salad tongs.

  “Yeah, maybe,” I said, pushing my food around my plate. My family was too busy joking to notice I wasn’t eating or to hear how dejected I sounded. I appreciated the soda offer, but I didn’t have the heart to tell my moms that not even the brilliant Dr Pepper had the skills to resuscitate my friendship with Dash.

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p; When we went to Mr. Maxx, Karen bought me a whole bunch of clothes. Two pairs of pants that weren’t jeans and didn’t have a drawstring, plus one pair of “nice” sweatpants that she agreed could be worn in public as long as they were clean. I also got a pair of shoes that were not sneakers, two shirts with pointy collars, and exactly one tie. The tie was a compromise. I got to pick it out, as long as I was willing to wear it to services each and every Saturday. And to the unveiling.

  I agreed, even though I had no intention of wearing my new tie to the unveiling. That was because I didn’t plan on going to the unveiling. I knew Dash didn’t want me there. And I figured the day would be hard enough without me showing up and making things worse for him. I was totally planning to talk to him, like I told Rabbi Fred. Just not yet and not there. Of course, I couldn’t explain this to my moms, so I ended up pretending I didn’t feel well. I was relieved when they bought it.

  The following weekend was Eli Webb’s bar mitzvah, so at nine-thirty in the morning, Enid actually got up early to do me a favor and tie my tie. She’s explained the whole thing about the rabbit running around the tree to me several times, but it still comes out better when she does it. Facing me, yet not meeting my eye (due to her tie-tying responsibilities), Enid quizzed me on whether the phone had been returned to Dash.

  “Not yet,” I replied.

  Enid frowned, examining the knot, then adjusting my collar.

  “He’s never at Hebrew school! So I haven’t had the chance.”

  “Well, figure out another way. Seriously, Noah. It’s time.”

  “I know, okay. Believe me, I want to,” I told her, and not just because every time I saw any kind of pebble or rock, Rabbi Fred’s words would come back to me. “Thanks,” I added, because my tie looked good.

  Yes, b’nei mitzvah season had begun—“with a vengeance,” according to my moms. Their big gripe was the driving involved. Every weekend, one or two of my Hebrew school classmates were up, so I had to get to temple by ten (nine-forty-five if I had to “ush” and hand out programs). I had to sit through services, then go downstairs to the social hall, in the temple basement, for lunch. Usually, there’d be time to go home before the party, although sometimes the party would start right after services and go all afternoon. Either way, I had my moms’ permission to remove the tie the minute they finished saying the hamotzi blessing over the challah bread.