All Three Stooges

by Erica S. Perl

  I was excited for Eli’s bar mitzvah. I had decided it would be the perfect place to strike up a casual conversation with Dash. If that went well, I could set down a well-placed rock or two—like asking him how he was feeling or offering to do something to help—and then maybe even tell him the funny story of how I inadvertently picked up his cell phone.

  And there was another reason I was already looking forward to Eli’s bar mitzvah. “Whoa,” I’d said when the invitation arrived. “Check this out—instead of a regular party, they’re taking everyone go-karting. Can we do that for mine?”

  “We’ll talk,” said Karen, pinning the invitation to the bulletin board in our kitchen with the others and making a note on the family calendar. No wonder I never saw the invitation Stacey sent for the unveiling—our bulletin board had been taken over by big, shiny square and rectangular, and, in Eli’s case, car-shaped invitations.

  The go-karting was to take place right after services ended, so after the hamotzi, all the girls ran to change clothes while we guys pulled off our ties and played something between Frisbee and football in the front hall with the leftover red satin yarmulkes with Eli’s name on them. Eli’s parents had rented a bus, so when it arrived, we all piled on board.

  “Take any available seat!” Eli’s dad yelled from the front of the bus. “Please, we need to get going.”

  Behind me, someone pushed, so I ended up in the very back by the bathroom. Sitting with Chris Stern, of all people. He was probably bummed not to be sitting with Dash, too.

  At the go-kart track place, a ridiculously cheerful woman called Safety Sam made us watch a safety video. And then we had to listen to all the same rules again from a similarly perky guy named Safety Steve. It was a lot like school, with the girls raising their hands because they knew the answers from paying attention. Next we had to put on these things they called head socks and helmets. I really wanted to riff with Dash on the idea of head socks (“What’s next, foot hats? Am I right?”), but he was standing as far away from me as humanly possible.

  There were too many of us to race all at once, so they grouped us into heats. I was glad that by some miracle Dash and I got put in the same heat, even though Noa was in it, too. She was fussing because she has so much hair that it was hard for her to put on the head sock. When she finally got it on, she had to use both hands to hold it in place while Dash helped her put her helmet on over it.

  The actual go-kart track was the coolest thing ever! They had signs up all over that literally read NO SPEED LIMIT! But during the safety briefing, Safety Steve kept saying again and again that bumping or trying to crash was strictly prohibited. They had all these different-colored flags, not just the usual checkerboard one. Yellow, blue, green, and black—each meant something. I wasn’t actually paying attention at that part, except I did hear him say that black meant you were being placed in a time-out for breaking the rules. We weren’t in the first heat, so we got to see the black flag in action a bunch of times before we were up. The yellow flag seemed to be a warning that came right before black.

  Finally, it was time for our heat. I looked around for Dash and saw him climbing into car #40 as Noa got into #36 right behind him. I grabbed #17, strapped myself in, and awaited the horn I had heard at the start of each of the previous heats.

  HWAAAAAAAAARRRRRNNNN!

  I tore off the instant the horn blasted and quickly overtook two of the seven cars in our heat, neither of which was Dash’s. I leaned into the turn, enjoying the speed and the noise of the engine racing. I could see #40 up ahead, and I tried to predict where he’d be in the next turn so I could pull alongside him. It had already occurred to me that it would be tough to have a real conversation at however many miles per hour we were going. Plus, it was really hard to hear because of the loud go-kart engines, the head socks and helmets covering our ears, and the cheering spectators (okay, most of the kids who weren’t racing were ignoring the action on the track, but Eli’s grandma seemed really into it). I didn’t have a plan for how to deal with this. I just figured I’d pull up and drive next to him for a lap or two and wing it. Maybe I could yell out that line from the mustard commercial—that’d crack him up. And even if it was too loud to hear me, at least he’d see me next to him and that might remind him of how much fun we used to have together.

  That’s the thing about being best friends: you don’t always have to talk. But if you do want to talk about stuff, you can. Especially late at night on sleepovers, just before you fall asleep. I remembered the time I told Dash how me and Enid weren’t technically related, like by blood. And he told me that sometimes he wished he didn’t have a brother, because before Pete came along, his parents didn’t used to fight so much. Then he said he wished I were his brother instead of Pete, and I said, “Me too.” We fell asleep making a plan for a time machine that would take us back to before Pete was born.

  That sleepover felt like a long time ago. It felt like time was going so fast—maybe because I was going so fast, whizzing around the speedway faster than I intended and actually passing Dash’s car at the corner, which was not what I wanted. I tried to slow my car a little so we’d be side by side, but there was another car behind me. And a flag flying in my face, a blue one being waved by Safety Sam, who was leaning over the railing in a way that didn’t look safe at all. I wondered if she and Safety Steve were related, or if Steve and Sam were even their real names. It would’ve been particularly funny if they were twins and their mom was such a safety nut that she actually named them Safety Steve and Safety Sam and gave them little fluorescent yellow safety vests to wear with their diapers. That could’ve made a hilarious comedy sketch….I wished I could tell Dash about it. Maybe after I—

  TWEEETTTTTT!!!

  A whistle sounded really loudly. I guessed it was because someone was breaking one of the rules, but I couldn’t stop to see who because Dash’s car was sliding into position next to me. I hit the accelerator to keep pace with him, and turned to grin at him, but the next thing I knew, there was a car in front of me that came out of nowhere and I had to scramble for the brake.

  Except the brake wasn’t where I thought it would be, so when I pressed a pedal, my car shot forward FAST.

  Right into the car in front of me.

  Car #36. Noa’s car.

  Errrrr­rrrrr­r!!!

  Augggghhhhh!!!

  CRUNCHHHHH!!!!

  That was the horrible noise my car made as it skidded toward car #36, and the terrified scream I let out as my car collided with car #36, and the sickening sound I heard as my car tumbled over car #36. Somewhere in there, I let go of the steering wheel and covered my face, which might have prevented me from breaking my nose when my face hit the steering wheel as my car flipped. I opened my eyes to find myself still strapped in, on my side, facing the Plexiglass guardrail. Looking down at me was Eli’s grandma, who no longer seemed as gung ho about go-karting.

  I immediately thought of Cool Runnings, the John Candy movie about the Jamaican bobsled team, and how every time they crashed, one of the guys would ask his friend, “Ya dead?” I was pretty sure I couldn’t be dead because I could feel my heart pounding. I hoped no one else was dead, either. That would be more than I could take.

  Someone—not one of the Safety siblings—ran over to unbuckle me and make sure I was okay. Meanwhile, everyone else—both Safeties, Eli’s parents, and the kids in our Hebrew school class, including Dash (who had pulled over when our heat came to a crashing halt)—ran to check on Noa. She stood up unsteadily, then removed her helmet, then her head sock. Her frizzy red hair exploded out of it, and she gave it a tentative shake. Leaning on Dash, she hobbled off the track while everyone cheered.

  No one clapped for me. And when Safety Steve was done making sure Noa was okay, he came over to tell me that I had to sit in the time-out zone until they served refreshments.

  “But I didn’t break any rules. It was an accident.”

  “You crashed, dude,” said Safety Steve, a.k.a. Captain Obvious. �
��That’s a rule violation in and of itself.”

  I felt a flash of anger. Don’t call me dude. “I thought yellow was the warning one,” I protested.

  “It is, but the blue flag is the one that means it isn’t safe to pass. We covered that in the safety training. And the video,” he added pointedly.

  Great, I thought miserably when the next heat started up and I was alone on the time-out bench. No yellow warning flag, no nothing. Just rolling along and then, when you least expect it, wham! Just like life.

  Or, more accurately, just like death.

  I know I should have been happy to be alive and well and sitting on a bench. I mean, consider the alternative. I could have been pining for the fjords. But surviving the crash meant a front-row seat to watch Noa and Eli and Chris and everyone having a blast without me. Even Dash, who was laughing and smiling, too. It didn’t seem like he was missing his dad at all. It seemed like he had forgotten all about him.

  —

  When the go-kart party was finally over, I saw Frau Blue Car pull into the parking lot. I ran to get in.

  “Hey,” I said, surprised.

  “What?” said Enid.

  “I just—you never pick me up.”

  “Okay, well, remind me never to do it again.”

  “No, I didn’t mean—”

  Enid laughed. “I’m just messing with you.”

  I slid down in my seat and watched as Noa and Dash both got into Dash’s mom’s car.

  “Hey, what happened?”

  “Huh?” I put my hand up because she was staring at my forehead. When I touched the Band-Aid, I realized that maybe I looked worse than I felt. I looked in the mirror on the passenger side. Yikes! In addition to the bandage, I was sporting a black eye. No wonder Safety Steve had offered me a frozen hamburger patty. He laughed when I asked him if I could have it medium-rare instead, but I wasn’t kidding.

  “Oh, it’s nothing,” I said, trying to play it cool, even as I became increasingly aware that my head actually kind of hurt. “I got into a crash with another go-kart, but I’m okay.”

  “Wow, sounds like quite the bar mitzvah,” said Enid.

  “I guess,” I said glumly.

  “Once more with feeling,” Enid teased. “Any swag?”

  I pulled out a red drawstring backpack emblazoned with GO, ELI, GO! plus a Star of David with go-kart wheels and the date on it. I yanked a matching red T-shirt out of it and held it up for her to see.

  Enid whistled appreciatively. “In my day,” she said, “you might get a bag or a shirt, but both?”

  “What did you give out?” I asked her.

  “Paperwhites.”

  “Paperweights?” I could totally see that: our moms handing out painted rocks or lumpy chunks of clay as party favors.

  “Not paperweights, you dork. Paperwhites,” said Enid. “They’re bulbs. You put them in gravel with a little bit of water in the winter, and they set down roots and these pretty green stalks and white flowers come up. They’re cool and they smell nice.”

  “Our moms sent people home with plants after your bat mitzvah?” I asked.

  “I didn’t have a bat mitzvah, remember?” Enid corrected me. “But I had a thirteenth birthday party, which the moms decided should be called a ‘not mitzvah’ as a joke. You don’t remember this?”

  I shook my head. “I was, what, six?”

  “More like eight, but same diff. It was a million years ago,” said Enid. “We gave everyone a paperwhite bulb in a little cup of gravel wrapped with tissue paper and with some sort of a poem Karen found about patience and blooming and stuff.” She laughed. “Ivan Metz-Peterson told everyone the poem was about boobs, not flowers.”

  “Seriously?” I asked. Ivan was my friend Adam from Hebrew school’s big brother.

  “Yup,” she said. “How is Adam?”

  “He’s okay,” I said. I was about to tell her how he drank three Slurpees in a row, announced he had a brain freeze, then threw up purple, when she casually asked, “Was Dash there?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Did you get a chance to give him his phone?”

  “No,” I admitted. “I was going to, but I couldn’t just, like, hand it to him. I needed to talk to him first, and there just wasn’t a good time.”

  To my relief, Enid nodded. “Makes sense. He’s gotta be a total train wreck right now.”

  “Train wreck” made me think of my go-kart crash and how, once again, I’d ended up making everything worse for everyone around me. And this time I hadn’t even opened my mouth!

  Enid continued. “I mean, the unveiling was just last weekend. That had to be hard for him. It takes a lot longer than you might think to get over something like this.”

  “Tell me about it,” I said.

  Enid poked at the radio, trying to find a good station. I could tell she was waiting for me to elaborate. Sometimes it bugs me that she always knows when I have more to say, but right then it didn’t.

  “This might sound weird,” I told her, “but you know how you sort of have a dad?”

  “I don’t ‘sort of’ have a dad,” said Enid. “Howard’s a real dad, he’s just not a particularly spectacular one.”

  “Right, but here’s the thing. I don’t even have a crappy one,” I said. “And Gil was a really good dad and, like, a total mensch. And he treated me just like he did Dash. So now that he’s gone, I miss him, too, okay?”

  “I get it,” said Enid.

  “Can you do me a favor and not tell the moms about this?” I asked. “I mean, just because I miss Gil doesn’t mean I don’t love them or appreciate—”

  “Noah, stop. You’re going to make me throw up.”

  “Okay,” I said warily.

  “This is just between you and me. Really.” She took her eyes off the road for a split second to lock gazes with me before turning back.

  We drove on without talking for a while.

  “You missed our turn,” I pointed out.

  Enid didn’t answer. Instead, she reached over to turn up the music and said, “Shhh, I love this song. Check it out, this is Disturbed.” I must have heard her wrong, because it definitely didn’t sound like her favorite band. But the slow, eerie tune was familiar to me. I couldn’t quite make out the words until Enid started singing along.

  Hello, darkness, my old friend.

  I’ve come to talk with you again….

  I definitely knew the song, but I had never heard this version before. And I guess I had never paid much attention to the lyrics.

  And the vision that was planted in my brain

  Still remains

  Within the sound of silence.

  I didn’t realize it was such a weird and creepy song, almost to the point of being scary. And the words made no sense whatsoever. How can darkness be a friend? Silence doesn’t have any sound—isn’t that the whole point? I closed my eyes, listening to the haunting melody and waiting for the song to end so I could raise these questions with Enid.

  But I must have dozed off, because the next thing I knew, the car had slowed down and made a sharp turn. I opened my eyes as Enid pulled into a parking lot and turned off the engine.

  “Where are we?” I asked. We were next to a big park, with an iron gate, tall old trees, winding stone paths, and lots and lots of gravestones. “Wait, is this—?”

  Enid got out of the car, then leaned back in the open door and asked, “You coming?”

  “Sure,” I said, though the real answer was, I don’t know. I was scared to get out of the car, but even more scared to sit in it all alone at the cemetery.

  Together we walked through the iron gate. It didn’t occur to me until we were pretty far down one of the paths that I wasn’t observing the not-polite-to-breathe rule. On reflex, I sucked in my breath. But then I let it out again, in one big whoosh. It was a cold day, so the puff of breath hung in the air for a split second, almost like a ghost.

  Without thinking, I did it again. Enid did, too. She must have had the
same idea, because she went “Woooo,” so I did, too. And for a moment we just stood there, making ghosts back and forth at each other. But then I started laughing at the idea of making ghosts with your breaths, and it felt a lot less scary. Like if it weren’t for all the grave markers, Enid and I could be taking a walk in a regular park. There were lots of trees and, probably because it was cold out, barely any people. I zipped my jacket all the way up and shoved my hands in my pockets, and Enid took off the long beaded scarf she was wearing and wrapped it around me, and we kept on walking.

  And then we walked down a little path and there it was. At first I was surprised that Enid knew how to find it. It’s not like there were maps and signs, like at the zoo. And the burial had been for immediate family only. But it dawned on me that she must have gone to the unveiling. Because she had walked us straight to it: Gil’s grave.

  There was a big gray stone marking it. The sides were rough but the front was polished and said GILBERT LOUIS BLUM. It had the date he was born and the date he died and a Star of David. And one line under it.

  “ ‘Always with us,’ ” I read. It was true. Gil was always on my mind, it seemed, whether I liked it or not.

  “Yeah,” said Enid. “At the unveiling, Stacey said that what Gil actually wanted it to say was, ‘There goes the neighborhood.’ Apparently, that’s what Rodney Dangerfield’s headstone says. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it.”

  I couldn’t help smiling at Gil’s last joke. Even though the thought of planning out what you wanted your gravestone to say seemed like the saddest thing ever.

  “I’m going to walk around a little,” said Enid.

  “I’ll come with you,” I offered.

  “Hang out here for a few,” instructed Enid. I must have looked worried, because she added, “I won’t go far, I promise.”

  “What am I supposed to do?” I asked.