After I finish my bite of chicken I say, “Mom, I can just make a playlist on my iPhone and hook up the temple speakers. Jerry doesn’t need to play guitar.”
“He’s very talented,” my dad chimes in. “He’s in a Billy Joel cover band.”
“Nice, but no thanks.” I smile. “We’ll just do a playlist.”
My mom moves the chicken and asparagus around on her plate. “I know it’s not what we had envisioned, but . . .”
“Mom, it’s not what you envisioned. You were the one who wanted a big party. I mean, I did, too. But you were the one obsessed with it.”
She looks at me, stunned.
“What? It’s true.” I wait for my dad and Gemma to back me up, but they stay quiet. “You never asked me what I wanted, by the way.”
“I thought we were all on the same page.” My mom sips her seltzer. “I’m just so disappointed now.”
“I am too. I mean, we all are. Obviously. But actually, here’s something to undisappoint you.” I crack up. “I know that’s not a word. Can we have a barbecue here next weekend? My friend Zoe will be in town with her dad, and we kind of want to set him up with Kaylan’s mom.”
“What?” my dad squawks. “Do they know about this?”
“Yes, they do,” I say defensively.
“Set up by kids!” Gemma slams her hand on the table and bursts into laughter.
“Stop, Gem.” I look around. “Also, I’m almost a woman. In the eyes of my people! Not going to be a kid for much longer . . .”
“Right.” Gemma shakes her head, still laughing.
“Well, I’m not really sure setting people up is first on the list of becoming a Jewish adult, plus we’re not really in a barbecue mood,” my mom starts. “And it’s the end of September. Could be chilly.”
I put down my fork. “Already checked the forecast. Gonna be in the low seventies. Also, we need a barbecue to put us in a good mood. I know Dad’s not working, but we can’t mope forever. Plus, did you know if you set up three couples you automatically go to heaven? That’s what Bubbie says.”
My parents make eyes at each other.
“It’s true. So a barbecue? Yes?”
“Okay, but let’s keep it on the small side,” my dad offers.
“We will.” I take a bite of my mashed potatoes. “We’ll get all the food at Costco. And everyone is gonna bring a side dish or dessert to keep the cost down.”
“I guess she has this figured out,” my dad says to no one in particular.
“Ooh-la-la, can’t wait to see the lovebirds in action!” Gemma makes kissy faces.
“Gem.” I bulge my eyes at her.
After dinner, I go up to my room to email and invite everyone.
From: Ari
To: Zoe, Alice, Hana
Subject: BBQ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We are on for the BBQ at my house next Saturday! Zoe and her dad are coming. AlKal and Hana, can you come too? Puh-lease?
Yay or nay to inviting Golfy?
WB! XOXOXOXO Ari
PS: AlKal, how’s ur grandma?
Um, yes to Golfy. Will ask my mom if I can come. Luv Hana
Grandma is ok. In rehab now. I think 2 far 2 come for one night. But yes to golfy. & FaceTime me when ur all 2gether. ILYSM AlKal
YAYYYYYYYYYYY! Will miss u, Al. LOVE U ALL TONS, Zoe
Golfy is slow with email, so I decide to text him instead.
Hi, I’m having a bbq at my house next Saturday. Zoe and hana r coming & some school peeps. Want 2 come?
I stay awake forever after that, waiting for him to respond. But he doesn’t.
Boys are so bad with phones.
I toss and turn all night imagining Golfy in my house. He will be in my room. He will go from the camp part of my life to the home part of my life.
I picture him chatting with my parents, being funny and charming with Gemma. I picture him and Kaylan joking around, Kaylan telling him funny old stories about us.
It feels so teenagery in a way—bringing a boy over to a family party. A boy who’s more than a friend, way more than a friend.
Even though it feels big and new and a little scary, it feels good, too.
Maybe a key part of the puzzle of feeling okay at home, better than okay even, is to merge my camp life with my home life, mixing it all together like some thick, chunky soup.
I’m imagining a broccoli cheddar level of perfection.
TWENTY-EIGHT
GOLFY WRITES BACK A FEW days later. My heart pounds through my crewneck sweatshirt when I see the text.
Golfy: So sorry. I lost my phone. Just found it! Will be @ ur bbq
I don’t understand how boys can honestly be this bad with phones. I would have been freaking out if I’d lost my phone, and he’s all calm about it, like it was nothing.
Does he have any idea how hard it is to be chill when someone you love just disappears and you have no idea if you’ll ever hear from him again?
“Golfy’s coming to the barbecue!” I nudge Kaylan on the ride to school.
“You didn’t even tell me you invited him!”
“I know, because then what if he couldn’t come? He hadn’t even written back, so I figured he wasn’t into me anymore, and . . .”
“You keep secrets!”
“So do you!”
“I invited the lunch table girls, by the way,” Kaylan tells me, resting her knees against the seat in front of us. “That was the plan, right?”
I nod. “Yeah, totally. But we’re almost at school, and I need to ask you something, so . . . changing topic for a sec,” I whisper. “Do you think Mr. Gavinder is weird?”
“All teachers are weird,” Kaylan says matter-of-factly.
“No, but I mean, like, he never calls on the girls,” I say. “Have you noticed that?”
Kaylan shakes her head. “No, but that’s because I’m so completely lost in that class. I can’t understand a single thing that’s going on. My mom is going to call and see if I can switch back to regular math.”
“Please don’t switch,” I say. “And see if you notice anything in class this morning.”
Halfway through math class, Kaylan whispers, “You’re so right. He hasn’t called on a single girl this period! And Isabela raises her hand for every question.”
“She’s a genius,” I whisper back.
“Arianna and Kaylan. Stop talking.” Mr. Gavinder says, facing the board with his back to us.
“He notices we’re here, at least.” Kaylan giggles.
“If I hear you two talking again, you will go straight to the office.”
We sit up straight in our seats, covering our mouths to stop ourselves from laughing.
At lunch, everyone’s talking about the barbecue.
“It’s kind of late in the season for a barbecue, though,” Cami says, pulling apart her turkey avocado wrap. “You’re lucky it’s going to be so unseasonably warm.”
“Global warming,” Amirah explains.
“Probably,” June adds.
“Is your camp boyfriend coming?” M.W. asks.
“I think so.” I smile. I love how that sounds. Camp boyfriend. So happy. And summery. I picture flip-flops and splashing swimming pool water and sitting on the grass and a counselor playing guitar.
“Hello! Earth to Ari!” Cami taps me from across the table. “OMG. I am so excited to meet him.”
“Yay.” I go back to my daydream.
Cami turns to Kaylan. “What about you? Are you on again or off or in the middle again with Jason?”
She peels off a piece of her string cheese. I can’t even remember the last time we talked about Jason, or the last time I saw Jason. And he lives across the street from me!
“Who knows.” Kaylan rolls her eyes. “Boys! Who needs ’em?”
The whole table cracks up.
“She is honestly the funniest person in the world,” Cami declares. “How’s it going with that come
dy troupe, Kay?”
“I’m gonna suggest it when they ask for club ideas,” she tells everyone. “I feel like that should be soon, no?”
“I think so,” I chime in. “Ms. Bixhorn was talking about it the other day during homeroom.”
There’s a lull in the conversation, so I turn to Kaylan and tell her I won’t be on the bus later because of my bat mitzvah lesson.
“Oh, okay.”
“Your bat mitzvah is so soon, right?” Cami barges into the conversation yet again.
“Yup. November third.”
“Insane.” Cami puts all of her lunch garbage into the brown paper bag. “Are you so excited?”
I nod. “Yeah, I am. I really like the learning part of it, actually. This is so weird to say, but the more I think about it, the more I feel like Torah portion applies to my life. I am just trying to figure out how, exactly.”
“I’ve literally never heard anyone say that before,” M.W. says. “I am so not into the actual prayer part of it.”
“Well, you still have a while, don’t you?”
“Yeah, true. Mine is in May, so I haven’t really started, but I don’t think I’ll be into it . . . I find it all really boring.”
Everyone stares at me after that, like I have to defend my position or something.
“Well, different strokes, different folks, ya know.” I laugh.
“But you’re not having a big party anymore, right?” M.W. says, not meanly or anything, but it still feels like she just threw some kind of toxic chemical all over the table.
“Um, well—”
“My mom ran into your mom at the grocery store,” she interrupts.
Cami interjects, “Wait, what’s going on?” and then M.W. starts to explain, but the lunch gong dings and it’s time to leave the cafeteria.
Thank God for that gong.
I feel like I’ve been through some kind of professional-level game of tennis, but I’m the ball.
Wasn’t it M.W. who barely talked last year? Now she’s like a Cami in training.
I don’t know what Kaylan could’ve done, but she just sort of sat there silently, picking at her string cheese.
I don’t think I can handle all of these intense, personal-discussion lunch periods every day.
Maybe I’ll have to switch into Marie’s Japanese class, just to stay sane.
TWENTY-NINE
SOMEHOW I MAKE IT THROUGH a few more crazy days of school. Between the honors track classes and our intense lunch table conversations, seventh grade is way harder than sixth.
But texting Alice every day totally helps and knowing that I’m going to see Golfy this weekend keeps me sane.
The day of the barbecue arrives, and I’m excited for Kaylan’s mom to meet Zoe’s dad, and it’ll be nice to JHH another list item.
But if I’m being honest, I kind of want the whole thing to be over already.
It feels like a lot of people, going through a lot of different things, all in the same place will make for a chaotic situation.
Maybe if Kaylan and I were at our strongest, I’d feel more confident about it. We’re working on keeping our friendship strong, but I kind of don’t even know what that means anymore.
We’re, like, on different football teams, and occasionally we meet in the middle of the field for a handshake. But I don’t feel like we’re really playing together.
“Hiiiii,” Kaylan sings, running through the gate to the backyard and snapping me out of my friendship analysis. “Barbecue day is here!” She fist-bumps me. “My mom is coming later, but I wanted to come early to set up.”
“Nice.” I smile, trying to make sure my parents aren’t arguing about something in the kitchen.
When my dad comes out, carrying a platter of uncooked burgers, Kaylan walks over to him and says, “We can take control of the grill, Mr. Nodberg.” Her hands are on her hips. “I’ve grilled before.”
“Okay, Kaylan.” He turns to face her, eyebrows raised. “First of all, you should know by now that Mr. Nodberg is my dad. My name is Marc.” He pauses for a second. (This is their private joke. It’s silly that my BFF and my dad would even have a private joke, but it’s comforting, too.) He goes on, “Second of all, why don’t you girls just enjoy yourselves and leave the grilling to me?”
“Can I just see all the meat?” Kaylan asks.
He sighs. “Knock yourself out.”
My dad wipes his sweaty forehead on the sleeve of his T-shirt, and I look away, pretending not to notice. The lightness in his tone that was always there has dissipated—it’s not that he comes across as angry or anything, just tense and not in the mood to deal. Even the private joke comes out as some kind of obligation, like he has to say it, not because he finds it all that funny.
“Looks good.” Kaylan shrugs and nudges her head toward the drink table, alerting me that I should follow her over there.
“Does he seem super stressed?” I whisper.
“Kinda yeah, to be honest. He doesn’t have his usual chill dad vibe going on right now.”
“That’s what worries me.”
“I know.” She puts a hand on my shoulder. “You can’t be the only chill one in your family. But let’s put that on hold for a tiny sec and game plan this my-mom-meeting-Zoe’s-dad thing.”
I nod. “Um, okay, when Zoe gets here, you, me, and your mom go over to where they’re sitting, and we just start to chat with Zoe and hope that the grown-ups get that they should chat, too.”
“Will they get that?” Kaylan asks me.
“I think so, I mean, they are adults who have been in the world a long time, right?” I pour myself a glass of Sprite. “Want some?”
“Sure.”
We go to sit on the hammock with our Sprites and keep game planning. For the first time in a while, there’s a lightness to everything. There’s a small breeze, but it’s still pretty warm. The air still has the faintest summer smell. And when it’s just Kaylan and me without the lunch table girls, I feel like things can maybe be okay. Strong, even. Like we can still be us, the way we were before camp.
My mom’s book club friends start coming in, and it feels nice that she invited some people, too. And then the husbands of the book club ladies traipse in carrying fruit salad platters and stuff.
I’m finishing the last sips of my Sprite when I see Golfy walking through the fence gateway that leads to my backyard.
“Hi, Mrs. Nodberg. I’m Jonah. We met on visiting day, I think,” he says, reaching out awkwardly to shake my mom’s hand. Seriously, who is this person? Who is Jonah? And also who shakes hands right when they walk into a place like they’re a campaigning politician or something?
“Golfy,” I yell out, loud enough for him to hear me, but not so loud that my parents and the few other early birds hear me, too.
“Oh, hi!” He waves and then mutters something to my mom, ducking his head a little bit.
“Hello!” he says, all joyful and cheerful sounding, and pulls me into a hug. “Your backyard is super cool.”
“It is?” I ask, releasing myself from the hug and looking around. We have an old wooden swing set, a patio with standard outdoor furniture, and a grill.
“It has a very peaceful thing going on,” he explains. “I like it.”
“Thanks.”
Kaylan looks at me crooked, but I just shrug and ask Golfy if he wants any soda.
“I’d love some of that Black Cherry Seltzer,” he says. “My favorite.”
Kaylan and I both crack up at the same time.
“I am who I am,” he says.
We stand around talking about nothing really—where his parents are going for dinner while he’s at the barbecue (Gari Sushi), how long he’s been going to camp (six years), where is older sister is away at college (Vassar).
Part of me wishes that all of these people could leave so I could be alone with Golfy and we could talk about all the stuff that’s been going on. I feel like he’d
have interesting perspectives on everything, stuff I haven’t thought of.
“Oh, there’s Zoe,” Golfy says, dipping a pita chip into the hummus.
“We gotta go,” I say to him. “Be back soon.”
“Uh, okay.”
“This wasn’t the plan. We weren’t supposed to storm over to them,” Kaylan whispers to me as we walk over. “We discussed this.”
“Oh yeah. I completely zoned out.”
“Bad habit alert!” Kaylan taps me on the forehead. “Keep working on it. Anyway, we’re walking over now, so we’ll just greet them and then we’ll go sit and try to get my mom to come over,” Kaylan instructs, looking around, probably to locate her mom.
“Zoe, love of my life.” I run the last few steps to meet her and wrap my arms around her neck, pulling her in for the tightest hug possible.
“Hey, thanks so much.” Kaylan feigns some anger.
“You’re the love of my life, too.” I reach an arm over her shoulder and pull her in, too, and soon we’re in a group hug even though Zoe and Kaylan don’t really know each other.
Life is weird like that. Sometimes you end up in group hugs you didn’t expect to be in. Sometimes you throw a barbecue to set up your first best friend’s mom with your new friend’s dad just to complete something on a list you and first best friend made up and are continuing because that’s just the kind of people you are.
“Where’s your dad?” I ask Zoe, suddenly panicked that he had to go somewhere else and he just dropped her off.
“You’re never going to believe this,” she starts.
Uh-oh.
“He’s already talking to Kaylan’s mom. She was out front getting something from the car and then he was trying to park behind her but he’s a terrible parker and he ended up having me get out of the car to see if he was too far from the curb and then Kaylan’s mom started to weigh in, but in a totally normal, funny way, and then they just kept talking.”
“OMG, that sounds insane.” Kaylan laughs. “My mom always talks to people she doesn’t know. I’m not sure what that’s all about.”
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