by Kennedy Ryan
“Mrs. Stern holds Ezra hostage all weekend,” I whine. “Going to synagogue and not getting to do stuff ’til Saturday evening.”
“He’s no more hostage on the Sabbath than you are on Sunday morning at Pine Grove Baptist for hours.”
I follow Mama into the kitchen, already dreading sitting on hard pews in a stiff dress with bobby socks and ponytails tomorrow. From Friday sundown to Saturday evening, the Sterns observe the Sabbath. Well, Mrs. Stern does. Mr. Stern plays golf with my father, but Ezra and his mother go to synagogue on Fridays and Saturdays. Our two families always eat together Saturday nights, alternating houses. Sundays my family always eats with my grandparents.
“Here you go.” Mama hands me a stack of plates. “I need to press your hair tonight after dinner.”
“Do I have to?”
“Maynard Jackson is coming to the service tomorrow, so your grandfather and daddy want everybody looking bright as new pennies.”
“I hate getting my hair pressed.” I pout, setting the plates in front of the empty seats.
“Push that lip in.” Mama walks into the dining room carrying a covered Corningware dish. “Make yourself useful and bring in the chicken.”
“Where’s Kayla?” I mumble on my way back to the kitchen. “And Keith? Why am I the only one working?”
“’Cause you’ll be the only one eating. I’m going out,” my older sister says, seated at the kitchen table. She blows on freshly painted nails. “And I can’t help set the table. My nails are still wet.”
On my way to get the chicken from the stove, I swipe a hand over one of her nails.
“You little brat.” Kayla glares at the dent in her manicure and tosses her emery board at me.
“Ow! Mama, Kayla’s throwing things at me.”
“You big baby,” Kayla grumbles.
“I’m not a baby.”
“Well, you sure sound like one,” Mama says, walking back into the kitchen. “Whatever you would do if I wasn’t standing right here, do that because I’m too tired to referee for the two of you.”
“All I needed to hear,” I mutter, grabbing a buttered roll from the basket of bread on the counter and throwing it at my sister.
“You better stop.” Kayla deflects the roll, and it lands on the table in front of her. “If I didn’t have a date, I’d deal with you now. If I were you, I’d sleep with one eye open.”
“Date?” Mama stops on her way back to the dining room with another dish. “Who has a date?”
“Um…” Kayla glares at me like it’s my fault. “I told you about him, Mama. You said it was okay if I went to the movies.”
“You said you were missing dinner because you were going to the movies with friends.” Mama continues into the dining room, but yells over her shoulder, “If your father hasn’t met him, you know it’s not happening.”
“Keith is a year younger than me,” Kayla shouts. “And you don’t halfway know where he is most of the time. He’s probably out with some girl right now.”
Mama reappears at the kitchen door, both brows lifted in the face of Kayla’s audacity.
“Who you yelling at?” She levels a stony look at my sister. “You lost your mind?”
“No, ma’am.” Kayla sighs heavily, her lips tightening over some rebellion she probably thought better of. “I’m just saying.”
“Just say it somewhere else,” Mama says. “And Keith’s a boy. It’s different.”
“Why is it different?” Kayla demands. “I’m older, but he has more freedom than I do. It’s not fair.”
“Oh, I think you have plenty of freedom, missy,” Mama says. “You can take up ‘fair’ with your daddy. His meeting went late, but he’s on his way home now. How ‘bout that?”
The comment does exactly what Mama knew it would. Shuts Kayla down. Daddy doesn’t have to rule our house with an iron fist. He’s a stern man, but it’s his heart that keeps us in line. He’d do anything for any one of us, and we know it. Disappointing him is punishment enough.
“Listen,” Mama says. “When this boy of yours comes, just introduce him to your father and it’ll be fine, Zee.”
Mama always uses our middle names when she’s being tender with us. All our first names begin with K. Kayla, Keith, Kimba, but our middle names are all for people our parents admired in history. Kayla Zora for Zora Neale Hurston. Keith Stokely for Stokely Carmichael. Kimba Truth for Sojourner Truth.
The doorbell rings and I shoot out of my seat, race to the living room and jerk open the door.
“Kimba,” Mrs. Stern says with a smile, standing on the front porch holding a covered dish of her own. “Hi.”
“Hey, Mrs. Stern.”
She walks inside while Mr. Stern and Ezra cross the street from their house, both carrying dishes, too. In a line-up, you’d never know they were father and son. Ezra’s much lighter skinned with blue eyes, and he’s small for his age. Mr. Stern easily stands six feet six inches.
“Hey, Ez.” I step back so they can enter. “Hey, Mr. Stern.”
Mama and Mrs. Stern are already laughing in the kitchen. When they get together, there’s no stopping them, whether it’s Saturday evening dinners or the mah-jongg games they play with some of the ladies from Mrs. Stern’s synagogue.
“Joseph late again?” Mrs. Stern asks, setting a basket of challah bread on the table beside the fish she usually brings.
“Girl, yes.” Mama sighs and shrugs. “With the Olympics coming soon, Mayor Jackson is trying to get as much done as he can before his term is up. So that means Joseph’s always late. He’s on his way, though. Fifteen minutes tops.”
“Mind if I watch the game while we wait?” Mr. Stern asks, nodding toward the living room. “Someone hasn’t let me turn on the television all weekend.”
Mrs. Stern’s mouth tightens, but she and my mother both nod permission. Even though Mr. Stern doesn’t believe in God, Ezra’s mom draws the line at the Sabbath. Once the sun sets on Friday, she doesn’t turn on the television or turn on lights or drive or anything until after the Saturday evening service.
“How was synagogue?” Mama asks, laying silverware by the plates.
“Good.” Mrs. Stern sets a bottle of wine beside Mama’s sweet tea. “Helen and Dina were there, the ones who came to mah-jongg last week.”
“Oh, they were so nice. Couldn’t play worth nothing, but nice.” Mama glances at Ezra, her face softening. “How was Shabbat, Ezra?”
His skinny shoulders lift and fall, the shrug telling me all I need to know. His mop of dark, springy curls is helmeted from the little cap he probably took off a few minutes ago. The first time I saw Ezra wearing his yarmulke, I called it a Jewish Kangol.
Mrs. Stern didn’t think that was funny.
“It’s not dark out yet, Mama.” I elbow Ezra. “Can we go ride our bikes for a little while?”
Mama and Mrs. Stern exchange a quick look and then nod.
“You can play twenty minutes, Tru,” Mama says firmly. “Soon as that streetlight comes on, bring your narrow hips home.”
I grab Ezra’s hand and we head toward the living room. “Yes, m-m-ma’am.”
I hate it when I stutter.
“Did I tell you Mrs. Downy called last week?” Mama asks, her voice lowered, but reaching us in the foyer as we’re about to leave the house.
Mrs. Downy? My teacher?
I put my hand on Ezra’s arm, stopping him so we can eavesdrop.
“No, what did she want?” Mrs. Stern asks.
“She wanted to talk about putting Tru in a remedial class.”
“What? Because she stutters? Kimba’s smart as a whip.”
“I know.” Outrage peppers Mama’s voice. “She’s having a hard year because a few of the kids started teasing her, but that’s all it is.”
Ezra and I stare at each other. He seems as focused on the conversation in the dining room as I am.
“I got to that school so fast,” Mama says. “Drove over on my planning period and told her if she ever tri
ed that again, she’d have to deal with me.”
“Good for you, Janetta,” Mrs. Stern says.
Shame fills my throat, makes me feel like I’m choking. I focus on the high shine of Mama’s hardwood floor.
“Mrs. Downy’s stupid,” Ezra says, his first words since he came into the house.
I make myself look up and Ezra doesn’t say anything else, but tips his head toward the door.
“You ready?” he asks.
I think every morning when Ezra wakes up, God gives him a tiny jar of words. He only gets so many, maybe a quarter of what the rest of us do. And he’s so scared he’ll run out, he uses as few of them as possible. Half his sentences are one word or a grunt. Weekends, he talks so little, I bet at the end of the day, he has leftovers.
Mama and Mrs. Stern have moved on, now talking about a sale at Dillard’s. I nod and follow Ezra out the door. Outside, I grab my bike and Ezra runs over to his house to grab his. We meet in the middle of the street that separates our homes.
“Race?” he asks, his voice quiet.
Without answering, I hop on my bike and take off. Ezra sputters behind me. His kickstand clanks and his wheels whir as he speeds after me.
“Kimba, you can’t just start,” he yells from behind me. “We have to count off.”
“Who says?” I shout back, shaking off the embarrassment of Mrs. Downy and laughing at the irritation in Ezra’s voice. Getting a rise out of Ezra Stern is one of my favorite things.
“The rules say.” His voice is closer now, his breaths little pants of exertion. “You always wanna break the rules.”
He pulls up beside me, doing that standing pedal thing that gives him the edge in our races. Flashing a grin, he pulls ahead and rushes toward the merry-go-round that always serves as our finish line. To rub it in, he climbs off the bike, sets the kickstand down and sits on the merry-go-round to wait for me. At least he didn’t do the Rocky dance like the last time he beat me.
“Cheaters never really win,” he says, smiling and leaning back on his palms.
“Butthead.” I set my bike and, ignoring him, walk over to the sliding board.
“And that was another come-from-behind victory, by the way,” he says. “Since you like to cheat.”
“I didn’t cheat. A head start isn’t cheating.”
“Well, I didn’t know you were gonna have a head start.” He climbs up onto the monkey bars and hangs by his skinny arms. “You know what my daddy calls it when one person has a head start that the other person doesn’t even know about?”
“What?”
“America.” He laughs, and I grin even though I don’t understand half of what Mr. Stern says most of the time.
“Did he hear anything about that job in Chicago?” I ask, facing him and hanging from the bars, too. I hold my breath while I wait for him to answer.
“He didn’t get it.”
Suspended from the bars, our bodies twisting, we face each other and give ear-to-ear grins. I’ve been worried Mr. Stern would get one of the many jobs he’s always applying for up north.
“Why’s your mom want to leave Atlanta so bad?” I ask, dropping to the ground, a dusty cloud puffing around my feet.
Ezra drops, too, and shrugs. “She says here, people still make a big deal out of me being mixed. She says in New York, folks won’t stare or make dumb comments.”
“What kind of dumb comments?” I ask, but I’ve heard some of them. I kinda know.
“Asking if I’m adopted,” Ezra mumbles, his chin sinking into the collar of his T-shirt. “Asking what I am, or calling me Oreo or zebra, or whatever. Dad’s applying in lots of places, but Mom’s hoping for New York. She misses our family up there.”
“You see them all the time, though.” My insides are heavy like there’s a roll of pennies at the bottom of my belly.
“Mama says holidays and a few weeks for summer’s not enough. She wants to be closer to my bubbe.”
Thinking about Ezra moving makes my stomach go all swimmy and my eyes burn and my throat tight. He’s my best friend. We even have the same birthday. He can’t leave.
“M-m-maybe your g-grandmother could m-m-move here.” When I get nervous or upset, my tongue “skips,” and I want to bite it clean in half. My speech therapist tells me to just take a deep breath and slow down before I talk. I forget sometimes, but Ezra never makes fun of me like some of the other kids do.
“Bubbe is never leaving New York,” Ezra says. “She wants me to Bar Mitzvah.”
I’ve learned a lot about Jewish traditions from the Sterns—enough to know that’s a big deal.
“Are you gonna?” I ask, glad my tongue is cooperating again.
“I guess.” Ezra shrugs. “I’d have to start going to Hebrew school every day after school.”
“Crap.” I relish the word my mother won’t let me say. “What about chess? You just started competitions.”
“I’ll still play chess. It’s a lot of time, but Mom says the busier I am, the less trouble I’ll get into.”
And the less time he’ll have to play, to spend with me. I look around the park, empty now that the sun has set. The streetlight blinks to life, reminding us it’s time to go home. Soon Mama will walk to the front porch and yell my name, telling the whole neighborhood I’ll come home if I know what’s good for me.
I take off running across the playground, willing to risk it to have a few more minutes with Ezra.
“L-l-let’s swing!”
Chapter Three
Ezra
12 Years Old
Be strong, be very strong, and we will strengthen each other.
Hazak, Hazak, Venithazek.
The Hebrew words turn over in my head, sloshing with Outkast’s lyrics pouring through the headphones fitted over my yarmulke as I walk home. This is my life—all the influences and interests colliding, conflicting, making sense and chaos. Bubbe wants me to become Bar Mitzvah, so I’m playing crazy catch-up, attending Hebrew school three days a week after school. I practice chess the other two.
Somehow, my grandmother, at only four feet eleven inches, casts a long shadow over me even from New York. I can’t deny that little lady anything, and she knows it. A few months ago she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, so when she begged me to have a Bar Mitzvah celebration, even though it basically requires me to be at synagogue all the time, cramming what the other kids have spent the last few years preparing for into less than two, I’ll do it.
Grandma guilt.
Most of the kids at synagogue are cool, and I've made some new friends, but a few of them love finding ways to make me feel like I don’t belong. Some laugh at me when they think I don’t hear them, or maybe they don’t care. When they have parties or go out together, I’m usually not invited. Mom says I imagine it because she doesn’t want to believe anyone at the synagogue would treat me that way. My father says I’m definitely not imagining it, but to ignore it and keep my head down. Dad thinks it’s all stupid anyway and asks at least once a week why I’m doing it. I tell him, and I guess I tell myself, it’s for Bubbe. But there is a part of me that simply wants to understand as much as I possibly can about this part of myself—my Jewish heritage. Neither of my parents really know what it’s like to live here as me. To look around and see no one who looks like you. To live with the stares and questions about “what I am.” To feel like a puzzle, pieces hidden and scattered, and always trying to find and fit all my parts together. To see myself not as half this or bi-that, but whole.
The synagogue is only a couple of blocks from my house, and I’m almost home. Kimba and I don’t go to the playground as much as we used to now that we’re in middle school. She joined the band. Clarinet. She’s good, but between my Hebrew classes and chess and her band practice, we don’t see each other as much outside of school, which sucks. If I’m home before dark, we can get in a bike ride before dinner.
My house is just ahead when someone jerks my arm.
“What the…” When I look up, three boys fr
om Hebrew school stand there, arms crossed, one smirking, one glaring and one frowning.
“We called you like six times,” one of them, the glare-er, says. Robert. His name is Robert and he always sits slumped in the corner and struggles with the basics of the Torah though he’s been studying for years.
“The music,” I say, pointing to my headphones, which I slide down to rest at the back of my neck. “Sorry. I couldn’t hear you.”
I look between the three of them pointedly, lifting my eyebrows to ask what they want.
“We came to have a little talk,” Paul, the smirker, says.
I fold my arms to match theirs. “So talk.”
“Stay away from Hannah,” Michael, the frowner, says.
“Who?” I turn the volume down on the portable CD player clipped to my belt.
“My sister Hannah,” Robert says, still glaring.
Who even is she?
“I don’t know who…”
Pale skin. A mass of freckles. Dark brown, tightly coiled ringlets. Looks away quickly every time I catch her looking at me.
“I barely know your sister,” I say with a shrug. “But okay.”
“Let’s keep it that way, Fraction.” Paul laughs.
Fraction. A new one, more inventive than Zebra or Oreo, but just as insulting. Lava percolates in my belly while Big Boi is reduced to a defiant murmur in my ears.
“Yeah, let’s keep it that way.” Robert thumps my forehead and snatches my yarmulke. “You don’t need this messing up your ’fro, do you, Stern?”
“Stop playing.” I reach for the cap, but Robert tosses it to Paul.
Paul’s smirk spreads into a full-blown grin when he catches my yarmulke and twirls it on his finger. “Look, it’s spinning like a basketball. You like basketball, right, Stern?”
All three of them are taller than I am, but I’m the one who would play basketball? I’ve never played in my life. I roll my eyes, but stretch for the yarmulke. Paul holds it over his head out of my reach and tosses it to Michael.
“Give it to me,” I say, my words rattling against the cage of my gritted teeth.