Adam Levin - The Instructions

“And Eliyahu’s still, like, muttering. And he’s throwing Yiddish into the mix, now. Stuff I never heard you say before, like cappy and—

Keppy, I said — it means head.

“And what else? This really great sounding one that goes, like, a-fat-stink-on-her or fuckatitioner. ”

Farshtinkener.

“Definitely! Yes. What’s it mean?”

Pretty much what it sounds like, I said, but what happened already?

“Oh, so Eliyahu’s muttering all this stuff, like, ‘…knock the hat from my keppy?… the uncircumcised dog… to push his filthy Canaanite teeth back so his farshtinkiner mouth may accommodate this… I will… I will force this thermos down his throat with my fists,’ and he pulls The Co-Captain’s thermos from the pile of bagjunk, and it’s right about then that I see through the gaps between the buses how the drivers in the circle are shaking hands and banging fists or whatever, and I figure I’ve gotta get Eliyahu outta there, so I touch his elbow, and he swings on me, man!”

Did you—

“No no, it’s okay — I ducked it, and he saw I was me, and I told him, ‘We gotta go now, the drivers are coming.’ And Eliyahu says, ‘Tell me I will damage him tomorrow, Vincie, or I will never be able to stop pacing this facocta circle.’ I love facocta by the way, it’s my favorite of all of them I think, but I know Eliyahu’s got ISS tomorrow, and so I tell him, ‘If not tomorrow, then Monday.’ And then he goes, ‘Am I a child? You would talk to me about Monday? There will be no Monday.’ And then the Co-Captain, through the window, he says, ‘Am I-uh the child? You woulda to talka to me about on Monday?’ like trying to mimic Eliyahu, but it sounds way more like Chico Marx than like Larry David’s dad — not his dad-dad, but his show-dad — what’s his name?”

Shelley Berman, I said.

“That’s it. The impression sounded nothing like Shelley Berman, which is pretty much what you’d go for if you wanted to make fun of how Eliyahu sounds, right? But Eliyahu whipped the thermos at his face anyway, and the Co-Captain pulled his head inside the bus and the thermos tonked off the windowframe and I caught it, which was really smooth of Vincie, I think.

Stealth, I said.

“Thank you. Because Eliyahu didn’t fucken appreciate it at all. He just tried to grab it from me, the thermos, and I didn’t let him because we had to get outta there because like I said: those facocta drivers.

“But so Eliyahu goes, ‘Give me the thermos and don’t give me nazarite about Monday, Vincie.’

Narishkeit, I said.

“That’s the one. And I said, ‘I don’t know what you mean about Monday, but please don’t be upset like this — we fucken have to fucken go.’

“And Eliyahu says some Hebrew stuff I can’t even begin to imitate, but The Co-Captain could. And he did. He did it pretty good, like, ‘Chuh chuchaluh shicha hucha lachama.’ And then Eliyahu swiped the thermos out of my hand and let fly at the Co-Captain’s grill again. This time he got chin: cronk! And the Co-Captain yelped, ducked under the windowframe. And I said to Eliyahu, ‘Feel better?’ and he goes, ‘Only a little. I want his earring,’ but he lets me kinda lead him away from the buses, and what’s funny is this: The Co-Captain’s on Eliyahu’s intramural bus, which is Bus One, but the one he’s barracaded himself on is Two, and there’s no way he’s gonna ride on the same bus as Eliyahu now, so he’s stuck on the wrong bus! And not only that, but he was supposed to go home on the regular bus like those other fuckers because he’s got his big game tomorrow. And plus, even though we got away from the bus circle a little so the drivers wouldn’t bust Eliyahu, Eliyahu made us stay in seeing distance so the Co-Captain was too scared to even get off Bus Two to gather up all the junk that fell out of his bag, which was strewn everywhere! I had no idea Eliyahu was like that, man. That he was the kinda guy to think of that — sticking around like that. He’s so fucken angry. Who knew? I mean, yeah, when he came into the Cage he did that thing where he held out his hat and said he was from Brooklyn, but then — I mean he asks me if you’re dead, like, five, six fucken times a day, and, every time, he looks ready to cry. The whole point of me telling you this is this, though: While we’re standing there watching over the bus circle, I’m going over it in my head, everything that just happened, and I ask Eliyahu, I say: ‘What was that shit you were saying before about no Monday?’ Because remember, he said, ‘There will be no Monday.’ So I ask what he meant, and he goes, ‘Are you kidding with me?’ Real snotty, he said it, like he was offended or something. So I was like, ‘What the fuck?’ and he goes, ‘Tomorrow we destroy the Arrangement.’ He said it like I was a dumbass not to know that, and I thought: Maybe I am. But what’s weird is, it didn’t feel like I was a dumbass. It felt more like what I was saying yesterday on this very bus; it felt like I was just playing the dumbass. It felt like that because when Eliyahu said we’d destroy the Arrangement tomorrow, it sounded true, like we’d all agreed on it, but I couldn’t remember doing that. I couldn’t remember agreeing on it, and it seems like the kind of thing I would have remembered, right? So I said, ‘There’s a plan to destroy the Arrangement?’ And Eliyahu said, ‘A plan I don’t know — an understanding, though? Surely there’s an understanding.’ ‘Well who says?’ I said. And Eliyahu said, ‘Everyone says.’ And I said, ‘Like who, though?’ And he said, ‘Like your friend the Main Man Scott Mookus.’ And I said, ‘Main Man says a lot of crazy stuff.’ And Eliyahu said, ‘Our friend Gurion says.’ And I said, ‘No way. I’d remember if Gurion said that.’ And Eliyahu said, ‘If hyperscoot was the beginning, and hyperscoot began third period, and by seventh period we’re already in the middle, what can be tomorrow if not the end, Vincie? And what can be the end for the Side of Damage, who is against the Arrangement, if not the end of the Arrangement? And what will bring about the end of the Arrangement, if not the destruction of the Arrangement? And who will bring about the destruction of the Arrangement, if not the side that is against the Arrangement?’

“So is it true, Gurion?”

I didn’t know if it was true. It was just like Vincie said.

I said, It’s just like you said — it sounds true, but I hadn’t thought of it til you said it. I mean…

“Well, I just play the dumb one, man, but I’ll tell you: This morning, right after that first hyperscoot? I would’ve said fuck yeah for sure we’re doing it and we fucken well should do it: destroy. But today was long and full of weird fucken shit. Like what happened with Nakamook? That’s the thing I wanted to talk to you about before. That was fucked up, right? And it was the same kind of fucked up as this kind of fucked up that we’re already talking about. We should have all rushed Slokum in the two-hill field — we were all there, and I don’t care who he is, he can’t take thirty-odd kids out, especially not while holding onto you — but at the same time, we were waiting for Nakamook to do something first. Actually, first we were waiting for you to kick Slokum’s ass, we figured you’d get it under control. But then there was like a solid half a minute where we all knew you weren’t gonna get it under control and what we did was look to Nakamook, and he wasn’t doing anything, and by the time we gave up on him — at least by the time I did — Bam had already set you down. That was some weird shit. No one ever said Nakamook would be the leader of us if you were in trouble, but we all acted like he was — there was an understanding. And that first hyperscoot, too — no one decided to do it, right? Not out loud. And then suddenly we were doing it. And it was great. But that other shit with Slokum? I feel really bad about that other shit. And I’m sorry about that fucken shit. And I feel like I gotta prove myself to you now. Or get Leevon and Ronrico and Ben-Wa and probably a fifth guy together and try to kick Benji’s ass or something, which is really the most fucken upsetting part, because he’s been my fucken friend for two years, which is more than one-sixth of my life, and since I can’t really remember shit from before kindergarten, it’s like more than that — it’s like one third of my life. Or two-fifths even, I don’t fucken know. But you’re the only guy besides Mookus and Leevon who never once made fun of me during that horrible flinching phase I was going through, and not only that but you healed it, and so what am I supposed to do?”