Adam Levin - The Instructions

I couldn’t tell whether I was really not supposed to call her back, or if it was like shaving the chinhairs — if I was supposed to disobey her.

She had said “yet” about the chinhairs. She’d said, “Did you shave your chinhairs yet ?” which meant she thought that if I hadn’t shaved them, then I was going to shave them = she’d thought I was going to do what she’d told me to do unless she stopped me = she was expecting that I would do whatever she told me to = she wouldn’t tell me not to call back if she thought it would make me call back = she didn’t want me to call back.

And I hadn’t corrected her “yet.” I hadn’t said that I’d never considered shaving my chinhairs, even though that was true. All I’d said was that I didn’t shave my chinhairs. The “yet” could have been implied by me, or not, from where June stood.

At the same time, though, maybe I had June’s “yet” wrong. Maybe the “yet” was to pre-empt the need for trickle-caulking. Maybe she knew all along that I wasn’t going to shave the chinhairs, and she only called to tell me not to shave them so that it would seem like I was obeying her because that way she could avoid having to save face the next time she saw me, when I would still have my chinhairs despite her original wish. And if she knew that I would have disobeyed her to begin with, that meant that she expected me to disobey her, and so then telling me not to call back = telling me to call back.

If calling back was like shaving the chinhairs.

The biggest problem of all was that the chinhairs might have had nothing in common with the potential callback. What I knew for sure was that I wanted to call her back — I didn’t even get to wish her goodnight or sweet dreams — and because I wanted to call her back, maybe I was just looking for a reason to call her back despite how she told me not to.

I was confused. I had to write scripture.

I typed the word is and the screen looked like:

There is

And the phone rang again. I picked it up before the first ring terminated.

June! I said.

“Who?” said Esther Salt.

I said, Esther Salt.

Esther Salt said, “Why don’t you ever call me anymore? You haven’t called me in weeks. I even got Caller ID to make sure I’d know if you called, like in case you didn’t leave a message, and so I know for sure you haven’t, so don’t try to lie.”

You broke up with me, I told her.

“I know,” said Esther, “but I didn’t know that meant we couldn’t talk anymore.”

What did you think it meant? I said.

I said that way too fast and it sounded cold. I didn’t mean it to be cold, though, so I said, All we ever did was talk, Esther, and if all you ever do is talk, then when you break up it means you stop talking.

“We didn’t only talk,” she said. “We’d see each other.”

I said, We still see each other every Wednesday.

She said, “No, that’s not true. You and my dad see each other every Wednesday; you and I just look at each other. Why don’t you say what you really mean?”

There was no way I could think of that Esther could have known about June, and even if she somehow did know about June, I’d fallen in love with June only that day, so there was no way Esther could think I hadn’t called her in weeks because of June, plus it wasn’t why I hadn’t called her in weeks.

What do you mean what I really mean? I said.

“Maybe that I’m too modest . Maybe that I’m not easy enough,” said Esther.

That’s not what I mean at all! I said. I said, I never even tried to hold your hand!

“Exactly,” she said, “because you think I’m too prude for you.”

“Esther,” I said.

“Esther!” said Rabbi Salt in the background.

“What?” she said.

I don’t think you’re prude, I said.

She wasn’t paying attention, though. She didn’t answer me. She was talking to her dad.

Then she said, “Did you get my dad’s email? He sent it twenty minutes ago.”

I said, I don’t know — I haven’t checked.

“He says he sent it and he wants to know if you’re coming over tomorrow to study.”

Tomorrow’s Wednesday.

“What’s that?” she said.

Of course, I said.

“Of course what ?” she said.

Of course I’m coming over to study tomorrow.

“He’ll be happy to hear that,” said Esther Salt. She said, “I am going to sleep.” She hung up.

I knew Esther’s feelings were hurt, but I couldn’t see how I could be the one who’d hurt them. She hurt them. She hurt them herself. And she was the one who broke up with me. And I thought that if I called her back out of niceness and June found out, then June would get upset, and even though I knew June wouldn’t find out, I wouldn’t want June calling someone who I wouldn’t want her calling even if I didn’t find out. But then what if it was Berman? Would I mind so much? I couldn’t tell. She said he was a dentist and she’d never kissed him, so if she called him back, it would just be out of niceness. Except if she called him back out of niceness, then wouldn’t I worry it was something other than niceness? Because why would she be nice to someone she thought was a dentist? I wouldn’t want to think about that, I didn’t want to think about it, and I wanted even less to not be able to think about it because I didn’t know about it. I wouldn’t call Esther. I didn’t even want to. I didn’t want to talk to her. I wanted to talk to June, and it wouldn’t be nice of me to call Esther and spend the whole conversation wishing she was June. But I wouldn’t call June, either, I decided. Because of Esther. Because Esther decided I was implying a bunch of things that I wasn’t implying and I didn’t like it, so I didn’t want to do it to June. I didn’t want to do something she wouldn’t like. She’d said not to call back. If what she meant was the opposite of what she said, it wasn’t for me to know.

I went online and got Rabbi Salt’s email. It had all the updated Schechter addresses in the body. After cutting Esther’s out, I pasted the addresses into a new list I cc’d, along with my list of Northside Hebrew Day addresses, and then I wrote this:

Draft Saved: November 14, 2006, 9:49 PM Central-Standard Time

Subject: THE TRUTH ABOUT GURION BEN-JUDAH MACCABEE

From: Gurionforever@yahoo.com (me)

To: Gurionforever@yahoo.com

CC: NEW SCHECHTER LIST, NORTHSIDE HEBREW DAY LIST

Scholars:

I am no more angry at you for avoiding me, for not stopping by or writing or calling, than I was when last I wrote you five months ago. I see no less a difference between avoiding and quitting than I did then, and I have no shallower a well of conviction that you and I must both honor our parents. However, I am troubled by some conclusions that some of you have lately drawn about my recent silence and seeming invisibility. I am troubled by the thought that you have failed to grasp fully the lesson of the weapons you have built.

Your weapons, when not projecting, are silent. Your weapons, when concealed, are seemingly invisible. Most of the time, your weapons aren’t projecting. Most of the time, your weapons are concealed. Do these conditions (unprojecting, concealed) render your weapons ineffective? Would it be correct to say that your weapons, in their silent concealment, are somehow defeated ?

No. And no. Your weapons are stealth.

And I am neither dead, nor in prison. I am in love with a red-haired seventh-grader and I attend Aptakisic Junior High School in Deerbrook Park, 60090. There are other Israelites at Aptakisic, but I am unknown to nearly all of them because they aren’t scholars and I spend my days in a cage. These Israelites think themselves Jews, for the arrangement at this school, though operated in part by Israelites, is nonetheless constructed by Canaanites and Romans in whose best interests it is that Israelites fear themselves. Rejoice that you still get to go to Schechter and Northside. I wish we could still be studying together.