Sons of the 613 by Michael Rubens Page A

in the past.
    I pieced together that she works at the diner next to Jerry’s, near downtown Edina, the place where Josh used to be a line cook.
    â€œThe first day I worked there we just started talking,” she said, “and we just kept going and ended up sitting in a park, talking until about two in the morning.”
    I tried to visualize my brother having that much to say to anyone.
    â€œSo you guys have been . . .
friends
since then?”
    She nods. “Friends.”
    â€œFriends?”
    â€œFriends,” she repeated, in an and-now-we’re-done-with-this-subject tone of finality. “That shirt isn’t working for you. Next.”
    I followed her out of the dressing room. We were in a store with exposed brick walls and cool light fixtures. Josh was hunched in a modern-looking chair in the corner, his thoughts somewhere else.
    â€œI worry about him, you know,” said Lesley, looking over at him. “I worry about the decisions he makes.”
    â€œLike what?”
    â€œYou know, what he’s doing. I think it’s a bad choice.”
    I stared at her, not sure what she meant. Her expression changed.
    â€œYou don’t know what I’m talking about, do you.” She sighed and looked over at Josh again. “Josh . . .” she said, shaking her head.
    Â 
    At one point we passed a jewelry shop, and Lesley gasped and said, “You know what? We should totally pierce your ear! Not here, though—I’ll do it.”
    â€œUm . . .” I said.
    â€œNo,” said Josh.
    â€œWhy not?” said Lesley. “He’d look supercute with an earring.”
    â€œI would?”
    â€œ
Super
cute. You’re cute already, so you’d be supercute with an earring.”
    Let me be clear: No female who’s not my mother’s age has ever called me cute. It’s unimaginable to me that someone might see me in that way. I know she was probably just being kind, but I was flooded with a sensation I can hardly describe, a warm maple syrup combining love and joy and ecstasy, a feeling so euphoric that my eyes teared up and I had to turn from her to hide it.
    â€œWe’re not piercing his ear,” Josh ruled.
    â€œOkay,” said Lesley. Then a moment later, when Josh wasn’t looking, she pulled me close and whispered, “
Super
cute. But if you do it, you have to promise to let
me
do it, okay? I’ll do it right.”
    â€œOkay,” I said, my face flushed.
    â€œPromise?”
    â€œI promise.”
    We reached the car and Josh opened the trunk, tossing in the bags of clothes. My heart sank, the euphoria ebbing away as I realized my time with Lesley was coming to an end. I started to stumble through a thank-you to her, my usual awkwardness returning to paralyze my tongue, when she interrupted: “Hold on, we’re not done yet. You still have to get your hair cut.”
    Â 
    We went to an actual salon, the kind of place that smells like flowers and doesn’t have a candy-cane barber’s pole. Josh has a simple approach to his hair: He just gives himself a buzzcut with my parents’ ancient hair clippers. He seemed uncomfortable in the salon, hovering over the hairstylist’s shoulder as the stylist turned my head this way and that, fussing as he planned his strategy.
    The hairstylist’s name was apparently Tao, and all I can say is, he was exactly what you would expect at that sort of salon. Both he and Lesley agreed that my hair was (a) luscious and (b) thick, and Tao informed me that (c) it also had wonderful root structure. Josh made faces.
    â€œJust don’t make him look too . . . you know,” he said to Tao.
    â€œGay?” said Tao.
    â€œRight,” said Josh.
    Â 
    In the end the volume of my semi-Jewfro was reduced by about two-thirds or more. Lying in my sleeping bag, I run my fingers over the hair on the back and sides, which is now very short, and then over the